Reviews

Le avventure di Robinson sono ormai un mito... Certo, si nota il peso dello stile scritturistico dell'ottocento, ma cmq è una storia piacevole, anche se spesso l'autore si sofferma molto a lungo su argomenti anche noiosi... Cmq recupera nella trama, per niente scontata. Lo consiglio a chi ama il mare e le isole deserte...

swoody788's review against another edition

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4.0

I can identify with some of poor Robin's experience though thankfully I'm not quite as alone as he was. Full of spiritual musings that I really enjoyed but also some rampant racism and eugenicism that I understand was the norm at the time but still hard to read. The last bit about traveling in the snow seemed bizarre and disconnected from the rest of the story, and I never knew there was a sequel until now. I thought for some reason that Friday was missing a toe - where did I get that idea? All in all this story is full of reminders to look for the good in all situations and give up fear. Jerk move to leave the Spaniards though.

Fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself.

serving_goffman's review against another edition

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slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

ryner's review against another edition

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adventurous reflective fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

While on a 17th-century voyage from Brazil to Africa, Robinson Crusoe's ship is severely damaged in a storm. He discovers upon gathering his wits on the shore of a Caribbean island that he is the sole survivor from the wreck and lucky to be alive. He also learns to his surprise that the ship and all its supplies is still in sight, foundering a tantalizingly reachable distance from shore. This is the eponymous story of Crusoe's nearly three decades surviving on the island, most of it in utter solitude.

In terms of engagement, it took a concerning few chapters for the story to get interesting, so I was relieved when it finally picked up steam. My first thought was that these were the most fortunate circumstances of any shipwreck I've ever heard of — Crusoe was able to salvage just about everything from the ship but the kitchen sink, to the point where the amount of supplies he started with was almost laughable. His detailed descriptions of his explorations and the things he built, created and cobbled together to further his survival were the most interesting parts of the narrative, although I couldn't believe it took him 11 years to start a herd of goats. The book's biggest shortcomings are when he goes off on lengthy theological tangents regarding what his plight might symbolize in the eyes of God and other pointless musings to the detriment of the plot. My eyes glazed over when the proselytizing got to be a bit much, and so I wanted to high-five Friday when he challenged Crusoe with the question, "If God is more powerful than the Devil, why doesn't he destroy evil once and for all?" (Friday, this is a question skeptics have been asking for centuries.) Crusoe was overall an interesting but occasionally unreliable narrator, at one point suggesting that he had no way to defend himself from "beasts," while having all variety of firearms, bladed weapons and barrelsful of gunpowder in his arsenal. Though he comes to the realization that the life he's living now is a better and a happier one than any he had lived previously, he doggedly continues to look for means to escape the island (one can suppose that what he really misses is social interaction). A few aspects that are particularly cringey to a 21st-century reader include the rampant racism (Crusoe takes no action against "savages" cannibalizing victims until a victim is shown to be European — we can't have that!), the portrayal of Friday's broken English, and animal cruelty. For a 300-year-old book this classic wasn't bad, and the language is still very readable/accessible. It's worth a read, with the added bonus of literary/pop culture awareness. One star removed for, after all we'd been through, an anticlimactic ending.

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