Paper-2 sem-1 assignment

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Name: Riddhi Joshi
Semester: 1
Roll no.: 37
Paper no.2:The Neo-classical Literature
Topic: Robinson Crusoe as Religious Allegory
Enrollment no.: 2069108420180028
Year: 2017-19
E-mail Id: Www.riddhij8@gmail.com
Submitted to:
S.B Gardi Department of English
Maharaja krishnakumarsinhji
Bhavnagar University.

About Daniel Defoe:-

Daniel Defoe was born in 1660 in London, England. He became a merchant and participated in several failing businesses, facing bankruptcy and aggressive creditors. He was also a prolific political pamphleteer which landed him in prison for slander. Late in life he turned his pen to fiction and wrote Robinson Crusoe, one of the most widely read and influential novels of all time. Defoe died in 1731.
Having always been interested in politics, Defoe published his first literary piece, a political pamphlet, in 1683. He continued to write political works, working as a journalist, until the early 1700s. Many of Defoe's works during this period targeted support for King William III, also known as "William Henry of Orange." Some of his most popular works include The True-Born Englishman, which shed light on racial prejudice in England following attacks on William for being a foreigner; and the Review, a periodical that was published from 1704 to 1713, during the reign of Queen Anne, King William II's successor. Political opponents of Defoe's repeatedly had him imprisoned for his writing in 1713.
Defoe took a new literary path in 1719, around the age of 59, when he published Robinson Crusoe, a fiction novel based on several short essays that he had composed over the years. A handful of novels followed soon after—often with rogues and criminals as lead characters—including Moll Flanders, Colonel Jack, Captain Singleton, Journal of the Plague Year and his last major fiction piece, Roxana (1724).
In the mid-1720s, Defoe returned to writing editorial pieces, focusing on such subjects as morality, politics and the breakdown of social order in England. Some of his later works include Everybody's Business is Nobody's Business (1725); the nonfiction essay "Conjugal Lewdness: or, Matrimonial Whoredom" (1727); and a follow-up piece to the "Conjugal Lewdness" essay, entitled "A Treatise Concerning the Use and Abuse of the Marriage Bed."

Plot overview:-

Robison Crusoe is an Englishman from the town of York in the seventeenth century, the youngest son of a merchant of German origin. Encouraged by his father to study law, Crusoe expresses his wish to go to sea instead. His family is against Crusoe going out to sea, and his father explains that it is better to seek a modest, secure life for oneself. Initially, Robinson is committed to obeying his father, but he eventually succumbs to temptation and embarks on a ship bound for London with a friend. When a storm causes the near deaths of Crusoe and his friend, the friend is dissuaded from sea travel, but Crusoe still goes on to set himself up as merchant on a ship leaving London. This trip is financially successful, and Crusoe plans another, leaving his early profits in the care of a friendly widow. The second voyage does not prove as fortunate: the ship is seized by Moorish pirates, and Crusoe is enslaved to a potentate in the North African town of Sallee. While on a fishing expedition, he and a slave boy break free and sail down the African coast. A kindly Portuguese captain picks them up, buys the slave boy from Crusoe, and takes Crusoe to Brazil. In Brazil, Crusoe establishes himself as a plantation owner and soon becomes successful. Eager for slave labor and its economic advantages, he embarks on a slave-gathering expedition to West Africa but ends up shipwrecked off of the coast of Trinidad.
Crusoe soon learns he is the sole survivor of the expedition and seeks shelter and food for himself. He returns to the wreck’s remains twelve times to salvage guns, powder, food, and other items. Onshore, he finds goats he can graze for meat and builds himself a shelter. He erects a cross that he inscribes with the date of his arrival, September 1, 1659, and makes a notch every day in order never to lose track of time. He also keeps a journal of his household activities, noting his attempts to make candles, his lucky discovery of sprouting grain, and his construction of a cellar, among other events. In June 1660, he falls ill and hallucinates that an angel visits, warning him to repent. Drinking tobacco-steeped rum, Crusoe experiences a religious illumination and realizes that God has delivered him from his earlier sins. After recovering, Crusoe makes a survey of the area and discovers he is on an island. He finds a pleasant valley abounding in grapes, where he builds a shady retreat. Crusoe begins to feel more optimistic about being on the island, describing himself as its “king.” He trains a pet parrot, takes a goat as a pet, and develops skills in basket weaving, bread making, and pottery. He cuts down an enormous cedar tree and builds a huge canoe from its trunk, but he discovers that he cannot move it to the sea. After building a smaller boat, he rows around the island but nearly perishes when swept away by a powerful current. Reaching shore, he hears his parrot calling his name and is thankful for being saved once again. He spends several years in peace.

