Robinson Crusoe鲁滨逊漂流记人物分析

The Characters of the Emerging bourgeoisie revealed in Robinson CrusoeAbstract: Robinson Crusoe, based on a real fact, successfully creates a hero, an empire builder, and a super man. The author Defoe, because of this book, becomes the father of English realistic novel. People like to talk about Robinson Crusoe, with his adventure and everything he had done when he was facing the obstacles. To some people, Robinson is a hero, a giant, and perfect in all aspects. While some other people think that Robinson is the one who struggles only for property. This paper deals with him as an emerging bourgeoisie. In this way, all his behavior seems more reasonable.Key words: adventure, property, material civilizationRobinson Crusoe is a classic adventure novel. In this novel, the spirit of adventure of the emerging bourgeoisie is highly praised. Robinson Crusoe, born as an emerging bourgeoisie, refusing to inherit property from his father, decides to leave his middle station family and begins his new adventurous life.The motive of his adventure, as he first tells her mother “that my thoughts were so entirely bent upon seeing the world”(Daniel Defoe,Robinson Crusoe, 5) [1] or as some people believes he is driven by his romantic ideas. However, there are neither any descriptions of his appreciation of the scenery nor any entertaining activities. Actually, in the 18th century, the word “adventure” does not refer to the impulse of romance to a large extent, but it refers to a fanatical pursuit of profit. [2] So the desire of Robinson’s adventure clearly reveals his willingness of getting more profit. Driven by this powerful force, he leaves his family although his father gives him serious and counsel against what he foresees is Robison’s design. Robinson is not a real adventurer; he leaves his family just because he is not satisfied with the current situation of his middle station family. He was not willing to stick to the old doctrines and lives a life of leisure and ease. And it is it that causes him to go out to sea three times to do business, even after he has established his plantation in Brazil.“That evil influence which carried me first away from my father’s house, that hurried me into the wild and indigested notion of raising my fortune, and that impressed those conceits so forcibly upon me as make me deaf to all good advice and to the entreaties and even command of my father” (Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe, 18). After the first accident, even Robinson is thrilled and feels regretful for a while, but this “evil influence” still supports him and makes him keep going sailing. This is only from one aspect, and in his later experience, we can see it more clearly. Once, he meets a captain and treats him as his good friend because from the captain he can learn a lot and “increased very considerably” as well as become “both a sailor and a merchant”(Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe, 20). Later in another voyage, “I did not carry quite ￡100 of my new-gained wealth, so that I had ￡200 left, and which I lodged withmy friend’s widow, who was very just to me”. Robinson’s principle of judging person is totally different from most of the people, his never changed principle is “pursuing property”. It is suitable for the friendship between the captain and him and it goes the same with the relationship between him and anybody else.Besides, it is hard to find his emotional attachment to any body. Between all the lines of the book, he talks a little about his parents and his family in the first few pages. During those 28 years living alone on the isolated island, he never thinks of his old friends or his parents (if his seldom thinking of his father’s good counsel is not included when he is frustrated). What he mentions most is his individual life and his hardworking on the island. He focuses on his fighting for a better life and the things he wants to possess.What impresses the readers most is Robinson’s experience on the island. For the first few years, he is all alone there and lives a miserable life. But he never gives up hope and complains about his fate. Instead, he tries his best to struggle for a better living condition. Luckily, he gets enough necessities including food and tools from the wreck of the ship. “how well I was furnished for my subsistence and what would have been my case if it had not been happened, which was a hundred thousand to one, that the ship floated from the place where she first struck and was driven so near to the shore that I had time to get all these things out of her”(Daniel Defoe,Robinson Crusoe, 78) This suggests that Robinson does not get rid of the material civilization. He doesn’t lives like a savage. With the aid of the tools, he builds up his living places, plants enough food for himself, hunts wild animals or domesticates them, manufactures tools and sewing clothes. After a series of struggle, everything on his island becomes in good order and all within his control. A once deserted island begins to prosper. Even Robinson himself can’t imagine, what will his life be like. His life on the isolated island reveals the shining characters of bourgeoisie in a rising stage. He is a hard working man. Robinson had shown his marvelous capacity for work, his boundless energy and persistence in overcoming obstacles. His perseverance in spending months making a canoe, and in practicing pottery making until he got it right, is praiseworthy. Additionally, his resourcefulness in building a shelter, dairy, grape arbor, country house, goat stable is remarkable. He struggled hard against nature and made it bend to his will. Robinson has set a good model for us. Anyway, although he left the society, his behaviors reflect a lot of characters of emerging bourgeoisie.At last, Robinson is nonetheless very interested in possessions, power and prestige. After the island was peopled, he thinks he is “very rich in subjects”, and he thinks “how like a king I looked. First of all, the whole country was my own mere property; so that I had an undoubted right of dominion. Secondly, my people were perfectly subjected: I was absolute lord and law giver; they all owed their lives to me, and every ready to lay down their lives…”(Daniel Defoe,Robinson Crusoe, 320) Meanwhile, he is cold and detached when it comes to his family and marriage. “ forfirst of all I married, and that not either to my disadvantage or dissatisfaction, and had three children, two sons and one daughter. But my wife dying…” He states all these facts in a brief and cold way, and it makes a great comparison with his detailed procedures of making tools on the island. So a conclusion can be drawn, it is always true to Robinson that the power and property is the perpetual theme in his life. He will never get rid of material civilization. Emotional attachment is not a necessity in his life.In a word, Robinson represents the bourgeoisie in the rising stage in English society. So his spirit of adventure, or to be more specific, the pursuit of property, his perseverance when faced obstacles, and his cold attitude toward relationships between people inevitably reveal the characters of the Emerging bourgeoisie of that age. In this novel, Defoe successfully gives us a fascinating glimpse into the complicated modern society in England of the 18th century.References:[1] Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe,外语教学与研究出版社，2007.2[2] 黄梅，推敲“自我”：小说在十八世纪的英国，生活﹒读书﹒新知三联书店，2003.5。