The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Robinson Crusoe
ROBINSON CRUSOE, the best-known
work of Daniel Defoe and one of the most
widely read of all modern books, was
published at London, on or about 25 April 1719,
by William Taylor at the Sign of the Ship in
Pater Noster Row, in an octavo volume somewhat
exceeding 350 pages, with a frontispiece
representing the hero in his goatskin clothes,
and under the following show-case or display
title: “The Life and Strange Surprizing
Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York,
Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years,
all alone in an un-inhabited Island on the Coast
of America, near the Mouth of the Great River
of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by
Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but
himself. With An Account how he was at last
as strangely deliver'd by Pyrates. Written by
Himself.” It was a rather expensive, not
ill-looking book, marred, however, by a considerable
number of typographical blunders.

Defoe at the time of its publication was
apparently in his 60th, possibly in his 61st year.
He was very widely but not favorably known
as a bankrupt merchant who more than 20
years before had turned pamphleteer and
politician. His satire ‘The True-Born Englishman’
(1701) had brought him fame, but shortly
afterward he was ruined through his exposure
in the pillory and his imprisonment for writing
his ironical tract ‘The Shortest Way with
the Dissenters,’ and he became in consequence
a political journalist, a secret government agent
and a miscellaneous writer whose pen was
supposed to be as venal as it was prolific.
Since the accession of the Hanoverians in 1715
he had been much attacked for his relations
with Jacobite newspapers, the fact that he was
in reality employed by the government to watch
them not being generally known. Of his
thousands upon thousands of pages in
periodicals, pamphlets and books nearly all had
been anonymous, and, while his style often
betrayed him, he had been detected in writing
nothing that on the surface markedly resembled
‘Robinson Crusoe.’ Yet it was not long before
his hand was recognized in that, a fact which
led to some rather stupid criticism of the book;
and in our own day certain preliminary essays
of his in more or less fictitious writing have
been discovered, which make his success in the
new vein, which he soon began to practise
assiduously, somewhat less surprising than it
would have been had he suddenly changed to an

unwonted field of composition and produced a
masterpiece. That something novel and
important had been added to English fiction was
speedily shown by the unparalleled popularity
of ‘Robinson Crusoe,’ in its full form, in cheap
abridgments, in translations and in frank imitations.
We do not know the size of the editions,
but we do know that before the end of 1719
there were probably six authorized impressions,
a Dublin reprinting and several piratical issues,
not counting serial publication in a newspaper.
No previous English story had been so circulated,
and by August 1719 the canny author had
presented the public with a second instalment
of his hero's history, likewise published by
Taylor, ‘The Farther Adventures of Robinson
Crusoe; Being the Second and Last Part of
his Life, And of the Strange Surprizing
Accounts of his Travels Round three Parts of
the Globe.’ This, while fairly popular and a
creditable piece of travel-fiction, was not, as
Defoe fondly thought, contrary to the usage
of second parts “every Way as entertaining as
the First,” a verdict which applies with still
greater force to the so-called third part
published by Taylor a year later (1720), really not
fiction at all but a volume of essays entitled
‘Serious Reflections during the Life and
Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe: With
his Vision of the Angelick World.’ Both of
these parts, like the first, bore the legend “Written
by Himself,” for those were days when
serious people denounced fiction as “lies,” and
Defoe indulged in some curious exegesis in his
prefaces in order to justify to his Non-Conformist's
conscience his lucrative story-writing.

