Robinson Crusoe, the illusion of self-sufficiency

It seems to me that our generation (I was born in 1951) and those who are younger, unlike generations before, were not stuffed with Robinson Crusoe in elementary school. It was more of a household name than a literary character. So I read Daniel Defoe’s novel only after school. The reading was not a revelation for me; rather, it confirmed my expectations. The fact is that Robinson Crusoe is a character so replicated that everyone knows about him even before they have time to read the novel. “Most people don’t remember when they first heard of Robinson,” writes English writer Jane Gardem. “He has always been.” In addition, this mythical (more than literary) hero anticipates in many ways the structure of our modern world. This figure expresses the dual position of a representative of urban civilization, who is attracted by society and who nevertheless runs away from it. In addition to the uninhabited island, Robinson also got absolutely free time, lived at his own discretion, outside the rhythms of public life. Isn’t this what many of us dream of? And although, upon returning to his homeland, Crusoe considers his constant desire to leave for the island a “real illness”, the realization of this fact does not make the desire itself less strong. But he is no less eager to return – like those rich businessmen who are always moving from city to village and back, whom Defoe observed in London. Attractive and repulsive, free and egocentric, Crusoe is a highly ambivalent teacher of life, just like his creator.

Keys to Understanding

Independence

Robinson Crusoe, at the same time a craftsman, farmer and livestock breeder living on the island, is an example of successfully implemented autarky, understood both as economic isolation and as personal independence from the outside world. This utopia fascinated Rousseau and Jules Verne, but Karl Marx subjected it to sharp criticism, which was addressed both to the economist David Riccardo with his “Robinsonade”, and to the utopian socialists Fourier and Owen: the weak point of their theories, Marx considered the illusory autonomy based on the dream of self-sufficiency and on the denial of social realities.

Robinson has something of the Club Med system, says writer Michel Tournier. The success of this holiday formula with a variety of “settlements” for tourists is largely due to the fact that during the holidays you can indulge yourself with the illusion of a common (communal) life.

Your circle

How does Crusoe feel about other people? His avoidance of association with savages anticipates today’s practice of withdrawing from public life. They will object to me: what about the faithful Friday? But Robinson quickly ceases to perceive him as an independent person, leaving him only the “function” of a comrade in misfortune. Crusoe needs not so much society as the company that he would choose for himself. The same thing happens with space: Robinson did not begin to adapt to the land where fate brought him. Instead, he seeks to bring it into line with his values ​​and ideas. The desire to be at home everywhere turns into a denial of everything alien and unusual.

Duality

While Rousseau, this radical follower of Robinson, preferred seclusion, Robinson himself hesitates. He flashes the idea to leave the coast – the only place where contact with people is possible – and settle in the depths of the island. In the end, he chooses a coast and sails back to England. But he will return. Two people are imprisoned in Robinson: one strives for a social life, the second for a world that belongs to him alone. His choice is not to make a choice; he preferred a way of life that Londoners of Defoe’s time considered alternative. Today, this “omnipresence” has become quite commonplace: just look at the streams of cars migrating out of town for the weekend, and the fashion for different types of “second homes”.