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ROBINSON CRUSOE

Paperback List Price: $19.99

ISBN: 9781632061195

Publication: 8/27/19

5.5" x 8.25" • 384 pages

Fiction: Classics/ World Litera-

ture / Caribbean/ Adventure/

Postcolonial StudiesTerritory: World

eBook ISBN: 9781632061201

READING GROUP GUIDE

BUY FROM RESTLESS

BY DANIEL DEFOE

Restless Classics presents the Three-Hundredth Anniversary Edition of Robinson Crusoe, the classic Caribbean adventure story and foundatio- nal English novel, with new illustrations by Eko and an introduction by Jamaica Kincaid that recontextualizes the book for our globalized, post- colonial era. Three centuries a?er Daniel Defoe published Robinson Crusoe, this gripping tale of a castaway who spends thir? years on a remote tropical island near Trinidad, encountering

cannibals, captives, and mutineers before being ultimately rescued, remains a classic of the adventure genre and is widely considered the ?rst great English novel.

But the book also has much to teach us, in retrospect, about entrenched attitudes of coloni- zers toward the colonized that still resound today. As celebrated Caribbean writer Jamaica Kincaid writes in her bold new introduction, “The vivid, vibrant, subtle, important role of the tale of Robinson Crusoe, with his triumph of individual resilience and ingenui? wrapped up in his European, which is to say white, identi?, has played in the long, unin- terrupted literature of European conquest of the rest of the world must not be dismissed or ignored or silenced." D????? D???? (?. ???? - ????) 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 the novel and helped popularize the genre in Britain.??????? ??????? is an Antiguan American author of essays, memoir, stories, and novels.

Immigrating to New York at age 16, she became a sta? writer at The New Yorker in 1976. She is a professor in the department of African and African American Studies at Har?ard

Universi? and lives in Vermont.

Eko is a Mexican engraver and painter. His wood etchings, o?en erotic in nature and the focus of controversial discussion, are part of a broader tradition in Mexican folk art popu-

larized by José Guadalupe Posada. He is the illustrator of three books in the Restless Clas- sics series: Don Quixote, Frankenstein, and Robinson Crusoe.

“[Robinson Crusoe] is a masterpiece, and it is a masterpiece largely because Defoe has throughout kept consistently to his own sense of perspective... The mere suggestion—peril and solitude and a desert island—

is enough to rouse in us the expectation of some far land on the limits of the world; ?of the sun rising and the

sun setting; of man, isolated from his kind, brooding alone upon the nature of society and the strange ways

of men." —Virginia Woolf

Dear Mr. Crusoe,

Please stay home. There's no need for this ruse of going on a trading journey, in which more oyen than not the goods you are trading are people like me, Friday. There"s no need at all to leave your nice bed and your nice wife and your nice children (ever?thing with you is always nice, except you yourself are not) and hop on a ship that is going to be wrecked in a storm at night (storms like the dark) and ever?one (not the cat, not the dog) gets lost at sea except lucky and not nice at all you, and you are near an island that you see in the ?rst light of day and then your life, your real life, begins. That life in Europe was nice, just nice; this life you ?rst see at the crack of dawn is the beginning of your new birth, your new beginning, the way in which you will come to know yourself—not the conniving, delusional thief that you really are, but who you believe you really are, a virtuous man who can sur?ive all alone in the world of a little god-forsaken island. All well and good, but why did you not just live out your life in this place, why did you feel the need to introduce me, Friday (and I will come to that name), into this phony account of your virtues and your sur?i- val instincts? Keep telling yourself geography is histor? and that it makes histor?, not that geography is the nightmare that histor? recounts.

EXCERPT FROM JAMAICA KINCAID'S

INCENDIARY INTRODUCTION

1. Crusoe embodies the perfect British colonist - he makes himself the

“king" of the island, considers its inhabitants his savage subjects, and attempts to civilize them. What other parallels do you see be?een the novel and British colonial histor?? How do the ?o di?er?

2. What are the implications of Crusoe selling Xur? to the Portu-

guese ship captain? Do you think it"s an unpardonable betrayal, or is Crusoe"s action justi?ed by his desperation to sur?ive? What does this say about the value he places on relationships?

3. Friday"s journey of redemption is complete only upon his assi-

milation into Crusoe"s “superior" lifes?le. However, Crusoe also undergoes several changes, from “primitive" to “civi- lized." Does Crusoe play the role of colonist, colonized, or both? How is his transformation di?erent from Friday"s?

4. Crusoe faces the dilemma of being repulsed by cannibalism

yet feeling guil? about forbidding the cannibals from practi- cing it. Ultimately, his own beliefs have precedence over theirs, and he forbids them from cannibalism. What do you think of Crusoe"s decision? Would you have done the same in his place?

5. Crusoe"s relationships with Xur? and Friday are diametrically di?e-

rent—Xur? is his friend, and without his help, Crusoe would not have been able to escape, while Friday is Crusoe"s subject and under his control. What do you think of Crusoe"s treat- ment of the ?o men? Why does he get rid of Xur? but not Friday?

6. How do Crusoe"s super?cial claims to care for both Xur? and

Friday tie in to his complicated relationship with his father?

7. Crusoe repeatedly bemoans his fate and wishes he had taken

his father"s advice not to set out to sea. How do you think his life would have been di?erent if he"d stayed at home?

8. What correlations are there be?een the novel"s overtly masculine

themes and the exclusion of female characters, other than Crusoe"s mother? How would this stor? be di?erent if Crusoe were a woman?

ROBINSON CRUSOE DISCUSSION

QUESTIONS

9. What are the contradictions in Crusoe's religious beliefs? How would you

describe his spiritual journey?

10. Crusoe meets a diverse range of people during his adventures. Do you think

that the message of the book is to embrace this diversi?, or to uphold the supre- macy of the white race?

11. While adaptations of Robinson Crusoe var? in narrative focus, one popular

theme is homoeroticism. What do you think of Crusoe"s sexual identi?? Are there any indications that Crusoe may be exploring his sexuali??

12. Crusoe"s desire to sail stems from a yearning to be free. Despite this, and being a

victim of slaver? himself, why do you think Crusoe has no qualms about coloni- zing the cannibals?

13. The phrase “Man Friday" originated from this book. What do you make of the

term"s common usage considering Crusoe"s struggle with communication throu- ghout the novel?

14. How do you think you would fare if you were shipwrecked on an island without

any technological tools at your disposal?

15. Why do you think this novel has sur?ived 300 years? How might the reactions of

modern-day readers di?er from those of 18th centur? readers?

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING

Interested in reading more by Daniel Defoe?

The Storm. 1704

The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. 1719.

Captain Singleton. 1720.

Memoirs of a Cavalier. 1720.

Serious Reyections During the Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe: With his Vision of the Angelick World. 1720.

A Journal of a Plague Year. 1722.

Colonel Jack. 1722.

Moll Flanders. 1722.

Roxana: The Fortunate Mistress. 1724.

A Tour Through the Whole Island of Great Britain. 1724.

A Plan of the English Commerce. 1728.

Want to learn more about Defoe himsel?? Check out these biographies

Daniel Defoe: His Life, Paula Backshsider.

Defoe's Early Life, Frank Bastian.

Daniel Defoe, Citizen of the Modern World, J. Robert Moore.

Daniel Defoe, Francis Waston.

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING

Night and Day by

Virginia Woolf

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Digital review copies can be found on Edelweiss

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