Tuesday, May 21, 2013 8:05 PM Published on: Wednesday, March 03,
2010 By Lew Toulmin Richard Henry Dana, in his classic tale Two
Years Before the Mast, describes Robinson Crusoe Island in the
South Pacific off the coast of Chile as “the most romantic spot
of earth my eyes had ever seen.” My visit made me think that
perhaps Dana was right. Robinson Crusoe Island was originally
known as “Mas a Tierra” (closer to land) in the Juan Fernandez
group, named after the Spanish seaman who discovered the islands
in 1574. The island gained its fame from the Daniel Defoe novel
Robinson Crusoe, first published in 1720. Defoe had learned of
the tale of Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish seaman who was
voluntarily marooned on Mas a Tierra from 1704 to 1709, and who
survived alone on the island. Defoe changed the true story into
the famous novel. In his story, Robinson Crusoe is shipwrecked
on an island in the southeast Caribbean near Trinidad, survives
cannibal raids, meets his faithful companion Man Friday and is
rescued after a