To follow the fortunes of ‘Robinson Crusoe’
after 1719 would require a large volume. Here
only a few salient facts can be given. At least
three additional authorized reprintings were
needed before Defoe died in 1731, quaint
illustrations were introduced, several abridgments
appeared, one of which, apparently made
by Defoe himself and covering all three parts,
went through numerous editions during the
next hundred years, the three parts were translated
into Dutch, French and German, and a
large number of imitations made unsuccessful
attempts to rival the popularity of the original,
although in some cases attaining themselves
considerable vogue. The story took root more
strongly perhaps in Germany than in any other
foreign country, but it was and remained very
popular in France, and before many years had
elapsed Italians also could read it in their
native tongue. It has since been translated into
all sorts of languages and dialects, it has
fascinated wandering Arabs, it is taught to school
children in our island possessions and it is
accessible in Esperanto. One of the largest
collections of “Crusoes,” that of Mr. William S.
Lloyd of Philadelphia, contains some 400
volumes, but unrecorded issues in English and
in other tongues are continually coming to light.
Some of the modern editions are true works of
art, very distinguished artists, especially in
France, having striven to illustrate adequately
so famous a book.

It has naturally attracted also both scholars
and literary critics and gossips, with the usual
darkening of counsel. It may fairly be said
that scarcely one of the numerous stories and
speculations about Defoe and his chief book

will bear investigation. He cannot be shown
to have made misuse of Selkirk's papers, it is
highly unlikely, to say the least, that Robert
Harley, Earl of Oxford, had anything to do
with writing the first part, it is far from
certain that Defoe had any difficulty in getting
that part published, it could not possibly have
been written at most of the places assigned
for its composition, and was probably thrown
off hastily at Defoe's house at Stoke Newington
not long before it was issued, and, finally,
all attempts to see in the book a serviceable
allegory of Defoe's life, however much
support they may receive from his sophisticated
prefaces, are likely to prove valueless and not
a little absurd. The truth is that scarcely
anything definite is known about the origin of
the great story except that it is clearly Defoe's,
since it was assigned to him by fellow-journalists
of the time, and since in all three parts,
from first page to last, the minute student finds
the stylistic evidence of his authorship
overwhelming, and that doubtless the occasion for
Defoe's attempting to describe the life of
a shipwrecked sailor upon a far-off deserted
island was the publication of accounts by
Capt. Woodes Rogers, Capt. Edward Cooke,
Sir Richard Steele and others of the strange
adventures of the Scotch sailor Alexander
Selkirk or Selcraig, during a more than four years'
solitary sojourn on the island of Juan
Fernandez off the coast of Chile. That this is not
Crusoe's island the very title-page of the book
plainly shows — many persons, inquisitive in
small matters, seem to be unduly positive that
Tobago should have that honor — but it is
about as clear as such things can ever be that
poor Selkirk's story influenced Defoe. He may
have taken hints from the experiences of other
castaways and from other narratives of travel,
also — indirectly if at all — from Grimmelshausen's
‘Der abenteuerliche Simplicissimus’
and from a Dutch story, Hendrick Smeeks'
‘Beschrijvinge van het magtig Koningrijk
Krinkle Kesmes’; but in the main most of the
“sources” for the masterpiece discovered by
indefatigable scholars are imaginary or at best
barely possible, and ‘Robinson Crusoe,’ like
‘Paradise Lost’ and many of Shakespeare's
plays, may truly be said to derive its greatness
from the appeal of its subject matter and
from its author's own genius. It is doing Defoe
no injustice to say that, on the whole, it is
the exceptional interest attaching to the central
part, the island portion, of the first volume of
‘Robinson Crusoe’ that has contributed most
to giving the story its extraordinary currency.
The third volume, the ‘Serious Reflections,’
while not without merit, has been but seldom
reprinted and is little known. The second
volume, ‘The Farther Adventures,’ possesses
more merit and has been many times reprinted
to accomplish the first, but it is seldom specially
in mind when the book is mentioned. Even the
extra-island portions of the first volume — the
experiences in Africa and Brazil and the
concluding journey through Spain — good of their
kind though they are — do little to make the book
impressive. What profoundly impresses us is
the frightful loneliness, the struggle of the
ordinary sailor-hero against what seem to be
overwhelming odds, his final success, although
his endowments, except perhaps in physical
resistance, are no higher than we may well

