Whether it is a vessel, a plantation, or an island, Robinson's immediate environment never ceases to play an active role in his character development as well as the advancement of the novel's plot. Over the course of the first four chapters, the geographic backdrop of Robinson's narrative frequently changes. This whirlwind of new settings in the book's exposition stands in stark contrast to the constancy of the island setting that continues through the majority of the novel. In the beginning, Robinson is constantly searching for new places to go. At the end of the fourth chapter, however, he finds himself physically stuck in one place; he has no choice but to remain there.
Although most of the book's chapters take place on the island and in the sea around it, the setting is still varied in scope after Robinson reaches the island. This is because he spends much of his time exploring the island and devotes much of the narrative to describing it in what might be described as a series of verbal maps. The island is its own world, and Robinson eventually has multiple abodes spread across it that he moves between. The setting of the final chapter is once again more global in nature, as he returns to Europe and spends time in Portugal, France, and England.
The geographically expansive scope of the setting is defined by European colonization of the New World. The novel is set in the 17th century, a period when European countries were competing for territory and trade in the Americas. Robinson moves all around the Atlantic world, and sees his access to it as quite natural. Many of his fellow characters, the Europeans in particular, share this view of exploration as a matter of course. Although his father expresses a profound desire for Robinson to remain in England, even he sees the movement of young men out beyond the confines of their own country and Europe as predictable. Otherwise he wouldn't be warning Robinson against doing just that. On a more micro level, Robinson's relationship to the island is also marked by colonialism. In his view, he has a "right of possession" to the island because he discovered it and settled it first—even if he knows that the "savages" had been there before him.
Timekeeping also occupies a central role in the novel. The very first detail readers learn from the narrator himself is that he was born in 1632. From the first line of the novel, Robinson remains committed to keeping his reader updated on what year it is (or how many years he has been on the island, what season it is, how much time has passed since he left England, etc.). He is attached to milestones, especially when they overlap with one another. For example, he identifies great significance in the fact that he left for the voyage that resulted in the shipwreck eight years to the day after setting off on his first voyage: "I went on board in an evil hour, [...] being the same day eight year that I went from my father and mother at Hull." Besides this, he notes that he reached the island on his birthday, "so that [his] wicked life and [his] solitary life begun both on a day." He is also struck by the fact that he left the island the same day of the month that he first made his escape from Sallee. In the end, he leaves the island after having lived on it for "eight and twenty years, two months, and 19 days."
