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October 2014 ENGLISH READING CLUB
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DANIEL DEFOE Robinson Crusoe
DANIEL DEFOE (c.1659-1660, London- 24 April 1731, London)
------------------------------- BIOGRAPHY Daniel Defoe was born in 1660 in London. In 1695 he adopted the more aristocratic sounding "Defoe" as his surname. Defoe trained for the ministry at Morton's Academy for Dissenters, but he never followed through on this plan, and instead worked briefly as a hosiery merchant before serving as a soldier for the king during Monmouth's Rebellion. After that short-lived revolt was speedily put down, Defoe returned to hosiery, and built a successful company. He traveled widely on the continent in the course of his business, and was recruited by the government to act as a spy, a role in which he seems to have delighted. Defoe was a prolific writer, and the first publication we know of appeared in 1688, but it was his The True Born Englishman (1701) which propelled him into the limelight. This poem attacked those who thought England should not have a foreign-born king. In 1719 Defoe turned to fiction, writing Robinson Crusoe, based on the true account of a shipwrecked mariner. He followed the success of Crusoe with Captain Singleton (1720), Journal of the Plague Year (1722), Captain Jack (1722), Moll Flanders (1722), and Roxanda (1724). Defoe did not confine himself to fiction; he also wrote several popular travel books, including the vivid Tour Through the Whole Island of Great Britain (1724-27). Before his death in 1731, Daniel Defoe published over 500 books and pamphlets. Defoe is regarded as one of the founders of the English novel, along with Samuel Richardson, and one of the founding fathers of English journalism).
----------------------------------SELECTED WORKS NOVELS
The Consolidator or, Memoirs of Sundry Transactions from the World in the Moon (1705) Atlantis Major (1711) Robinson Crusoe (1719) The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1719) Captain Singleton (1720) Memoirs of a Cavalier (1720) A Journal of the Plague Year (1722) Moll Flanders (1722) Roxana: The Fortunate Mistress (1724) The Pirate Gow (1725) Colonel Jack (1722)
Non-fiction
The Storm (1704) The Family Instructor (1715) Memoirs of the Church of Scotland (1717) The History Of The Remarkable Life of John Sheppard (1724) A Tour Thro' The Whole Island of Great Britain, Divided into Circuits or Journies (1724–1727) The Political History of the Devil (1726)
Essays
An Essay Upon Projects (1697) The Shortest Way with the Dissenters (1702) Serious Reflections of Robinson Crusoe (1720) The Complete English Tradesman (1726) An Essay Upon Literature (1726) Mere Nature Delineated (1726) Conjugal Lewdness (1727) A Plan of the English Commerce (1728)
Poems The True-Born Englishman: A Satyr (1701) Hymn to the Pillory (1703)
---------------Robinson Crusoe (1719) The sole survivor of a shipwreck, Robinson Crusoe is washed up on a desert island. In his journal he chronicles his daily battle to stay alive, as he conquers isolation, fashions, shelter and clothes, first encounters another human being and fights off cannibals and mutineers. With 'Robinson Crusoe', Defoe wrote what is regarded as the first English novel, and created one of the most popular and enduring myths in literature. Written in an age of exploration and enterprise, it has been variously interpreted as an embodiment of British imperialist values, as a portrayal of 'natural man' or as a moral fable. But above all it is a brilliant narrative, depicting Crusoe's transformation from terrified survivor to self-sufficient master of his island.