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Teachers' Resource Web Study Questions on Daniel Defoe Robinson Crusoe 1. The novel has been called a hybrid text that incorporates many forms of narrative, both fictional and non-fictional. Robinson Crusoe bears the features of several different genres: episodic romance, adventure story, realism, travel narrative, autobiography, spiritual autobiography, and allegory, to name a few of the most prominent. Explain what conventional features Defoe's novel derives from one of these genres, and how that genre shapes the text. 2. What features of the travel narrative appear in Robinson Crusoe? Consider the function of travel narratives in terms of imperialism. What are the ideological implications of his descriptions of the exotic locales and exotic peoples he meets? 3. The editor of your text says that, in Robinson Crusoe, Defoe has "created the myth of the ‘economic man"' (xi). What does he mean by that? 4. In The Rise of the English Novel, Ian Watt calls the novel the literature of the middle class. How would you link this claim with the text's repeated references to the ‘middle station of life'? What is the significance of the fact that Crusoe rejects the middle path? Where does he find himself at the end of the book? 5. What tensions arise in the novel between Crusoe's rational empiricism and his desire to read his experiences according to a providential narrative? How are they resolved in the text? 6. What is the significance of Defoe's characterization of cannibals in the novel? Who is the real cannibal in the book, Crusoe or Friday? Explain your answer. 7. How is the relationship between Crusoe and Friday cemented? Is it by saving Friday's life, by fighting side-by-side, or by naming? What is the significance of Crusoe's choice of name for Friday? 8. Why does Friday bait the bear at the end of the novel? 9. Consider the ways in which Crusoe describes his various island abodes. His shelter not only grows in size but it also becomes more grandiose—he first calls it a "tent", then a "fort then a "home", and finally even a "castle". How do the various terms reflect shifts and changes in Crusoe's domain? 10. Crusoe's solitude does not really begin on the island; he does not seem to have intimate friends. Why not? What sorts of relationships does he have with others? Why does he seem more afraid of meeting up with someone else on his island than he is of being all alone? What do other people represent to Crusoe?
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