I Just Can't Do It – Four Year Olds Hilarious Reaction To Homework
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One day Crusoe is shocked to discover a man’s footprint on the beach. He first assumes the footprint is the devil’s, then decides it must belong to one of the cannibals said to live in the region. Terrified, he arms himself and remains on the lookout for cannibals. He also builds an underground cellar in which to herd his goats at night and devises a way to cook underground. One evening he hears gunshots, and the next day he is able to see a ship wrecked on his coast. It is empty when he arrives on the scene to investigate. Crusoe once again thanks Providence for having been saved. Soon afterward, Crusoe discovers that the shore has been strewn with human carnage, apparently the remains of a cannibal feast. He is alarmed and continues to be vigilant. Later Crusoe catches sight of thirty cannibals heading for shore with their victims. One of the victims is killed. Another one, waiting to be slaughtered, suddenly breaks free and runs toward Crusoe’s dwelling. Crusoe protects him, killing one of the pursuers and injuring the other, whom the victim finally kills. Well-armed, Crusoe defeats most of the cannibals onshore. The victim vows total submission to Crusoe in gratitude for his liberation. Crusoe names him Friday, to commemorate the day on which his life was saved, and takes him as his servant.
Finding Friday cheerful and intelligent, Crusoe teaches him some English words and some elementary Christian concepts. Friday, in turn, explains that the cannibals are divided into distinct nations and that they only eat their enemies. Friday also informs Crusoe that the cannibals saved the men from the shipwreck Crusoe witnessed earlier, and that those men, Spaniards, are living nearby. Friday expresses a longing to return to his people, and Crusoe is upset at the prospect of losing Friday. Crusoe then entertains the idea of making contact with the Spaniards, and Friday admits that he would rather die than lose Crusoe. The two build a boat to visit the cannibals’ land together. Before they have a chance to leave, they are surprised by the arrival of twenty-one cannibals in canoes. The cannibals are holding three victims, one of whom is in European dress. Friday and Crusoe kill most of the cannibals and release the European, a Spaniard. Friday is overjoyed to discover that another of the rescued victims is his father. The four men return to Crusoe’s dwelling for food and rest. Crusoe prepares to welcome them into his community permanently. He sends Friday’s father and the Spaniard out in a canoe to explore the nearby land.
Eight days later, the sight of an approaching English ship alarms Friday. Crusoe is suspicious. Friday and Crusoe watch as eleven men take three captives onshore in a boat. Nine of the men explore the land, leaving two to guard the captives. Friday and Crusoe overpower these men and release the captives, one of whom is the captain of the ship, which has been taken in a mutiny. Shouting to the remaining mutineers from different points, Friday and Crusoe confuse and tire the men by making them run from place to place. Eventually they confront the mutineers, telling them that all may escape with their lives except the ringleader. The men surrender. Crusoe and the captain pretend that the island is an imperial territory and that the governor has spared their lives in order to send them all to England to face justice. Keeping five men as hostages, Crusoe sends the other men out to seize the ship. When the ship is brought in, Crusoe nearly faints.
On December 19, 1686, Crusoe boards the ship to return to England. There, he finds his family is deceased except for two sisters. His widow friend has kept Crusoe’s money safe, and after traveling to Lisbon, Crusoe learns from the Portuguese captain that his plantations in Brazil have been highly profitable. He arranges to sell his Brazilian lands. Wary of sea travel, Crusoe attempts to return to England by land but is threatened by bad weather and wild animals in northern Spain. Finally arriving back in England, Crusoe receives word that the sale of his plantations has been completed and that he has made a considerable fortune. After donating a portion to the widow and his sisters, Crusoe is restless and considers returning to Brazil, but he is dissuaded by the thought that he would have to become Catholic. He marries, and his wife dies. Crusoe finally departs for the East Indies as a trader in 1694. He revisits his island, finding that the Spaniards are governing it well and that it has become a prosperous colony.

