An eventful life
Daniel Defoe was born in ,
in London, and was originally christened Daniel Foe, changing his name around
the age of thirty-five to sound more aristocratic. Like his character Robinson
Crusoe, Defoe was a third child. His mother and father, James and Mary Foe,
were Presbyterian dissenters. As a boy, Daniel witnessed two of the greatest
disasters of the seventeenth century: a recurrence of the plague and the Great
Fire of London in . These events may have
shaped his fascination with catastrophes and survival in his writing. He studied
in one of the best Dissenting Academies and then became a merchant dealing in
various products such as wine and tobacco. He joined William of Orange's army
and was an enthusiastic supporter of the Whig party. He went bankrupt and to
solve his financial problem turned to journalism. When Queen Anne ascended the
throne, his political fortune changed. He was arrested and tried because of his
position in defence of the Dissenters, sentenced to three days in the pillory
and then spent some months in prison. To be released he denied his Whig ideas
and became a secret agent of the government, supporting either Tories or Whigs
according to what minister was in power. In 1704 he wrote and published his
journal, "The Review", the periodical which he published two or
three times a week. In 1719, at the age of fifty-nine he turned to prose
fiction, certainly not for literary or artistic purposes, but considering it a
kind of business activity which now paid better than many others.
He
published his first novel, Robinson Crusoe,
in , attracting a large middle-class
readership. He followed in with Moll Flanders, the story of a tough, streetwise
heroine whose fortunes rise and fall dramatically. Defoe's last novel was The
Fortunate Mistress, better know as Roxana. Defoe died in London on April , , of a fatal
"lethargy", an unclear diagnosis that may refer to a stroke.
Structure of the novel
Defoe's long narratives were produced
with extraordinary speed; they were fictional autobiographies always pretending
to be 'true' stories thanks the biographical details and memories provided by
the protagonist. The device of the first person narrator and the documentary
style helped him to create a realistic atmosphere so that the readers could
easily identify themselves with his characters.
The structure of the
novels is characterized by a series of episodes and adventures held together by
the unifying presence of a single hero, who is a 'flat' character, such as a
person that does not change his ideas or behaviours in the course of the novel.
Characterisation
His focus on the actual conditions of
everyday life and avoidance of the courtly and the heroic made Defoe a
revolutionary in English literature and helped define the new genre of the
novel. Stylistically, Defoe was a great innovator. Dispensing with the ornate
style associated with the upper classes, Defoe used the simple, direct,
fact-based style of the middle classes, which became the new standard for the
English novel.
The
characters are presented from the inside and through their actions rather than
from the outside. With Robinson Crusoe's
theme of solitary human existence, Defoe paved the way for the central modern
theme of alienation and isolation, either physically like Robison Crusoe, or
socially like Moll Flanders.
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