The exposition of Robinson Crusoe is replete with foreshadowing of the narrator's fate. It is obvious that something very bad will happen to Robinson, and that it will come as a result of his own decisions. These hints create a buildup that makes the reader apprehensive for all the misfortune to come.
The tone in the beginning of the novel is to a significant degree shaped by Robinson's position as an old man looking back on his "preposterous" ideas and choices early in his life. It is no coincidence that Robinson Crusoe is narrated posteriorly. The past tense is an essential element of the narrative, and Defoe makes active use of it in his narrator's frequent critiques of his past missteps. Despite knowing how everything will turn out before he begins recounting his story, the narrator obviously does not give it all away from the get-go. Nevertheless, Robinson's commentary on the enduring ramifications that his early decision-making will have on the rest of his life foreshadows the coming calamities. For example, Robinson identifies the following part of his father's discourse as "prophetick" in Chapter 1:
[...] he would venture to say to me, that if I did take this foolish step, God would not bless me, and I would have leisure hereafter to reflect upon having neglected his counsel when there might be none to assist in my recovery.
These reflections continue after Robinson sets off on his journey and the plot is underway. After his first bad experience at sea, the Shipmaster tells Robinson he has bad luck and exhorts him to go back to his father, "and not tempt Providence to [his] ruin." This Shipmaster delivers a weighty warning to Robinson in Chapter 2.
Young man, says he, you ought never to go to sea any more, you ought to take this for a plain and visible token that you are not to be a seafaring man [...] And young man, said he, depend upon it, if you do not go back, where ever you go, you will meet with nothing but disasters and disappointments, till your father's words are fulfilled upon you.
In these early chapters of the novel, the foreshadowing of Robinson's fate leaves the reader conflicted. On the one hand, the reader hopes that Robinson will give up and go home after this series of indications that a life at sea is not for him. On the other hand, the reader knows that Robinson will not give up—otherwise the story would not exist.
The exposition of Robinson Crusoe is replete with foreshadowing of the narrator's fate. It is obvious that something very bad will happen to Robinson, and that it will come as a result of his own decisions. These hints create a buildup that makes the reader apprehensive for all the misfortune to come.
The tone in the beginning of the novel is to a significant degree shaped by Robinson's position as an old man looking back on his "preposterous" ideas and choices early in his life. It is no coincidence that Robinson Crusoe is narrated posteriorly. The past tense is an essential element of the narrative, and Defoe makes active use of it in his narrator's frequent critiques of his past missteps. Despite knowing how everything will turn out before he begins recounting his story, the narrator obviously does not give it all away from the get-go. Nevertheless, Robinson's commentary on the enduring ramifications that his early decision-making will have on the rest of his life foreshadows the coming calamities. For example, Robinson identifies the following part of his father's discourse as "prophetick" in Chapter 1:
[...] he would venture to say to me, that if I did take this foolish step, God would not bless me, and I would have leisure hereafter to reflect upon having neglected his counsel when there might be none to assist in my recovery.
These reflections continue after Robinson sets off on his journey and the plot is underway. After his first bad experience at sea, the Shipmaster tells Robinson he has bad luck and exhorts him to go back to his father, "and not tempt Providence to [his] ruin." This Shipmaster delivers a weighty warning to Robinson in Chapter 2.
Young man, says he, you ought never to go to sea any more, you ought to take this for a plain and visible token that you are not to be a seafaring man [...] And young man, said he, depend upon it, if you do not go back, where ever you go, you will meet with nothing but disasters and disappointments, till your father's words are fulfilled upon you.
In these early chapters of the novel, the foreshadowing of Robinson's fate leaves the reader conflicted. On the one hand, the reader hopes that Robinson will give up and go home after this series of indications that a life at sea is not for him. On the other hand, the reader knows that Robinson will not give up—otherwise the story would not exist.
In Chapter 2, Robinson sets off on a voyage and experiences his two first storms as a sailor. The first storm seems to make an impression on no one but Robinson himself, and the other sailors mock his naiveté when he reveals that it frightened him. The second storm, however, frightens everyone on board; even the weathered Shipmaster prays to God for assistance, certain that they "shall be all lost, [...] all undone."
When they make it back to shore instead of foundering, the Shipmaster finds out that Robinson had considered this voyage as a trial. This discovery enrages the Shipmaster, who tells Robinson to go back home and prophecies that he will face great calamities if he continues on his seafaring adventure. Alluding to Jonah, he suggests that their near-death experience was Robinson's fault.
Young man, [...] you ought never to go to sea any more, you ought to take this as a plain and visible token that you are not to be a seafaring man [...] as you made this voyage for a trial, you see what a taste Heaven has given you of what you are to expect if you persist; perhaps this is all befallen us on your account, like Jonah in the Ship of Tarshish.
