Crusoe in England

Elizabeth Bishop’s “Crusoe in England” is based on Daniel Defoe’s 1719 The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. Defoe’s novel depicts the misfortunes and tenacity of its main character, Robinson Crusoe, as he survives as a castaway on an unknown Caribbean island. Bishop adopts Crusoe as her speaker and imagines his life and recollections after returning to England at the end of Defoe’s novel. Bishop takes poetic liberties with the events of Defoe’s narrative, particularly regarding Friday and his death “of measles” (Line 181) at the poem’s end. In Defoe’s account, Friday is a former cannibal, presumably from a local tribe, rescued by Crusoe. Crusoe converts Friday to Christianity and befriends him, and Friday leaves the island to live with Crusoe upon their rescue. Their loyalty toward one another is eternalized in the expression “my man Friday,” which suggests someone loyal and trustworthy, a so-called right-hand man. Despite Bishop’s liberties with Friday, she stays true to the novel’s setting and themes of continual solitude.

Bishop’s poem relies on the distinctions its speaker, Robinson Crusoe, makes between England and his “poor old island” (Line 8). In doing so, Bishop sets England and Crusoe’s Caribbean island in constant

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