230566 Daniel Defoe: From Journalism to the Novel (S) (WiSe 2009/2010)

Defoe is most widely known to modern readers for his novel Robinson Crusoe (1719) – a text that many have regarded to be the first English novel. As a writer and a man living in the transitional phase from the 17th to the 18th century, Defoe is an altogether astonishing phenomenon: He served as a soldier and a secret agent, worked as a merchant and produced the incredible output of some 500 books on all sorts of topics, including geography, politics, economics, and what we would no term psychology. As an acute observer of his time, he also produced a newspaper. His writing demonstrates the close connection between fact and fiction, fabulation and accuracy that was to become characteristic of the 'realist' novel; his novels deal with life in the booming city of London, with merchants and prostitutes, the rise of the middle classes, and the plague – among other things. In this seminar, we will read three of his novels and extracts from some of his other works in order to study the life and times, the mentalities and the themes of Britain as depicted by Defoe. Photocopies of the extracts from his miscellaneous writings will be provided during the semester, but please buy your own copy of the three novels: Robinson Crusoe, Moll Flanders, Journal of the Plague Year. Please purchase an edited edition (i.e., one with an introduction and/or annotations), such as the Penguin Classics series.