The severity of the Shipmaster's accusation is heightened by the comparison of Robinson to Jonah. In the Old Testament, God sends a storm after Jonah when Jonah runs away from what God had asked him to do. Just as Robinson gets on the Shipmaster's ship to flee the life his father wants for him, Jonah gets on a ship to flee from God's wishes. The Shipmaster finds Robinson's unfilial decision-making as inauspicious as Jonah's disobedience to God and suggests that Robinson's presence on his ship was the reason for the tempest.
This allusion can also be understood as a form of foreshadowing. Jonah is eventually thrown into the sea, just as Robinson eventually ends up in the shipwreck. To save Jonah from drowning, God sends a large fish to swallow him up. Although Robinson does not find himself swallowed by a fish, he does come to believe that God saved him. The fish that God sent to swallow Jonah returns him to dry land; in Robinson's view, it was God who ensured that he survived the shipwreck and made it to the island. Jonah and Robinson end up in the sea because of their own foolishness and disobedience, and they both attribute their survival to divine providence.
In Chapter 4, during his brief stint as a sugar planter in Brazil, Robinson begins to itch for adventure again. After being taken as a slave in Sallee, he has already had a taste of how horribly a life at sea can go for him. Nonetheless, he longs for a more exciting life. He also feels dissatisfied because he appears to be reaching exactly the middle station that his father had wanted for him—and so he feels like he might as well be living comfortably in England than in a foreign, far-off lace where he lacks family and friends. He uses a simile to describe his emotions:
I used to look upon my condition with the utmost regret. I had no body to converse with but now and then this neighbour; no work to be done, but by the labour of my hands; and I used to say, I liv'd just like a man cast away upon some desolate island, that had no body there but himself. But how just has it been, and how should all men reflect, that when they compare their present conditions with others that are worse, Heaven may oblige them to make the exchange.
The simile in these reflections, that he lived like a man stranded on a desolate island, exaggerates Robinson's solitude and foreshadows the shipwreck in his near future. Although the reader does not yet know this, their narrator is an expert on what it means to be stuck on a desert island—it will prove greatly relevant to much of the novel's plot. The final sentence of the quote is what really pushes this ironically relevant simile into the realm of foreshadowing. Robinson frequently shares reflections such as this one regarding the forces of providence, fate, and divine will. In this moment, it is unlikely that the reader understands that he is suggesting that "Heaven" (divine providence) will literally exchange his present condition with life on a desolate island. Nonetheless, the simile foreshadows a looming change in Robinson's life.
Robinson mentions cannibals quite early on, which foreshadows a later point in the novel when he actually encounters cannibals. His first mentions of cannibals feel especially premature considering how late they appear in the narrative as veritable characters with any kind of bearing on the plot.
For example, when Robinson has made his escape from Sallee and is traveling along the coast of Africa with Xury, his decisions are informed by his fear of being "devour'd by savage beasts, or more merciless savages of human kind." On the voyage that results in the fateful shipwreck, he is similarly preoccupied by the "danger of being devoured by savages." Robinson the narrator wants to make sure to put cannibals on his reader's radar as early as he can.
Before he even becomes aware of the presence of cannibals on his island, he reflects from time to time on the man-eating natives who live in this part of the world. In Chapter 9, he thinks about his geographic location and the degree to which it renders him vulnerable.
[...] then it was the savage coast between the Spanish country and Brasils, which are indeed the worst of savages; for they are cannibals, or men-eaters, and fail not to murther and devour all the human bodies that fall into their hands.
By this point, the reader becomes increasingly sure that their backward-thinking narrator would not be so focused on cannibals if they were not going to turn up in the narrative at some point. And sure enough, Robinson eventually finds the footprint in the sand and discovers that cannibals from a nearby island come to his island to sacrifice and eat humans. He fixates more and more on the cannibals, and an encounter between Robinson and the cannibals begins to seem inevitable to the reader. In Chapter 17, he becomes obsessed by this looming threat:
...yet all this while I liv’d uncomfortably, by reason of the constant apprehensions I was in of their coming upon me by surprise; from whence I observe, that the expectation of evil is more bitter than the suffering [...] I spent my days now in great perplexity, and anxiety of mind, expecting that I should one day or other fall into the hands of these merciless creatures...
As a result, the reader is almost relieved when Robinson comes into contact with the cannibals. Defoe has foreshadowed this encounter with a growing focus throughout the novel, so the reader feels ready and excited (though perhaps tensely so) when it finally occurs.
Robinson mentions cannibals quite early on, which foreshadows a later point in the novel when he actually encounters cannibals. His first mentions of cannibals feel especially premature considering how late they appear in the narrative as veritable characters with any kind of bearing on the plot.
For example, when Robinson has made his escape from Sallee and is traveling along the coast of Africa with Xury, his decisions are informed by his fear of being "devour'd by savage beasts, or more merciless savages of human kind." On the voyage that results in the fateful shipwreck, he is similarly preoccupied by the "danger of being devoured by savages." Robinson the narrator wants to make sure to put cannibals on his reader's radar as early as he can.
Before he even becomes aware of the presence of cannibals on his island, he reflects from time to time on the man-eating natives who live in this part of the world. In Chapter 9, he thinks about his geographic location and the degree to which it renders him vulnerable.
