The eponymous hero of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe has often been characterized

as the model of the rugged individual, a foreshadow of the modern capitalist. This

characterization has been laregly founded on two core arguments: Robinson’s selfish pursuit of

his desires in spite of his familie’s wishes and Robinson’s utilitarian characterization of his

relationships in primarily economic terms1. While these arguments are persuasive, they lack any

consideration for the narrative structure of the fictional, yet self-described as authentic,

autobiography; even though, Robinson Crusoe does seemingly possess the motives and

actions of the “the middle state, or what might be called the upper station of low life”2, these

motives and actions are all retroactively described by a fictional narrator who in the presentation

of his life does so with an agenda driven to validate the authenticity of his accounts as much as

to simply narrate. Consequently, the construction of self in Robinson Crusue is not so much an

economic unit, driven by the nascent individualism of the European middle class, as it is a

solipsistic mental construct trying to explain and justify its existence to both itself and its

audience. In this consideration of the narrative construct, the selfishness of Crusoe’s youth is

not so much proof of his individualism as it provides the religious context for the series of

calamitous events in his life and the economic qualifications to his relationships are not so much

proof of his capitalism as they provide actuarial evidence of his life.

While Crusoe states that “no vessel could say to [God] ‘Why hast thou formed me

thus?’”3, Crusoe

“Why has God done this to me? What have I done to be thus used?” 125

“deliverance from sin a much greater blessing than deliverance from affliction” 131

“But, alas! For me to do wrong that never did right, was no great wonder. I hail no

remedy but to go on” 47

1
Robinson Crusoe as Economic Man (September, 2002),
http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/novel_18c/defoe/economic.html (April, 2011)
2
P. 3
3
thewritedirection.net (2004), Daniel Defoe Robinson Crusoe, <http://ipod-library.net/eBooks/Give-
Away/Movie_eBooks/defoe-robinsoncrusoe.pdf> (April, 2011), p. 147.
 “All evils are to be considered with the good that is in them, and with what worse attends

them” 84

“the absence of it is insupportable” 257

“waiting the issue of the dispositions of Heaven seemed to be suspended” 271

“my original sin” 266

“narrow bounds to his sight and knowledge of things” 268