The writers of the Enlightenment

DANIEL DEFOE “ROBINSON CRUSOE”

Study Questions

1. At the beginning of the novel, what is Robinson Crusoe's attitude towards God and religion?

2. What evidence can you find in Crusoe's youth to determine his capitalism?

3. What are Crusoe's attitudes towards women in the latter part of the novel?

4. How many years was Crusoe on the island?

5. Do you think that Defoe meant this novel to be a moral tale? If so, what was the moral?

6. Could Crusoe be considered a "racist"?

7. Defoe has his hero practice two different types of writing in the novel. One type is the journal that Crusoe keeps for a few chapters until his ink runs out. The other is the fuller type of storytelling that makes up the bulk of the novel. Both are in the first-person voice, but they produce different effects. Why does Defoe include both types? What does a comparison between them tell us about the overall purpose of the novel?

8. Crusoe expresses very little appreciation of beauty in the novel. He describes the valley where he builds his bower as pleasant, recognizes that some of his early attempts at potter}-' making are unattractive, and acknowledges that Friday is good-looking. But overall, he shows little interest in aesthetics. Is this lack of interest in beauty an important aspect of the character of Crusoe, or of the novel?

9. Crusoe spends much time on the island devising ways to escape it. But when he

finally does escape, his return to Europe is anticlimactic. Nothing he finds there, not

even friends or family, is described with the same interest evoked earlier by his fortress or farm. Indeed, at the end of the novel Crusoe returns to the island. Why does Defoe portray the island originally as a place of captivity and then later as a desired destination?

10. Although he is happy to watch his goat and cat population multiply on his island, Crusoe never expresses any regret for not having a wife or children. He refers to his pets as his family, but never mentions any wish for a real human family. While he is sad that his dog never has a mate, he never seems saddened by his own thirty-five years of bachelor existence. Does Crusoe's indifference to mating and reproduction tell us anything about his view of life, or about the novel?

11. In many ways Crusoe appears to be the same sort of person at the end of the novel as he is at the beginning. Despite decades of solitude and exile, wars with cannibals, and the subjugation of a mutiny, Crusoe hardly seems to grow or develop. Is Crusoe an unchanging character, or does he change in subtle ways as a result of his ordeal?

12. Crusoe's religious illumination, in which he beholds an angelic figure descending on a flame, ordering him to repent or die, is extremely vivid. Afterward he does repent, and his faith seems sincere. Yet Defoe complicates this religious experience by making us wonder whether it is instead a result of Crusoe's fever, or of the tobacco and rum he has consumed. We wonder whether the vision may be health- or drug-related rather than supernatural and divine. Why does Defoe mix the divine and the medical in this scene? Does he want us to question Crusoe's turn to religion?

13. Consider the prominent role that religion plays in the novel and examine the progression of religious and political thought in Crusoe's "society."

14. What are Crusoe’s two major requirements of a good Chrisrian?

15. How does Crusoe reconcile his urge to kill cannibals with his religious beliefs?

JONATHAN SWIFT "GULLIVER'S TRAVELS"

Study Questions

1. Give examples of general and specific satire in all parts in Gulliver's Travels.

2. What significant and imaginative etymologies might be proved for the following names: Gulliver, Lilliput, Brobdingnag, Laputa, Houyhnhnm, Yahoo?

3. Can you discover any design in the various ways in which Gulliver reaches the country of his travel?

5. Compare the manner of escape, rescue and return home of Gulliver from his adventure.

6. Show that the figure of Gulliver presents both comic and tragic elements

7. While Gulliver's Travels is undoubtedly original, Swift drew upon several genres of writing for the composition of his book: namely, travel literature, the philosophic voyage, Utopian treatises and the fable. Illustrate.

8. No one country that Gulliver visits is considered by Swift to be an ideal Utopia, yet Utopian elements are found in each of them. What are some from country?

9. What aspect of monarchy (positive and negative) does Swift attempt to portray in each book?

10. " The chief function of reason, according to eighteenth - century views, was to fit a man for a happy life among his fellows." Does Gulliver s Travels always agree with this philosophy?

11. Swift satirizes the gulf between appearance and reality in Gulliver s Travels. Illustrate.

12. Would you consider Gulliver s Travels a novel?

13. Why might Swift have chosen horses to rule Houyhnhnm - land?

SEMINAR #7

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 1545