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    Robinson Crusoe
    Robinson Crusoe
    Robinson Crusoe
    Audiobook (abridged)2 hours

    Robinson Crusoe

    Written by Daniel Defoe

    Narrated by Tony Britton

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    Defoe's masterpiece is part adventure and part do-it-yourself book. It describes the experiences of the resourceful sailor and castaway Robinson Crusoe. After escaping shipwreck and being swept on to an island with nothing but his wits, Crusoe survives ? and even prospers ? through his ingenuity and perseverance. He builds his own dwelling and makes furniture and clothes. He lives alone until the arrival of cannibals brings him an unexpected companion and the chance landing of mutineers gives him the opportunity to return home.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThe Copyright Group
    Release dateJan 1, 2014
    ISBN9781780001395
    Author

    Daniel Defoe

    Daniel Defoe (1660-1731) was an English novelist, pamphleteer, journalist and political agent. He is best known for his novels Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders, and for his Journal of the Plague Year.

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    Reviews for Robinson Crusoe

    3.5/5

    3,738 ratings131 reviews

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    • 4/5
      While I was reading Robinson Crusoe, I was also reading aloud to my children Edward Eager's Seven-Day Magic. The children in Edward Eager's books always end up interacting with the characters of classic children's literature. Crusoe was still alone on his island, trying to eke out an existence when the children in Seven-Day Magic took a short trip to the island, too, where they noted that Crusoe was followed about by his man Friday and thereby spoiled a bit of the plot for me. It wasn't a huge spoiler, though; it turns out, as with so many classic works of literature, I was already fairly familiar with the story even though I'd not read it before.

      I know, however, that many people (like my spouse) aren't so blas? about having plot points revealed to them ahead of time, so I will warn you that I will be making reference to events towards the end of the book with impunity. If you don't want read Robinson Crusoe spoilers, you might want to stop here, read the book, then come on back and read the rest of my review. Otherwise, carry on.

      I didn't realize that Robinson Crusoe was considered a children's book, although I remember having a copy of it in the "children's classics" set my parents put on my bedroom bookshelf and of which I never cared to read more than the titles on the spines. I can see where children might enjoy reading about his adventures and imagining themselves shipwrecked on a deserted island, but I wonder what else they would take from the book because there really is a lot more here.

      Central to the story is the kind of religious conversion experience that Crusoe has, and his musings about faith and Providence take up a fair amount of text. I could see myself just skipping over those sections as a child, but as an adult, I found the evolution of his personal faith very interesting. I particularly liked Crusoe's shift from a "Why me, God?" perspective to one of gratitude that he was spared when all the rest of his shipmates perished.

      "I learn'd to look more upon the bright side of my condition, and less upon the dark side, and to consider what I enjoy'd, rather than what I wanted; and this gave me sometimes such secret comforts, that I cannot express them; and which I take notice of here, to put those discontented people in mind of it, who cannot enjoy comfortably what God has given them; because they see and covet something that He had not given them. All our discontents about what we want appear'd to me to spring from the want of thankfulness for what we have."

      With some updates to the language and more prudent use of semi-colons, this could come from a 21st-century self-help book.

      I also really enjoyed reading about the roll that isolation played in Crusoe's personal evolution. For example, when Crusoe finds evidence of the presence of cannibals on the far shore of his island, he spends years waiting for their return, first in fear and then in plotting their murders before deciding it's better to not get involved unless they involved him. Without distractions---even without the ability to write down his thoughts and feelings in the moment---and with, as it were, all the time in the world, Crusoe was forced to sit with personal conflicts and crises of faith without the power to act. Defoe does a very good job of showing how that mental space and that practice of mindfulness and reflection lets Crusoe's emotions run their course and gradually leads him to a more rational plan of action.

      I frequently wonder if, by blogging about books I read or issues I face in my life, I'm making too concrete my thoughts about different issues and diminishing their potential to evolve over time. With status updates and tweets and blog posts, it seems like we're getting into the habit of broadcasting our thoughts the moment we have them. For me, at least, I wonder if this squelches the process of reflection and doesn't allow the thoughts to mature. Is it like picking an apple before it's ripe? Or can the process of sharing these thoughts actually enhance the "ripening" process?

