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A review by jonjas
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
5.0
A timeless adventure tale, it really does hold up after all these years. If you want a “stranded on a tropical island” fantasy, boom, Daniel DeFriend did that for us 300 years ago.
The ruminations on Christianity do get tiring, but there is some purpose there imo. I see other reviews blasting the book for its colonial, racist aspects, which is obviously a reader’s right, but that kinda ignores the underlying story, the era, etc. I’m not pardoning anything, I’m saying you can recognize that aspect while still acknowledging the merits of other aspects of the story.
I also think those critiques are dead wrong. It’s always tough to judge authorial intent, but I believe there are points where Defoe seems satiric, subversive. It struck me most in a passage where he clearly states “I sent Friday and his dad to chop down a tree, and the Spaniard to supervise them.” He’s already made it very clear how competent Friday is, and by making it such an obviously straight-forward task it seems he might be calling attention to how dumb such thinking is. You might think that a one-off, but on the same page he says “we’d go hunting, Friday and I one day, the Spaniard and Friday the next. We took turns like that.” Something to that effect, where he’s written it so you very clearly see that, no, Friday had to work every day. Again, you can assume blind racism if you like, but to me it’s so bluntly stated that it seems purposeful. Defoe isn’t gonna overturn all of his racist-ass society, but he presents a “savage” in a way his honky world might get. No one wanted to hear “well actually, verified cannibalism isn’t really common, it’s more a cultural fear we have!” Nope, given the audience of his time he spoke a language they might understand and then made it very clear every step of the way that Friday was an equal human, but in the narrator’s mind and world that didn’t ultimately result in the same life, or anything close to it. Again, I think there’s something purposeful in how the white man made a fortune doing literally nothing but investing at a point early on.
Anyway, that’s my reading, if you wanna just blast everything written by a white dude prior to 1990 as racist crap, hey, you do you, but I find this to be interesting insights into the times. I personally feel Defoe was somewhat subversive here, and regardless of your reading I find the actual survival story to be very engaging, all these years later.
The ruminations on Christianity do get tiring, but there is some purpose there imo. I see other reviews blasting the book for its colonial, racist aspects, which is obviously a reader’s right, but that kinda ignores the underlying story, the era, etc. I’m not pardoning anything, I’m saying you can recognize that aspect while still acknowledging the merits of other aspects of the story.
I also think those critiques are dead wrong. It’s always tough to judge authorial intent, but I believe there are points where Defoe seems satiric, subversive. It struck me most in a passage where he clearly states “I sent Friday and his dad to chop down a tree, and the Spaniard to supervise them.” He’s already made it very clear how competent Friday is, and by making it such an obviously straight-forward task it seems he might be calling attention to how dumb such thinking is. You might think that a one-off, but on the same page he says “we’d go hunting, Friday and I one day, the Spaniard and Friday the next. We took turns like that.” Something to that effect, where he’s written it so you very clearly see that, no, Friday had to work every day. Again, you can assume blind racism if you like, but to me it’s so bluntly stated that it seems purposeful. Defoe isn’t gonna overturn all of his racist-ass society, but he presents a “savage” in a way his honky world might get. No one wanted to hear “well actually, verified cannibalism isn’t really common, it’s more a cultural fear we have!” Nope, given the audience of his time he spoke a language they might understand and then made it very clear every step of the way that Friday was an equal human, but in the narrator’s mind and world that didn’t ultimately result in the same life, or anything close to it. Again, I think there’s something purposeful in how the white man made a fortune doing literally nothing but investing at a point early on.
Anyway, that’s my reading, if you wanna just blast everything written by a white dude prior to 1990 as racist crap, hey, you do you, but I find this to be interesting insights into the times. I personally feel Defoe was somewhat subversive here, and regardless of your reading I find the actual survival story to be very engaging, all these years later.