[...] then it was the savage coast between the Spanish country and Brasils, which are indeed the worst of savages; for they are cannibals, or men-eaters, and fail not to murther and devour all the human bodies that fall into their hands.
By this point, the reader becomes increasingly sure that their backward-thinking narrator would not be so focused on cannibals if they were not going to turn up in the narrative at some point. And sure enough, Robinson eventually finds the footprint in the sand and discovers that cannibals from a nearby island come to his island to sacrifice and eat humans. He fixates more and more on the cannibals, and an encounter between Robinson and the cannibals begins to seem inevitable to the reader. In Chapter 17, he becomes obsessed by this looming threat:
...yet all this while I liv’d uncomfortably, by reason of the constant apprehensions I was in of their coming upon me by surprise; from whence I observe, that the expectation of evil is more bitter than the suffering [...] I spent my days now in great perplexity, and anxiety of mind, expecting that I should one day or other fall into the hands of these merciless creatures...
As a result, the reader is almost relieved when Robinson comes into contact with the cannibals. Defoe has foreshadowed this encounter with a growing focus throughout the novel, so the reader feels ready and excited (though perhaps tensely so) when it finally occurs.
Throughout his narrative, Robinson demonstrates a keen preoccupation with fate and prophetic signs. He derives great value from the experience of coincidentally opening the Bible to verses that seem to perfectly capture and address his current situation. Additionally, he shows deference to the symbolic or predictive power of his own dreams. The most significant example of this can be found in Chapter 18, when Robinson dreams that one of the cannibals' prisoners escapes and comes to him. This dream is an example of foreshadowing because it comes true a few years later—in part because the dream makes him determined to "get a savage into [his] possession."
I dream’d, that as I was going out in the morning as usual from my castle, I saw upon the shore, two canoes, and eleven savages coming to land, and that they brought with them another savage, who they were going to kill, in order to eat him; when on a sudden, the savage that they were going to kill, jumpt away, and ran for his life; [...] and, smiling upon him, encourag’d him; that he kneel’d down to me, seeming to pray me to assist him; upon which I shew’d my ladder, made him go up, and carry’d him into my cave, and he became my servant...
Almost this exact situation arises later in the novel. However, it is not simply a matter of Robinson's dream happening to come true. Rather, he goes out of his way to ensure that the dream will serve as a prophecy. Designating the dream as an instructional model, he takes cues from it for how he ought to proceed. Robinson is determined to make his dream real, and in Chapter 19, about a year and a half later, he does.
...and now I expected that part of my dream was coming to pass, and that he would certainly take shelter in my grove; but I could not depend by any means upon my dream for the rest of it, (viz.) that the other savages would not pursue him thither, and find him there.
In the same way that the reader eventually grows certain that an encounter with the cannibals is inevitable, the reader expects that their narrator will soon acquire a companion in the chapters leading up to this moment. As a result, it is not simply the coming together of Robinson and Friday that is exciting, because Defoe's meticulous foreshadowing has made the reader sure that something like this would take place. More so, the reader feels eager to see how it will take place, and whether it will happen as it did in the dream.
Throughout his narrative, Robinson demonstrates a keen preoccupation with fate and prophetic signs. He derives great value from the experience of coincidentally opening the Bible to verses that seem to perfectly capture and address his current situation. Additionally, he shows deference to the symbolic or predictive power of his own dreams. The most significant example of this can be found in Chapter 18, when Robinson dreams that one of the cannibals' prisoners escapes and comes to him. This dream is an example of foreshadowing because it comes true a few years later—in part because the dream makes him determined to "get a savage into [his] possession."
I dream’d, that as I was going out in the morning as usual from my castle, I saw upon the shore, two canoes, and eleven savages coming to land, and that they brought with them another savage, who they were going to kill, in order to eat him; when on a sudden, the savage that they were going to kill, jumpt away, and ran for his life; [...] and, smiling upon him, encourag’d him; that he kneel’d down to me, seeming to pray me to assist him; upon which I shew’d my ladder, made him go up, and carry’d him into my cave, and he became my servant...
Almost this exact situation arises later in the novel. However, it is not simply a matter of Robinson's dream happening to come true. Rather, he goes out of his way to ensure that the dream will serve as a prophecy. Designating the dream as an instructional model, he takes cues from it for how he ought to proceed. Robinson is determined to make his dream real, and in Chapter 19, about a year and a half later, he does.
...and now I expected that part of my dream was coming to pass, and that he would certainly take shelter in my grove; but I could not depend by any means upon my dream for the rest of it, (viz.) that the other savages would not pursue him thither, and find him there.
In the same way that the reader eventually grows certain that an encounter with the cannibals is inevitable, the reader expects that their narrator will soon acquire a companion in the chapters leading up to this moment. As a result, it is not simply the coming together of Robinson and Friday that is exciting, because Defoe's meticulous foreshadowing has made the reader sure that something like this would take place. More so, the reader feels eager to see how it will take place, and whether it will happen as it did in the dream.