Characters in Robison Crusoe:-

 

Robinson Crusoe -  The novel’s protagonist and narrator. Crusoe begins the novel as a young middle-class man in York in search of a career. He father recommends the law, but Crusoe yearns for a life at sea, and his subsequent rebellion and decision to become a merchant is the starting point for the whole adventure that follows. His vague but recurring feelings of guilt over his disobedience color the first part of the first half of the story and show us how deep Crusoe’s religious fear is. Crusoe is steady and plodding in everything he does, and his perseverance ensures his survival through storms, enslavement, and a twenty-eight-year isolation on a desert island.
Friday -  A twenty-six-year-old Caribbean native and cannibal who converts to Protestantism under Crusoe’s tutelage. Friday becomes Crusoe’s servant after Crusoe saves his life when Friday is about to be eaten by other cannibals. Friday never appears to resist or resent his new servitude, and he may sincerely view it as appropriate compensation for having his life saved. But whatever Friday’s response may be, his servitude has become a symbol of imperialist oppression throughout the modern world. Friday’s overall charisma works against the emotional deadness that many readers find in Crusoe.
The Portuguese captain -  The sea captain who picks up Crusoe and the slave boy Xury from their boat after they escape from their Moorish captors and float down the African coast. The Portuguese captain takes Crusoe to Brazil and thus inaugurates Crusoe’s new life as plantation owner. The Portuguese captain is never named—unlike Xury, for example—and his anonymity suggests a certain uninteresting blandness in his role in the novel. He is polite, personable, and extremely generous to Crusoe, buying the animal skins and the slave boy from Crusoe at well over market value. He is loyal as well, taking care of Crusoe’s Brazilian investments even after a twenty-eight-year absence. His role in Crusoe’s life is crucial, since he both arranges for Crusoe’s new career as a plantation owner and helps Crusoe cash in on the profits later.

The Spaniard -  One of the men from the Spanish ship that is wrecked off Crusoe’s island, and whose crew is rescued by the cannibals and taken to a neighboring island. The Spaniard is doomed to be eaten as a ritual victim of the cannibals when Crusoe saves him. In exchange, he becomes a new “subject” in Crusoe’s “kingdom,” at least according to Crusoe. The Spaniard is never fleshed out much as a character in Crusoe’s narrative, an example of the odd impersonal attitude often notable in Crusoe.
Xury -  A nonwhite (Arab or black) slave boy only briefly introduced during the period of Crusoe’s enslavement in Sallee. When Crusoe escapes with two other slaves in a boat, he forces one to swim to shore but keeps Xury on board, showing a certain trust toward the boy. Xury never betrays that trust. Nevertheless, when the Portuguese captain eventually picks them up, Crusoe sells Xury to the captain. Xury’s sale shows us the racist double standards sometimes apparent in Crusoe’s behavior.
The widow -  Appearing briefly, but on two separate occasions in the novel, the widow keeps Crusoe’s 200 pounds safe in England throughout all his thirty-five years of journeying. She returns it loyally to Crusoe upon his return to England and, like the Portuguese captain and Friday, reminds us of the goodwill and trustworthiness of which humans can be capable, whether European or not.

Robinson Crusoe as Religious Allegory:-

Apart from being an exciting account of a man’s adventures on an uninhabited island, the book, “Robinson Crusoe” has been found to possess a profound allegorical significance. For many, Crusoe’s many references to God, to Providence, to sin are extraneous to the real interest of the novel. Readers through the 19th century read “Robinson Crusoe” in the light of religion. For example, a reviewer for the Dublin University Magazine called the book a great religious poem, showing that God is found where men are absent. In deciding whether or to what extent Robinson Crusoe is a spiritual autobiography and a great religious poem, one might consider the following:
In the “Preface,” Defoe announces that his intention is to justify and honor the wisdom of Providence in all the variety of our circumstances.
Moreover, Robinson Crusoe can be viewed from theological and practical levels. If we see from the theological level, we will find that man’s extreme aspiration is the cause of sin. As we see in “Paradise Lost” by John Milton that Adam and Eve are banished from the Heaven because of their aspirations and disobedience to God, here in the same was Crusoe is thrown on an uninhabited island because of disobedience towards his father.
Crusoe receives warnings against the rashness of going to sea from his father and from the captain of the first ship he sails on. Both are figures of authority and can be seen as proxies for God. In ignoring their warnings, he is also denying God’s providential social order in the world. God’s providential social order in the world means that God arranged the world hierarchically, endowing the king with authority in the political realm and the father with authority in the family.
Crusoe’s conversation with his father about leaving home can be interpreted from a religious perspective. Crusoe repeatedly refers to leaving home without his father’s permission as his “original sin“; he not only associates God and his father but regards his sin against his father as a sin against God also remembering his first voyage.

