Description

Defoe's immensely popular and influential work, published in 1719, tells the story of an English mariner, the sole survivor of a shipwreck, who manages to survive for 28 years on a deserted island in the South Pacific. Defoe's depiction of the hardships and ingenuities of the castaway are masterly, as is his description of loneliness and isolation. He builds a house, teaches himself to grow corn and barley, and bakes bread. When a band of cannibals invades his island, he drives them away, but rescues one of their prisoners--the faithful Friday--who remains with Crusoe until their eventual rescue and return to England. During one of his several adventurous voyages in the 1600s, an Englishman becomes the sole survivor of a shipwreck and lives for nearly thirty years on a deserted island.