Record Keeping as a Tool for Improvement in Robinson Crusoe
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This paper aims to elucidate the relationship between improvement and record keeping, as observed in Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. Robinson Crusoe’s act of record keeping synchronically enables both kinds of improvement, material and spiritual, which together form the twin pillars of the novel. In Crusoe’s records, the economic account that promotes his material progress is composed of bookkeeping and timekeeping. Bookkeeping allows Crusoe to take active possession of unoccupied land and render it his private property. Timekeeping serves to regularise his working life, which enhances his productivity. The self-reflective account that spurs Crusoe’s spiritual progress can be divided into an exploration of the self and an interpretation of the Bible. Through writing on his mental state in isolation, he begins to explore his self more seriously than ever before. By interpreting the Bible, Crusoe experiences a spiritual awakening, which is crystallized by his journal keeping. Crusoe’s records are the key to the interpretation of Robinson Crusoe as a novel that suggests the possibility of congruence of materiality and spirituality, and also the close relation between improvement and the act of record keeping which continues to this day.
Abstract
This paper aims to elucidate the relationship between improvement and record keeping, as observed in Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. Robinson Crusoe’s act of record keeping synchronically enables both kinds of improvement, material and spiritual, which together form the twin pillars of the novel. In Crusoe’s records, the economic account that promotes his material progress is composed of bookkeeping and timekeeping. Bookkeeping allows Crusoe to take active possession of unoccupied land and render it his private property. Timekeeping serves to regularise his working life, which enhances his productivity. The self-reflective account that spurs Crusoe’s spiritual progress can be divided into an exploration of the self and an interpretation of the Bible. Through writing on his mental state in isolation, he begins to explore his self more seriously than ever before. By interpreting the Bible, Crusoe experiences a spiritual awakening, which is crystallized by his journal keeping. Crusoe’s records are the key to the interpretation of Robinson Crusoe as a novel that suggests the possibility of congruence of materiality and spirituality, and also the close relation between improvement and the act of record keeping which continues to this day.
참고문헌 (17)
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- Novak, Maximillian E., "The Cambridge Companion to Daniel Defoe", pp.25~42 (2009), Cambridge UP
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- Watt, Ian, "Myths of Modern Individualism: Faust, Don Quixote, Don Juan, Robinson Crusoe" (1996), Cambridge UP
- Wood, Ellen Meiksins, "Liberty and Property: A Social History of Western Political Thought from the Renaissance to Enlightenment" (2012), Verso
- Yamey, Basil S., "Scientific Bookkeeping and the Rise of Capitalism", The Economic History Review, 1(2-3), pp.99~113 (1949)