Daniel Defoe: Ambition & Innovation

by Paula R. Backscheider

An excellent biography, the first since 1958, of a man whose life was an adventure rivaling Robinson Crusoe's. Backscheider (English, U. of Rochester) reveals new information about Defoe's secret career as a double agent, his daring business ventures, and his cat-and-mouse games with those who wanted to control the press and his dangerous pen. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.

Genres: Biography

299 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1986

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Backscheider's biography of De Foe introduced me to aspects of British history during his lifetime that I found to be very interesting. However, it includes so much detail that I finally gave up on it. It's an amazing piece of research, but not something for a general reader.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Second Reading: I see no reason to change my comments.

First Reading (2010/11)
I've owned this book for many years. After finishing several biographies of Stalin and several books on the kulak campaign and the show trials of the 1930s, I was ready for something entirely different - which this biography furnishes in abundance.
I will say that this biography is rather of the "old-school" variety, by which I mean that the author collates an abundance of biographical information, literary criticism, descriptions of political and intellectual contexts, etc., but seems to miss the man altogether. This is not to say that Backscheider's book isn't "definitive" or a success, at least respecting the objectives she set for herself. It is to say, however, that after having read Ann Wroe's "Being Shelly" or Novick's volumes on Henry James or Joseph Frank's multi-volume work on Dostoyevski, Backscheider's Defoe is rather bloodless in comparison. She still manages to engage me, at least, because she writes so well, but I look forward to another biography of the man that captures what must have been his extraordinarily intense personality and active intellect.

After 450 pages, I am struggling to finish this 640 page book, which I will do, of course. Someone needed to write a book of this kind, and I'm glad Ms. Backscheider did so. I have to say, however, that she looses sight of her subject in her description/explication of context. And besides, I can't imagine that anyone would want synopses of 500-600 works that DeFoe authored over 20-30 years in the vicious pamphlet wars of the reigns of King William, Queen Anne and George I. She seems to miss not a one.

I am astonished that anyone could write a book like this. Very well paced - very slowly paced, but paced slowly very well.

This is not a book I would ever read again, but this is the very first book I'd pick up if I needed info on party politics during the reigns of William, Anne and George I.