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| 1/27/1722 |
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Daniel Defoe & Moll Flanders
On this day in 1722 Daniel Defoe published Moll Flanders -- or, more exactly, "The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c who was born at Newgate, and during a Life of continued Variety for Threescore Years, besides her Childhood, was Twelve Year a Whore, five time a Wife (whereof once to her own Brother), Twelve Year a Thief, Eight Year a Transported Felon in Virginia, at last grew rich, liv'd Honest, and died a Penitent." |
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| 7/16/1703 |
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Daniel Defoe, Dissenters, and the Pillory
In the summer of 1703, Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders were in Daniel Defoe's distant and improbable future; he was locked up, literally, in the horrors of the present: a cell in Newgate Prison, charges of "seditious libel," and thoughts of suicide. His "The Shortest Way With Dissenters" satire put him there, and his "Hymn to the Pillory" got him through it. |
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| 7/16/1703 |
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Daniel Defoe's "Hymn to the Pillory"
On this day in 1703 Daniel Defoe began to serve a three-day sentence in the pillory at Charing Cross, part of his punishment for the "seditious libel" of The Shortest Way with Dissenters. Others had died or been maimed in the pillory, but the ever-resourceful Defoe managed to so charm the crowd with "Hymn to the Pillory," written in Newgate Prison, that they presented him with flowers rather than rocks. |
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Online Books Page
Find electronic texts to a large body of works, including Moll Flanders, Robinson Crusoe, Everybody's Business is Nobody's Business, and A Journal of the Plague Year, and other works and essays. |  | Spark Notes
This student resource offers an online study guide to the novel which includes a plot overview and chapter-by-chapter summary, a review of themes, motifs and symbols, a list and analysis of characters, quotes, facts about the book, study questions, a quiz, and suggested reading.
"His focus on the actual conditions of everyday life and avoidance of the courtly and the heroic made Defoe a revolutionary in English literature and helped define the new genre of the novel. Stylistically, too, Defoe was a great innovator. Dispensing with the ornate and showy style associated with the upper classes, Defoe used the simple and direct fact-based style of the middle classes, which became the new standard for the English novel. Finally, with Robinson Crusoe's theme of solitary human existence, Defoe paved the way for the central modern theme of alienation and isolation." | |
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The TinL masthead features photography by
Natasha D'Schommer
, and the book art featured is by Jim Rosenau.
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