WRITING SELF IN DANIEL DEFOE’S NOVELS

Abstract

Daniel Defoe’s novels are widely acknowledged as self-reflexive constructs in which the criminal protagonists, like the author, often thrust moral judgment aside for the sake of personal interests. Existing studies on Defoe have tended to downplay the import of the relationship which he established between the activities of these criminal protagonists and the seemingly impeccable Restoration English society (1660-1700). The study was designed to examine the presence of the authorial self vis-à-vis the values of the Restoration English society in shaping Defoe’s ideology in order to establish that the individual is a product of the immediate environment. Sigmund Freud’s model of ‘phantasy as fiction’ within the Psychoanalytic Theory was adopted based on its effectiveness in integrating and interpreting authorial psychic self, and the writer’s creative sensibility. The novels, Robinson Crusoe, The King of Pirates, Captain Singleton, Moll Flanders, Colonel Jack and Roxana were purposively selected based on their apt reflection of the criminal activities of the protagonists in the context of the values of the Restoration English society. The novels were subjected to critical analysis. Salient evidence of the authorial self is demonstrated by all of Defoe’s protagonists through the pursuit of gentility with its attendant identity crisis and avarice. His ambition-oriented drives make him change his name from ‘Foe’ to ‘Defoe’, besides using a series of pen names like T. Taylor. This is re-enacted in Robinson Crusoe, where the protagonist drops his German ‘Sir-name’ Kreutznaer for Crusoe as a means of taking on a new English identity. The protagonist in Captain Singleton is generally known as Captain Bob; however, he uses the name Captain Singleton as a trade-name. In Moll Flanders, the heroine disguises as Gabriel Spencer in order to carry out robbery operations, among others. Defoe’s avaricious nature is demonstrated in The King of Pirates and Captain Singleton where Avery claims he is richer than a nation and Singleton confesses that he has made more wealth than what he needs in a life-time; nevertheless, they did not stop robbing others. In Roxana, Roxana rejects a noble marriage with the merchant and chooses to be a whore to the Prince because of the latter’s wealth. Crusoe also disobeys his father out of his desperate attempt to make wealth as a sailor. The final note of Defoe’s stories is that all the changes and criminal activities he engages in, and subsequently re-enacts through the fictional lives of his criminal protagonists, are as a result of the high value that the Restoration English society places on the socio-economic notions of the individual’s identity, level of wealth and state of gentility. Defoe’s criminal protagonists are archetypes of the authorial self who practises vice as a result of the false sense of gentility which the Restoration English society imposes on its members. Therefore, through his artistic sensibility, he writes of the authorial self as a victim and product of an already corrupt society.