Crusoe comments:-

“… my conscience, which was not yet come to the pitch of hardness to which it has been since reproached me with the contempt of advice and the breach of my duty to God and my father”.
In the Puritan Family structure, the father was regarded as God’s deputy, in rejecting his father’s advice, Crusoe is committing Adam and Eve’s sin of disobedience. For Crusoe as for Adam and Eve, disobedience grows out of restlessness and discontent with the station God assigned.
When Crusoe is cast ashore on a deserted island, he sees his situation as the fulfillment of his father’s prediction that if Crusoe disregarded his advice, Crusoe would find himself alone with no source of help. As his father said with a little sigh.
That boy might be happy if he would stay at home, but if he goes abroad, he will be the most miserable wretch that ever was born”. Alone on the island Crusoe is Everyman, aliented from God because of sin.
One way of reading Robinson Crusoe is as a spiritual autobiography. The spiritual autobiography potrays the  puritan drama of the soul. Concerned about being saved, having a profound sense of God’s presence, seeing his will manifest everywhere and aware of the unceasing conflict between good and evil. Puritans constantly scrutinized their lives to determine the state of their souls and looked for signs of the nature of their relationship with God. The spiritual autobiography usually follows a common pattern. The narrator sins ignores Go’s warnings, hardness his heart to god, repents as a result of God’s grace and mercy, experiences a soul wrenching conversion and achieves salvation. The writer emphasizes his former sinfulness as a way of glorifying God. The deeper his sinfulness, the greater God’s grace and mercy in electing to save him. He reviews his life from the new perspective his conversion has given and writer of the present and the future with  a deep sense of God’s presence in his life and in the world. Here we also find the touch of spiritual autobiography.
Crusoe throughout uses religious language, imagery and biblical references Crusoe narrates in his life story long afterwards and from a Christian perspective he looks at his pat through the eyes of the convert who now constantly sees the working of providence, he tells of his first shipwreck and of his then ignoring what he now perceives as God’s warning. “ … Providence as in such cases generally it does resolved to leave me entirely without excuse. For if I would not take this for a deliverance, the next was to be such a one as the worst and most hardened wretch among us would confess both the danger and the mercy”. And he found “the secret hints and notices of danger. After his dream and beginning of his regeneration, Defoe reviews his life and his understanding and sense of God deepen. But reason alone is not sufficient to result. In conversion and Crusoe twins to the Bible, studying it reveals God’s word and will to him, and he finds comfort, guidance, and instruction in it for the first time in many years he prays, and he prays, not for rescue from the island, but for the God’s help.
“Lord be my help, for I am in great distress..”
After thinking about his life, he kneels to God for the first time in his life and prays to God to fulfill his promise “that if I called upon him in the day of trouble, he would deliver me” His next step towards conversion is asking for God’s grace, “ Jesus, Thou son of David, Jesus, Though exalted prince and savior, give me repentance!” He comes to realize that spiritual deliverance from sin is more important than physical deliverance from the islan. A little later, when he is about to thank God for bringing him to the island and so saving him, he stoops, shocked at himself and the hypocrisy of such  statement. Then he “sincerely gave thanks to God for opening my eyes, by whatever afflicting providence, to see the former condition of my life, and to mourn for my wickness and repent.” This incident indicates that Crusoe’s faith is fervent and honest.
In short we can say that Defoe’s “Robinson Crusoe” is a great religious allegory this shows the inner of Crusoe and portrays the puritan drama of the soul. This follows the pattern of “sin---punishment---redeem---solvation.’

 

Works cited:

http://www.josbd.com
http://www.bachelorandmaster.com