      I've read reviews in which people complain about the level of detail Defoe goes into about Crusoe's life on the island, but I actually found those alone-on-the-island parts to be the most interesting. Aside from a riveting account of a wintertime trek through the Pyrenees upon his return to Europe, the "action" parts of the story were somewhat less interesting to me. I guess I prefer the accounts of personal growth to the really plot-driven bits. It seemed almost like, when Crusoe was engaged in action of any kind, his personal growth was on break. For example, there was some rather disturbing treatment of a starving bear near the end of the book, which kind of made me wonder if maybe Crusoe's personal evolution really was entirely dependent on his being alone. Crusoe himself points out that the bear was going about its own business and would likely have ignored them entirely if Friday hadn't decided to mess with the creature for their amusement. Of course, this doesn't seem to stop Crusoe from getting as many laughs from the situation as everyone else. Perhaps spiritual evolution was different back when the Spanish Inquisition was still alive and well.
    • 5/5
      One of the best young adult books ever written. Deserted islands and shipwrecks started with Dafoe.
    • 1/5
      I don't remember reading this book, though it's obvious I have -- the spine is bent, and I'm the only one who's ever owned it. It obviously left no impression on me. It might be something I'd pick up in the future and try again.
    • 4/5
      The story begins with the universal quest: the young man in Britain, torn between his safe home and his hunger for adventure, breaks away from his loving father and sails away into the unknown. After a series of harrowing escapes, he's shipwrecked on a desert island. His lively first-person account shows how his intelligence and education help him survive for many years, and how he uses technology, including guns and tools salvaged from the ship. He sets up home, reads the Bible, finds a parrot as a pet, and even devises a calendar to keep track of time. Then one day he finds a human footprint: "Was it someone who could save me and take me back to civilization? Or was it a savage who landed here?" When some "savages" arrive in several canoes, he uses his guns to get rid of them, and he rescues one of their captives, a handsome fellow with very dark skin. Delighted to have a companion at last, Crusoe names the newcomer Friday (since Crusoe found him on Friday).
    • 4/5
      My childhood library included an abridged version of Robinson Crusoe. It was one of my favorites, and I read it several times. When this unabridged version arrived from the Easton Press, I happily settled in to enjoy it again. I don't know what changed - my level of understanding, or the additional material not included in the version I had previously read - but I found the religious material to be slow going.
    • 5/5
      It's a classic; how could I not give it 5 stars. I was delighted to discover how very readable the book is despite the language of early 1700s. Also surprised that the two main themes of the book are mechanical and spiritual. Mechanical, in the sense that there is a lot of practical detail about how Crusoe creates a living from the bits and pieces he rescues from the wrecked ship. And spiritual, in his struggles to come to terms with life alone (until near the end) on an island (not desert, btw) and how considers his relationship with God under the circumstances. Doubtless one of today's editors would have asked for a rewrite to reduce the book in half, but the rambling detail is part of its classic charm. Read slowly and it's easy to be with Crusoe for a LONG time.
    • 1/5
      I don't think I've ever disliked a book more in my life.

      Robinson Crusoe is basically the literary equivalent of stale bread. IT'S SO DAMN DULL, and PAAAINFULLY BORING (at least stale bread still has some nutritional value). I hated it. I hated it with the fiery passion of a thousand suns.

