The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe
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By Daniel Defoe 11 May, 2019
Robinson Crusoe is a novel by Daniel Defoe that was first published in 1719. Epistolary, confessional, and didactic in form, the book is a fictional autobiography of the title character—a castaway who spends 28 years on a remote tropical island nea ... Read more
Robinson Crusoe is a novel by Daniel Defoe that was first published in 1719. Epistolary, confessional, and didactic in form, the book is a fictional autobiography of the title character—a castaway who spends 28 years on a remote tropical island near Trinidad, encountering cannibals, captives, and mutineers before being rescued. The story was perhaps influenced by Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish castaway who lived for four years on the Pacific island called "Más a Tierra" (in 1966 its name was changed to Robinson Crusoe Island), Chile. The details of Crusoe's island were probably based on the Caribbean island of Tobago, since that island lies a short distance north of the Venezuelan coast near the mouth of the Orinoco river, in sight of Trinidad. It is also likely that Defoe was inspired by the Latin or English translations of Ibn Tufail's Hayy ibn Yaqdhan, an earlier novel also set on a desert island. Another source for Defoe's novel may have been Robert Knox's account of his abduction by the King of Ceylon in 1659 in "A Historical Account of the Island Ceylon," Glasgow: James MacLehose and Sons (Publishers to the University), 1911. Although inspired by a real-life event, it was the first notable work of literature where the story was independent of mythology, history, legends, or previous literature. Less
  • File size
  • Print pages
  • Publisher
  • Publication date
  • Language
  • ISBN
  • 246.286 KB
  • 386
  • Public Domain Books
  • 1995-06-01
  • English
  • 9781466440166
Daniel Defoe (1659/1661 [?] - 1731) was an English writer, journalist, and spy, who gained enduring fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest practitioners of ...
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