P.S. (Pre-script): I’ve added all of my books to read to my Goodreads.com account, so if you have an account there, feel free to add me as a friend or whatever.
Since I couldn’t wait to finalize the list before I started reading something, I ended up consuming Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe in about a week. I thought I’d give this whole review thing a shot since I will be doing it much more in the coming years.
Before I embark upon my review, I just want to sort of set up how I envision these going. I’m not a scholar or talented at articulation. I like to think, but I’m not great at putting my thoughts into words so much. My goal is to give you an account of how each book impacted me and some of the general points or ideas I took away from it. Hopefully by reading these, you’ll be able to tell if a book will be the kind you will enjoy reading, or engage with me and others on how the book impacted you if you have read it. I’m going to focus on how the book made me feel, as well as general writing style and other “logistical” matters like that.
On to my thoughts.
Robinson Crusoe was a little tough to get into at first, being written in the early 1700s, but once I got going it wasn’t too terribly difficult. Most of you probably know, but Robinson Crusoe is about a man who finds himself stranded on an uninhabited island far from any kind of help or company. From the get go the book is written in 1st person from the perspective of Crusoe, so you know some way or another he gets out of all the trouble in which he manages to find himself. I found however, that although I knew from the outset there was probably some sort of happy ending, it didn’t in any way deaden the suspense I felt at several difficulties Crusoe finds himself in.
One of the main themes in the book is the idea of God’s providence. Crusoe goes back and forth throughout as he tries to find assurance in the belief of an all-powerful God who has his best interests at heart. While severe and troubling external trials force Crusoe to think, be creative, act boldly, work hard, and fight for his life, he always seems to go back to giving the credit of his own actions to the God that empowers him and watches over him. As a Christian myself who shares these beliefs, I empathized with this struggle for assurance of one’s own well-being.
The book is a roller coaster of emotions. Fear, loneliness, desperation, and despair will suddenly give way to the most exuberant joy (and vice versa), and when Crusoe felt it, so did I. Defoe does an amazing job at making the internal dialogue of one man over the period of decades not only interesting, but engrossing. Somewhere near the end, I had a strong desire to live on my own little island and have as amazing an experience as Crusoe.
Bottom line: I’d highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys fiction. If I had to rate it, I’d say it got a 4/5. Those of you who have read it, let me know what you thought were the main themes and how it affected you. To those of you who haven’t, do you think you might give it a try? Thanks for reading as I try to figure this all out.
3 Responses to “Book -1 (or 0?): Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe”
Nice review. I might pick this up and give it a read. I get nervous with older books because they’ve always been hard to read but I am encouraged that you said it was easy once you got into it.
Yeah. I mean, there were several times when I had no idea what a word meant, but could generally figure it out with context.
I like your review. Just the kind I like! This book is on my shelf (and has been for a little while actually…) so, hopefully, I’ll get around to reading it soon.