Daniel Defoe

Robinson Crusoe Daniel Defoe

Robinson Crusoe is one of the most famous adventure books in the world. It was written by Daniel Defoe in 1791 and is considered the first English novel as such. It tells the story of the young Robinson Crusoe who, disobeying the wishes of his father, embarks on a long voyage as a sailor aboard a business ship. But a great storm abates the ship in which it traveled, wrecking to an uninhabited island near Venezuela. Alone and without means of escape, they will spend their adventures in the island in which it stays during 28 years. Robinson Crusoe is part of the literature of the eighteenth century, marked by the Enlightenment and the Romantic movement, characterized by its commitment to imagination and subjectivity, its freedom of expression and its idealization of nature. The novel includes features of both movements and also elements that would be present in Daniel Defoe's own life, such as religious sentiment and passion for travel. This love of adventure has a great presence in the novel, and shows how, despite the penalties suffered on the island, Crusoe's return to England is anticlimactic, and wishes to return to his life of adventure. One of the main themes of the novel is the overcoming of adversity and is the promotion of the protagonist to the government of its surroundings. Robinson Crusoe comes to the island with nothing and ends up dominating both nature and animals. When Friday appears he is already considered the "king" of the island, and despite the affection he feels for him, his relationship is of lord and lackey.