"Robinson Crusoe" is Dofoe's first novel and it is based on the real experience of Alexander

Selkirk, a Scottish sailor who, from October 1704 to February 1709, managed to survive alone on
the deser island of Juan Fernandes.

Robinson Crusoe belongs to the middle class, which is praised by his father as "the best state in
the world" and "the most suited to human happiness".

What characterizes Robinson and associates him to the classical heroes of travel literature is his
restlessness, the search for his own identity in alternative to the one provided by his father.
The novel contains many religious references to God, sin, Providence and salvation. It can be
considered a spiritual autobiography: the protagounist reads the Bible to find comfort and
guidance(Crusoe's own story can be considered, in some passage, similar to the parable of the
prodigal son).

The novel begins with Crusoe's rebellion against his father, which can also be read as an act of
rebellion against God. Then he suffers a series of misfortunes that land him on the deserted
island. Once there, he finally atones for his sins and undergoes a serious religious conversion.
Crusoe experiences the costant conflict between good and evil, and keeps a diary to record
events in order to see God's will in them. With "Robinson Crusoe" Defoe explores the conflict
between economic motivation and spiritual salvation. The island is the perfect place for Robinson
to prove his qualities and to demostrate that he deserves salvation and that he is worth of God's
Providence. Dofoe shows that, thought God is the prime cause of everything , man can modify
his destiny trought action.

Robinson embodies the English mercantile spirit and is the archetype pioneer: he is armed with
his own strenght and intelligence and has a Puritan's firm conviction that he has God on his side.
On the island Robinson organises a primitive empire and becomes the prototype of the English
coloniser: the society he creates on the island is not an alternative to the English one but, on the
contrary, an exaltation of England and its ideals. Robinson is also the archetyper colonist: his
relation with Friday portraits the one between colonist and native.

Robinson's education of Friday closely recalls the processes of modern colonialism: Crusoe
gives Friday a new name, meant to remind him of his debt to the white man; Robinson gives
Friday European clothes; Robinson teaches Friday his language; Robinson teaches Friday the
principles of Christianity; Robinson never gives Friday a weapon. So Robinson has a technical,
linguistic and cultural advantage on Friday.