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Robinson Crusoe shipwrecked, and clinging to a rock.
Artist: Thomas Stothard
Engraver: C. Heath
1782, 1790
Copper-engraving
11 cm high by 8.3 cm wide
Source: Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe, facing page 36.
[Click on image to enlarge it and mouse over text for links.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
The wave that came upon me again buried me at once twenty or thirty feet deep in its own body, and I could feel myself carried with a mighty force and swiftness towards the shore — a very great way; but I held my breath, and assisted myself to swim still forward with all my might. I was ready to burst with holding my breath, when, as I felt myself rising up, so, to my immediate relief, I found my head and hands shoot out above the surface of the water; and though it was not two seconds of time that I could keep myself so, yet it relieved me greatly, gave me breath, and new courage. I was covered again with water a good while, but not so long but I held it out; and finding the water had spent itself, and began to return, I struck forward against the return of the waves, and felt ground again with my feet. I stood still a few moments to recover breath, and till the waters went from me, and then took to my heels and ran with what strength I had further towards the shore. But neither would this deliver me from the fury of the sea, which came pouring in after me again; and twice more I was lifted up by the waves and carried forward as before, the shore being very flat.
The last time of these two had well-nigh been fatal to me, for the sea having hurried me along as before, landed me, or rather dashed me, against a piece of rock, and that with such force, that it left me senseless, and indeed helpless, as to my own deliverance; for the blow taking my side and breast, beat the breath as it were quite out of my body; and had it returned again immediately, I must have been strangled in the water; but I recovered a little before the return of the waves, and seeing I should be covered again with the water, I resolved to hold fast by a piece of the rock, and so to hold my breath, if possible, till the wave went back. Now, as the waves were not so high as at first, being nearer land, I held my hold till the wave abated, and then fetched another run, which brought me so near the shore that the next wave, though it went over me, yet did not so swallow me up as to carry me away; and the next run I took, I got to the mainland, where, to my great comfort, I clambered up the cliffs of the shore and sat me down upon the grass, free from danger and quite out of the reach of the water. [Chapter III, "Wrecked on a Desert Island," pp. 35-36]
Stothard initially provided fifteen plates in Harrison's 1782 edition, then a more comprehensive set for John Stockdale's 1790 edition. Stothard added five plates to the second group of illustrations for this edition.
Left: Wal Paget's elaborate treatment of the ship's bow as Crusoe returns to retrieve supplies, I espied a small piece of rope (1891: lithograph, Chapter IV, "First Weeks on the Island"). Centre: A children's book's colourful realisation of the same scene, but utterly lacking in realistic perspective: Robinson Crusoe cast away on the rock (1818). Right: Wehnert's dynamnic realisation of Crusoe's struggle for survival, Crusoe saved on the island (1862).
Above: Cruikshank's woodblock engraving of young Crusoe's clinging to a rock as the surf pounds him: Crusoe clinging to a rock on the beach (1831).
Above: Cassell's highly realistic wood-engraving of the wreck of the slave-ship, The Shipwreck (1863-64).
Defoe, Daniel. The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. A new and improved edition, interspersed with reflections, religious and moral. Adorned with engravings. London: J. Harris, 1818.
Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Written by Himself. Illustrated by Thomas Stothard; engraving by C. Heath. London: Bliss, Sands, and Foster, 1820.
Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, with introductory verses by Bernard Barton, and illustrated with numerous engravings from drawings by George Cruikshank expressly designed for this edition. 2 vols. London: Printed at the Shakespeare Press, by W. Nichol, for John Major, Fleet Street. 1831.
Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner. (1831). Major's Edition. London: Chatto & Windus, 1890.
Defoe, Daniel.The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, as Related by Himself. Illustrated by Wal Paget. London: Cassell, 1891.
"The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Extra-Extra-Illustrated (T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1820): Scope and Contents." PACSCL Finding Aids.Web. [18 January 2018]. http://dla.library.upenn.edu/cocoon/dla/pacscl/ead.html?id=PACSCL_RBCat_RBCat&sort=date_added_sort%20asc&fq=name_facet%3A%22Stothard%2C%20Thomas%2C%201755-1834%22&
Patten, Robert L. "Phase 2: "'The Finest Things, Next to Rembrandt's,' 1720–1835." Chapter 20, "Thumbnail Designs." George Cruikshank's Life, Times, and Art, vol. 1: 1792-1835. Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers U. P., 1992; London: The Lutterworth Press, 1992. Pp. 325-39.
Last modified 22 April 2018