Robinson Cruose Exam

1. Core Argument: The Novel and the Colonial Project

The central claim, from Azim's The Colonial Rise of the Novel:

"The birth of the novel coincided with the birth of the European colonial project; it partook of and was part of a discursive field concerned with the construction of a universal and homogenous subject. This subject was held together by the annihilation of other subject positions."

Key implications:

It's not accidental that "the first novel" is about a European claiming ownership of a "deserted" island.

"Discursive field": The novel must be considered alongside travel literature, military accounts, and scientific writing.

"Universal and homogenous subject": Denies the specific, historical perspective of Europeans who sought to dominate foreign lands.

"Annihilation of other subject positions": No legitimacy is given to non-European perspectives.

2. Context: Travel, Exploration, and Empire

Early Travel Literature (Marco Polo, Columbus)

-Unpredictable mix of fact and fabrication; exotic and improbable details; mermaids, monsters

Enlightenment Exploration (Captain Cook)

- Aligned with science: mapping, documenting flora/fauna, new navigation technologies

Key Point

Science and discovery went hand-in-hand with territorial expansion and wealth accumulation

Aravamudan on Defoe:

"For Defoe, adventure stories were like thought-experiments. In his hands, the adventure novel is a means of diagnosing global positioning for national domestic advantage. Adventure leads to empire in Defoe's writings."

3. Crusoe's Colonial Fantasy (Key Quotations)

(3)

"I was King and Lord of all this Country indefeasibly, and had a Right of Possession" (p. 73)

Claims absolute, unquestionable ownership; compares himself to an English lord

"I fancy'd now I had my Country-House, and my Sea-Coast-House" (p. 75)

Imposes English domesticity onto the island; makes it "home"

"I serv'd them, as we serve notorious Thieves in England, viz., Hanged them in Chains" (p. 85)

Imposes English law and punishment on the island

4. The Footprint: Colonial Nightmare

(1)

When Crusoe discovers a single footprint:

"I came Home to my Fortification, not feeling, as we say, the Ground I went on, but terrify'd to the last Degree, looking behind me at every two or three Steps, mistaking every Bush and Tree, and fancying every Stump at a Distance to be a Man." (p. 112)

Significance:

The footprint shatters Crusoe's fantasy of solitary possession.

His fear is irrational and intense – he has not yet seen any other human.

Represents the colonial fear of the "Other" – the possibility that the land is not empty.

Analysis: Friday's speech is rendered in broken English ("more many," "where me was"), emphasizing his linguistic subordination. The dialogue is structured entirely by Crusoe's questions – Friday never initiates, never tells his own story. His complex experience of warfare, capture, and enslavement is reduced to simple, fragmented answers that serve Crusoe's curiosity, not Friday's self-expression.

(1)

“MASTER. - You always fight the better; how came you to be taken prisoner, then, Friday? FRIDAY. - My nation beat much for all that. MASTER. - How beat? If your nation beat them, how came you to be taken? FRIDAY. - They more many than my nation, in the place where me was; they take one, two, three, and me: my nation over-beat them in the yonder place, where me no was; there my nation take one, two, great thousand. MASTER. - But why did not your side recover you from the hands of your enemies, then? FRIDAY. - They run, one, two, three, and me, and make go in the canoe; my nation have no canoe that time. “ (p. 341)

The phrase "in token of acknowledgment" suggests Friday's submission is gratitude, not coercion. "It seems" implies Crusoe interprets the gesture – he may not understand its true meaning but imposes his colonial reading. The foot-on-head gesture literalizes the hierarchy: Crusoe literally stands above Friday.

(4)

I beckoned to him again to come to me, and gave him all the signs of encouragement that I could think of; and he came nearer and nearer, kneeling down every ten or twelve steps, in token of acknowledgement for saving his life.

and then he kneeled down again, kissed the ground, and laid his head upon the ground, and taking me by the foot, set my foot upon his head;

this, it seems, was in token of swearing to be my slave forever.

But there was more work to do yet; for I perceived the savage whom I had knocked down was not killed, but stunned with the blow, and began to come to himself:... (p. 324)

Analysis: This reveals the irrational, self-amplifying nature of colonial fear. Distance from the threat increases rather than decreases his terror – fear feeds on itself. The phrase "frightful ideas of the thing" (not the thing itself) shows that the colonial imagination produces more terror than any actual danger. He is haunted by what he imagines the Other might do.

(5)

I slept none that night;

; but I was so embarrassed with my own frightful ideas of the thing, that I formed nothing but dismal imaginations to myself

Sometimes I fancied it must be the devil, and reason joined in with me in this supposition,

how should any other thing in human shape come into the place? Where was the vessel that brought them?

And how was it possible a man should come there? (p. 246)

Analysis: The colonial encounter becomes a mirror for European self-reflection. Friday's "information" triggers Crusoe's self-discovery. The phrase "occurred naturally to my mind" suggests that Crusoe believes his superior understanding is innate, not culturally constructed. Teaching becomes an act of self-perfection.

(5)

I had, God knows, more sincerity than knowledge in all the methods I took for this poor creature’s instruction

I really informed and instructed myself in many things that either I did not know or had not fully considered before, but which occurred naturally to my mind upon searching into them,

poor savage;

my grief sat lighter, upon me; my habitation grew comfortable to me beyond measure: and when I reflected that in this solitary life which I have been confined to,

To save the life, and, for aught I knew, the soul of a poor savage, and bring him to the true knowledge of religion and of the Christian doctrine, that he might know Christ Jesus,  (p. 351)

Analysis: The word "indefeasibly" (cannot be annulled or voided) is crucial – Crusoe believes his ownership is legally and morally absolute. The comparison to an English "Lord of a Mannor" maps English property law onto the island, erasing any prior claim. The phrase "if I could convey it" acknowledges a practical obstacle (he can't transfer the title) but not a moral one.