      I never want to hear of this book ever again.
    • 3/5
      Zeer onderhoudend, zelfs na 3 eeuwen. Verrassende spirituele link: vergelijking met Job (beschouwingen over de voorzienigheid). Uniek thema: de nobele wilde, zelfs de kannibalen.
    • 1/5
      Unreadable prose (37 semicolons in a single sentence!) and a self-satisfied narrator make for a very unlikeable book. Defoe was a sexist, racist, colonialist pig, and this book reflects little more than his own crazed view of the world. It's a useful historical document, of course.
    • 2/5
      This book is very very slow. It is classic, but the type of classic that is only for a few excited readers that are not afraid of a long winter evenings with reading about Robinson's struggling on the sunny (or rainy) island.. Good luck to all brave readers.
    • 4/5
      One of my favorite classics as a child - I suppose because I felt so isolated back then. Defoe shows us that we are all victims of a shipwreck - stranded in the middle of the ocean called life. Faced with the struggle of Man against Nature, most of us would not cope as well as Defoe's hero.
    • 5/5
      One of the best young adult books ever written. Deserted islands and shipwrecks started with Dafoe.
    • 4/5
      A wonderfully entertaining story. Much darker and adult than modern Hollywood and politically correct society would have us think. This is a great story and sadly one that is rarely seen in school libraries anymore. It seems to have fallen into that “offensive to some” niche. Loneliness, doubt, self-discovery and the desire to understand why our stars align the way they do and in what manner we should…or should not accept their formation. Defoe comes across with insight and brilliance to tell us the story of Mr. Robinson Crusoe, a young man who appears to have more bad luck than good. Stranded on an island for nearly three decades our protagonist suffers, lives and learns and still has the uncanny ability to be human.
    • 1/5
      A man with wanderlust encounters a series of escalating misfortunes.1/4 (Bad).I gave up after 40 pages. I haven't even gotten to the really racist stuff yet (I suspect), but already the attitude towards slavery is too much. The style is readable but uniformly void of personality, and it's pretty clear how the story is going to unfold, so I'm confident that I'm not missing anything.(Aug. 2022)
    • 5/5
      There are a handful of novels that fascinated me in my early days of reading. This is one of them - I remember being mesmerized by the events of Robinson's life as narrated by Defoe. His creation of a new world on the island where he lived for years. The amazing feeling when he realized there was another person on the island and his ingenuity in developing a new life for himself. I think it was the first adventure book that I ever read and it spurred my interest in reading true tales of adventure ever since,
    • 3/5
      definately a book of it's time (white englishman is a higher moral ethical and valuable animal than both black men and the spanish/portuguese), but interesting to read nevertheless
    • 2/5
      I read it the first time when I was a kid but somehow I fail to have a nostalgic feelings for it. This is a story of an extremely lucky restless young (at the start of his adventures) man who skips on his family, gets enslaved, escapes, immediately enslaves another person, sets up a plantation, buys some slaves, and only crashes on a deserted island because he sets sail to catch some slaves in Africa because they're too expensive on the free market. Gets stranded on this island, goes crazy, finds religion and belief in god's providence that is working for him through his good luck. Not that he's reformed, the first words he teaches to a native is "Friday" (native's new name, presumably he already had one) and "master" (his owner's name). Robinson grows wise over the years and states that given the chance to make the choice again he wouldn't have sailed for slaves again - he would just buy on the open market (surprise!) as this turned out to be a false economy. I know the book is old and I'm picking holes in century old morality but to be honest it's not that gripping. Lots of theological arguments and not that much "surviving".
    • 3/5
      I'M FR--FINISHED!!!!! Seriously, that book is a lot to swim through. I actually really liked Robinson's documenting of how he MacGyvered his dwelling and food and whatnot, which made me think Andy Weir had been inspired by Defoe when writing The Martian. But be not fooled, there is much else to slog through. I am happy to send this book off to the Goodwill in the sky.
    • 1/5
      This should have been a book I really liked, but the overbearing narrative voice ruined it. And I say this as someone who has been reading and enjoying a lot of books with opinionated narrators lately.

      Generally, when I read a novel I expect it to have a degree of personal growth (unless a lack of growth is the point of the story) and narrative tension. And this story *should* have had both of those. Certainly, the protagonist finds God and humility over the course of the novel, but the narration spends the entire book lamenting that he didn't trust to providence, etc., etc. (at length, every few pages, so you don't miss it...) that the personality he had at the beginning is totally absent, overridden by who he becomes by the end. And the way it's written it just seams so *easy* for him to survive--certainly, he must have had problems, but those are mostly glossed over, he has a whole ship full of stuff, and he routinely points out how something he did early on would be useful later, so when the problem does come up you already know it's solved.

      And if the protagonist barely has a personality, no one else has any personality at all. And you might think, well, yeah, he spends the whole book alone on an island--but no! Quite a bit of the book isn't on the island, or otherwise there are other people around. But they just waft on and off-stage with no real effect. Friday is more of a person than anyone else, but he's such a caricature that I feel like he hardly counts. Oh, and the narrator mentions that he got married and had three kids and his wife died, all in one sentence, and goes on with the narration like nothing remarkable happened, and did these people mean nothing to you?

      Ugh. And even though he keeps belaboring the religious lesson over and over, it isn't even a good sermon, because good rhetoric has roots in good story and personal development.