suppose our own to be. Our sympathy and our
curiosity — two mighty elements in the success
of a book if the author can but arouse them
thoroughly — are brought into play from the
shipwreck to the departure, although some may
experience a slight flagging of interest after
the life with Friday has been described. “Would
I have thought of doing that?” is the question,
however egotistical, that continually presents
itself, and in reflecting upon it we can
legitimately bring Defoe in for a high share in
the praise we bestow on his book. ‘Robinson
Crusoe’ through the universality of its appeal
has much of the carrying power of the world's
greatest poems, but Defoe, although possessed
of more imagination than is often given
credit for, was not a great poet. He was,
however, as a journalist and much experienced,
versatile and wideawake man, endowed with qualities
that stood him in good stead when he
began his book at a remarkably late period in
life for the inception of new literary enterprises.
His English, if careless, was easy
and unaffected, his methods of narration were
straightforward, and he had not only a very
large knowledge of character and of the
details of life but an exceptional power of lending
vividness and reality to whatever he
described. This last he attained chiefly through a
skilful use of minute features and circumstances,
which beguile the reader into belief
of all he is told. It may be at bottom a
journalistic faculty, but, as Defoe seems to be the
only professional journalist who has a ‘Robinson
Crusoe,’ a ‘Moll Flanders,’ and a ‘Journal
of the Plague Year’ to his credit, it would
seem either that he was a good deal more than
a journalist, or else that critics need to revise
their notions as to what the term “journalistic”
should connote.

We have already seen that Defoe had made
some mild attempts at semi-fictitious writing
before the second edition (1718) of Woodes
Rogers' ‘Cruising Voyage’ brought, in all
probability, the story of Selkirk, much in evidence
six years before, once more to his attention.
An omnivorous reader, he undoubtedly knew
the work of preceding picaresque writers, like
the author of ‘The English Rogue,’ as well
as that of Mrs. Aphra Behn, but in the main
his contribution to English fiction was original.
He had learned early as a pamphleteer to
narrate and to describe in a lifelike fashion —
vide his ‘True Relation of the Apparition of
one Mrs. Veal’ (1706) — and he had also learned
to manage dialogue and to tell anecdotes
effectively. Later he had learned how to
construct books of some length and to make them
less and less sprawling; he had even begun
to create characters and to move in imagination
in foreign countries and in the past — vide,
his ‘History of the Wars’ of Charles XII of
Sweden (1715) and his ‘Continuation’ of the
famous ‘Letters’ supposed to be written by a
“Turkish Spy” (1718). Shorter pieces more
specifically fictitious might be added to these,
but the main point is that he had gradually,
probably without knowledge of it or conscious
purpose of any sort, been assembling the qualities
and materials necessary to the writing of
fiction. The story of Selkirk supplied the
occasion, the spark, and Defoe was doubtless
influenced also by the facts that he now lived

at home, being no longer sent by the government
on tiresome journeys, and that, writing
as he did with great ease, the more books he
could produce, the more money he could lay
by to furnish dowries for several daughters, to
whose attractiveness one of his future
sons-in-law, the naturalist, Henry Baker, has borne
testimony. In some such uninvolved and human
way, we may imagine, one of the most
uninvolved and human books ever written came
into existence, and it was in giving this book,
not merely to his countrymen, but to the world,
and in showing other writers what it was to be
uninvolved and human in their stories that
Daniel Defoe proved himself to be a benefactor
to the race. To the student he is in his mixed
character and in his perplexing career one of
the most interesting of men; to the masses of
mankind he is and will always remain “the
Author of Robinson Crusoe,” a name and little
else. The thing created has swallowed its
creator, which is not far from being the highest
tribute that can be paid to any achievement.

Convenient editions of ‘Robinson Crusoe’
may be found in the Globe, Golden Treasury and
other well-known series, and in the late George
A. Aitken's edition of Defoe's ‘Romances and
Narratives.’ The text of most editions,
however, leaves much to be desired. The writer
has endeavored to supply an accurate text of
the first part in a school edition published in
1916 by Ginn and Company, and he has an
edition of the same part with full apparatus
in the press of the same firm.