"Robinson Crusoe" by Daniel Defoe

In his collection of essays, published as "Why Read Classics?" Italian writer Italo Calvino explains that classics are works we re-visit and re-read again - not only they create our collective memories, they never exhaust possibilities of interpretations, although they sound familiar they might surprise with new discoveries and they have power to enchant the reader although they might have been created in completely different times. "Robinson Crusoe" neatly fits all these definitions: simultaneously ancient museum piece and exciting adventure novel, it has been translated and re-created into various media to the point that we feel as we know everything about it, but if you attempt to actually re-visit this old friend, you might be surprised how strongly it still hold the spell on the reader. It is a perfect and quite unforgettable piece of escapism literature, camouflaged as adventure novel but in fact Crusoe's journeys are inward as much as outward - superficially we might see the main character just as a young and hot-headed adventurer who falls from one danger into another, however since he is stranded alone on desert island for a lengthy period of time, its just natural that he reflects and meditates about the life, destiny, faith and providence that brought him there and saved his life. 

Majority of these probably went over my head when I first read the novel as a precocious little reader and back than I was too excited about adventure aspects of desert island survivor and his daily fights with elements - aspects which are still a thrill to read, mind you - Daniel Defoe had deservedly earned everlasting fame with painstaking description of every little detail his Crusoe had to go trough in order to survive, until it actually hypnotises reader into breathless excitement about mundane survivor techniques. After years of solitude and main focus on food, grain, goats and such, the discovery of another human footprint in the sand comes as the most thrilling moment in the novel - and this is just a start of completely new turn in the story already full of surprises. Reading it again, several decades and a whole lifetime of experience later, these adventures are still thrilling but they take a second place when compared to Crusoe's inner life and journey that his lonely spirit travels between desperation and hope. Separated from any kind of human contact, he is left absolutely alone to either busy himself with basic survival or (on occasion of rainy days and illness) meditate about destiny, God and chain of accidents that brought him here - naturally he gets in low spirits and succumbs to depression from time to time, though eventually the pride in "his kingdom" takes over and at certain point he actually feels affectionately towards the place that at the beginning seemed dangerous and unfriendly. When current of the Sea takes him almost away from security of the island, Crusoe actually feels horrified - on one hand, he wants to escape from this place, on the other, this is only security he knows so he desperately finds his way back. Once Friday comes along, the story picks up though I actually loved everything that led to this moment, years of solitude and hard work. As expected the language and writing style are extremely old fashioned and flowery, which in my opinion gives the whole work even better quality, since its clearly written centuries ago and we are constantly aware this kind of prose serves almost as time capsule - from my middle-aged perspective, this gives the whole novel completely different aspect and I honestly loved it because of the way it was written.