(4)

I descended a little on the side of that delicious vale, surveying it with a secret kind of pleasure,

to think that this was all my own

that I was king and lord of all this country indefensibly, and had a right of possession; and if I could convey it

I might have it in inheritance as completely as any lord of a manor in England.

Analysis: The simile "as if I had seen an apparition" frames the footprint as supernatural, not merely surprising. His inability to "feel the ground" suggests psychological disintegration. The projection of human figures onto "every bush and tree" reveals how colonial fear transforms the natural environment into a landscape of potential threat.

(4)

I was exceedingly surprised with the print of a man’s naked foot on the shore

I stood like one thunderstruck

I could see no other impression but that one.

I went to it again to see if there were any more, and to observe if it might not be my fancy; but there was no room for that, for there was exactly the print of a foot - toes, heel, and every part of a foot.

Analysis: Analysis: The detail "like a cockpit" compares the cannibal feast to an English entertainment venue, creating disturbing familiarity. The phrase "savage wretches" dehumanizes while the catalogue of body parts ("skulls, hands, feet") creates visceral horror. This spectacle becomes the moral justification for Crusoe's later violence.

(2)

I was perfectly confounded and amazed;

nor is it possible for me to express the horror of my mind at seeing the shore spread with skulls, hands, feet, and other bones of human bodies; and particularly I observed a place where there had been a fire made, and a circle dug in the earth, like a cockpit, where I supposed the savage wretches had sat down to their human feastings upon the bodies of their fellowcreatures (p, 263) 

Analysis: The verb "brooded" suggests obsessive, almost maternal incubation of violence. The meta-textual claim that describing his plans would exceed the book's length emphasizes how thoroughly colonial violence permeates his consciousness. Violence becomes not just action but a consuming fantasy.

(3)

had not the frights and terrors I was in about the savages intervened,

for night and day I could think of nothing but how I might destroy some of the monsters in their cruel, bloody entertainment, and if possible save the victim they should bring hither to destroy.

I hatched, or rather brooded upon, in my thoughts, for the destroying these creatures, or at least frightening them so as to prevent their coming hither any more

Analysis: Friday's logical question exposes the problem of theodicy (why evil exists if God is omnipotent). Crusoe's silence ("could not tell what to say") reveals that his religious authority is superficial. The "savage" asks a question that has troubled Christian theology for centuries, undermining the assumption that European religious knowledge is superior.

(5)

God is stronger than the devil - God is above the devil, and therefore we pray to God to tread him down under our feet

‘if God much stronger, much might as the wicked devil, why God no kill the devil, so make him no more do wicked?’

I was strangely surprised at this question;

I was now an old man, yet I was but a young doctor,

at first I could not tell what to say; so I pretended not to hear him,  (p. 348)

Analysis: The phrase "merry reflection" suggests comic self-awareness, but the content reveals serious colonial ideology. "Allowed liberty of conscience" parodies Enlightenment tolerance – he "allows" it because he has total power. The joke about three subjects of three religions masks the reality of coercion: Friday is a "Protestant" only because Crusoe converted him. This fantasy of total loyalty – that his subjects would die for him "if there had been occasion" – reveals the colonial desire for complete, unquestioning devotion. The conditional "if there had been occasion" is telling: Crusoe imagines a hypothetical sacrifice that has never been tested. Their lives are framed as debts owed to him, not as their own to live.

(4)

My island was now peopled, and I thought myself very rich in subjects; and it was a merry reflection, which I frequently made, how like a king I looked.

the whole country was my own property, so that I had an undoubted right of dominion.

my people were perfectly subjected - I was absolutely lord and lawgiver - they all owed their lives to me, and were ready to lay down their lives,

I had but three subjects, and they were of three different religions - my man Friday was a Protestant, his father was a Pagan and a cannibal, and the Spaniard was a Papist. However, I allowed liberty of conscience throughout my dominions

Analysis: This extends the slide's point about Crusoe's fantasy of kingship. He doesn't just claim ownership – he explicitly compares himself to an English lord ("manor") and elevates himself to imperial status ("king or emperor"), revealing how colonial ideology maps European hierarchies onto "empty" lands.

(3)

I was removed from all the wickedness of the world here

 I had neither the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eye, nor the pride of life

 I was lord of the whole manor

Analysis: Crusoe admits he was "wrong" to suspect Friday, but the passage is striking for what it doesn't contain: any direct quotation or account of Friday's feelings. Friday's perspective is entirely mediated by Crusoe's interpretation ("the honest, grateful creature"). Even when admitting his own error, Crusoe cannot step outside his own viewpoint to imagine Friday's inner life. Friday remains a projection of Crusoe's fears and reassurances.

(4)

I wronged the poor honest creature very much

I was very sorry afterwards

I was certainly wrong too

both as a religious Christian and as a grateful friend

Analysis: The captain becomes not a fellow human but a "man sent by Heaven" – an instrument of divine will. The phrase "chain of wonders" suggests an unbroken sequence of providential events leading to his deliverance. Most telling is the claim that Providence can "search into the remotest corner of the world" – this justifies colonialism as divine reach, the idea that no place is too far for European (and Christian) intervention.

after I recovered my speech

embraced him as my deliverer

we rejoiced together

I looked upon him as a man sent by Heaven to deliver me

I forgot not to lift up my heart in thankfulness to Heaven