Daniel Defoe

Before writing Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Defoe had worked as a merchant, manufacturer, pamphleteer and newspaper editor. William Minto follows this varied career through a biography that places Defoe's writing alongside the religious and political disputes of his time. The opening traces his London background, his education for the Dissenting ministry and his decision to enter business. It also introduces a problem that runs through the account: Defoe's own stories about his life need careful checking.

Minto's attention extends to the practical pressures behind public argument. In the discussion of a change of government, Defoe weighs party loyalty, the reputation of departing ministers and the effect of political uncertainty on national credit. Readers interested in the relationship between literature and public life will find a portrait of an author whose newspaper work and shifting political circumstances receive close attention alongside his fiction.