      Anyway, I think what I'm saying here is you'd be better off spending your time reading a wilderness survival manual while singing Amazing Grace over and over again.
    • 5/5
      My absolute favourite as a child
    • 4/5
      Read another copy as a child - loved it - played games for a year based on this shipwrecked, lonely chap & Man Friday (younger sister in reality): Defoe's story is a timeless classic of imagination mixed with the reality of a seafaring mishap all too familiar to the era - amazingly his first novel when aged 60, & a masterpiece of its kind. Still love its vivid ruggedness, today.
    • 2/5
      I tried to read this when I was getting my Masters in English. Truly, I did. It was on a list of maybe a hundred books that I was supposed to read outside of classes and be prepared to talk about in an oral exam... and it was the only one I began, and simply couldn't finish. I got to page 26 before I gave up.This year, I decided to try it again. After all, back when I tried it the first time, I was stressed and rushed, and surely some book or another would test my patience, so it had to be better than I'd thought back then. Right? Well, um, yeah... not really.I understand this is a classic, and I even understand why. I'm glad to be able to say that I finally finished it. But that's about all I can say. This was a dry read, and one that I had a hard time getting through. Sprinkles of action didn't make up for the non-action or the style of the book, and although I rather like the idea of the story and wanted to enjoy this, I just couldn't. Unless you have to read it, I probably wouldn't recommend it.
    • 3/5
      There's probably nothing I can say about this that hasn't already been said. my thoughts on the matter as as follows. I'm not sure this was what I was expecting. Having thought of it as something you tend to read in school, I wasn't expecting the depth that is to be found in here. In a sense it is a morality play, in that the young Crusoe sins (by leaving to seek adventure), suffers (shipwreck and being stranded on the island) seeks redemption (finds God) and finally is brought safe home. The redemption passage was a little bit wearing, that's really not my thing, but the notes helped put this into some context of the time and nature of religion when this was written. There's an element of you know what happens in outline, so the first part of the book is spent wondering how he's going to get shipwrecked. Once he's on the island, you're waiting for Friday to appear and the pair of them to get off the island again. That is, I think, to do it a disservice. The manner by which Crusoe is able to set up his life is interesting, it makes you wonder how you'd cope if suddenly you were responsible for your own survival - how would you cope? (frankly, I probably wouldn't!). The passage about the savages was, to me, totally unexpected. How did I miss a major plot point like that?! It was dramatic and startling, but could have done with a little less angst about it all. The end all felt a little bit rushed and not necessarily thought through. He sends an emissary to the Spaniards on the mainland and then leaves the island in the hands of some good for nothings and just disappears off home. It didn't seem terribly consistent behaviour. It's certainly a book I am glad I have finally read, but I'm not sure it is one I will return to repeatedly.
    • 4/5
      This was a classic that I'd missed reading for over five decades but determined to attempt this year. It was an enjoyable read, believable, and kept my interest throughout the tale.
    • 4/5
      The legend of Robinson Crusoe and his Man Friday are elaborated in the novel and one can understand the appeal. The audiobook is also nicely done.
    • 1/5
      To say I hated this book is probably the understatement of the century. In fact, I'm only halfway through the book after six years! I just can't seem to bring myself to buckle down and finish it mainly because the main character is a whiny pompous ass who is just plain dislikeable. I should probably donate this book, but there is still this little part of me that insists on finishing it, although that will most likely never happen.
    • 2/5
      When I started this book, I was expecting a story about survival. I expected to hear about wild adventures and man vs. nature. I got a little of that. But, mostly I got a whiny narrator who complained bitterly about how lonely he was and how he wanted a companion. Turns out, he really just wanted a servant. I couldn't get into the story at all, I didn't like the main character (not even enough to feel a little sorry for him) and I really wasn't impressed by the ending. This was a slight disappointment for me.
    • 4/5
      I heard a lot of negative things about the story of Robinson Crusoe, so when I decided to pick up the book I had my doubts. I have to say, I found the book engaging and the story thoroughly interesting. I loved everything about the book right up until the ending. I felt as though Defoe rushed the end and took away everything we enjoyed from the Robinson's island adventure.
    • 3/5
      I think if someone cleared this of about 95% of the religious/"moral" drivel, it would be a decent story. As it is, much of it is bogged down by his droning on about that. But the story itself was fairly interesting. Not really recommended unless you're simply a fan of the old classics, and/or like having that sort of thing shoved endlessly down your throat.
    • 1/5
      After the main character in THE MOONSTONE mentioned this as his Bible so frequently, I decided to re-read itsince little remained in my memory except the title. While it may be a "Classic," it is mostly that only in the telling of surviving against great odds.When Robinson ends up being the only survivor of a shipwreck (whose direction he insisted onand for which he feels no guilt), readers are drawn into his methods.The moral dilemma is that he is an unrepentant slave owner who was "...bound to the coast of Guinea, for negroes."Thus, while his ideas are ingenious, we keep hoping that the tons of Bible reading and spiritual conversions he drones on about willbring an awareness or compassion for his fellow humans. This never happens despite the eventual master/servant friendship with darker skinned Friday and that Robinson spent two yearshimself as a slave of the Moors.His senseless killing of many wild animals not for food also makes this less than compelling reading for anyone who cares about animals.And, what happened to Friday's dad?