Daniel Defoe (1660-1731)

Compact Performer Shaping Ideas

Marina Spiazzi, Marina Tavella, Margaret Layton
© 2021
 Daniel Defoe

1. Defoe’s life

• Born into a family of Dissenters in 1660;

• studied modern languages, economics,

geography, besides the traditional subjects;

• started to write in Whig papers; his greatest

achievement was ‘The Review’;

• Queen Anne did not like his critical attitude

and had him arrested, tried and imprisoned.

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 Daniel Defoe

1. Defoe’s life

• Made three appearances in the pillory which turned

into triumph when his friend threw him flowers;

• denied his Whig ideas and

became a secret agent
for the new government;

• started to write novels when

was about sixty;

• regarded as the father of the

English novel.
Ron Embleton (1930-1988),
Daniel Defoe. Private Collection.

Compact Performer Shaping Ideas

 Daniel Defoe

2. Defoe’s works
Robinson Crusoe The story of a shipwreck on a desert island.
(1719)

Captain Singleton The voyage story of a captain who becomes

(1720) a pirate.

Colonel Jack The story of a pickpocket who repents.

(1722)

The adventures of a woman who becomes a

Moll Flanders
thief and a prostitute to survive but finally
(1722)
leads a respectable life.

Roxana The adventures of a high-society woman who

(1724) exploits her beauty to obtain what she wants.

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 Daniel Defoe

3. Defoe’s novels: structure

• Fictional autobiographies;

• a series of episodes and

adventures;

• unifying presence of a
single hero;

• lack of a coherent plot.

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 Daniel Defoe

3. Defoe’s novels: structure

• Retrospective first-person
narration;

• the author’s point of view

coincides with the main
character’s;

• characters presented through

their actions.

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 Daniel Defoe

4. Robinson Crusoe: the story

• Born in York in 1632 of a

German father and an
English mother, Robinson
Kreutznaer, anglicised
Crusoe, leaves home at the
age of 19;

• he travels around the

world to make his fortune;

• his first voyage leads him to

Guinea and then back to
England.

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 Daniel Defoe

4. Robinson Crusoe: the story

• He becomes the owner of a

plantation in Brazil and sets
out on a voyage to Africa to
get more slaves;

• during this journey he is

shipwrecked on a desert
island where he will remain
for 28 years;

• when he returns to England,

he discovers that his
plantation in Brazil has made
him very rich.
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 Daniel Defoe

5. Robinson Crusoe: the island

The ideal place for Robinson to prove

his qualities.

Robinson organises a primitive

empire.

Not a return to nature,

but a chance to exploit and dominate
nature.

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 Daniel Defoe

6. Robinson Crusoe: Friday

Friday is the first native character to be portrayed in the

English novel.

Attractive and lively,

he becomes the symbol of the colonised.

Robinson rescues him, teaches him the word

‘master’, Western culture and to read the Bible.

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 Daniel Defoe

7. Robinson Crusoe:
the middle-class hero
Robinson is restless, refuses the model provided
by his father and wants to find his identity.

An act of transgression,
of disobedience.

His isolation on the island after the shipwreck.

Pragmatic, individualistic outlook, rational approach to

reality.

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 Daniel Defoe

8. Robinson Crusoe: the style

• First-person narration;

• clear and precise details;

• description of the primary qualities of objects;

solidity, extension and number

• simple, matter-of-fact and concrete language.

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 Daniel Defoe

9. Robinson Crusoe:
the individual and society
The society Robinson creates on the island is not
an alternative to

but an exaltation of 18th-century England,

its ideals of mobility, material productiveness and
individualism.

Though God is the prime cause of everything, the

individual can shape his destiny through action.

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 Daniel Defoe

10. Robinson Crusoe:

a spiritual autobiography

Full of religious references to God, sin,

providence, salvation.

The hero reads the Bible to find comfort and

guidance.

Defoe explores the conflict between

economic motivation and spiritual salvation.

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