Importance Of Imagination In Robinson Crusoe

Imagination can be found in every person; it is a mental ability that drives a person, be it in a positive or negative way, into developing an opinion from something unknown to them. A person can be influenced, by their imagination, into taking risks, making decisions or seeing different aspects of their current circumstances. In Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, imagination came into play as a key factor of how Crusoe developed throughout the novel; because it opened his mind into seeing situations differently; involving feelings, like fear. It manipulated Crusoe’s thoughts and emotions to further impact his isolation on the island. In the end, imagination became the catalyst that led Crusoe into his own mind to further understand and analyze …show more content…
As Foster wrote, “the journal functions as a narrative accretion which intensifies the division in Crusoe's character. The journal displays an evolving pattern of mastery over the environment, but set against this pattern is the view it offers of a terrified, anxious, and paranoid Crusoe, the victim of a fear-haunted imagination, who builds enclosures around himself” (Foster 191). Not only is the journal seen as Crusoe’s way of keeping order, it also shows his constant fear of either not having enough to survive or of dying alone and not leaving a trace of his existence on the island. Imagination is understood here as the fear factor that plays part throughout all of Crusoe’s experience on the …show more content…
As Foster wrote “the limitations imposed on Crusoe by his situation on the island serve to intensify the conflict and to reveal the main character as the victim of the powerfully disruptive force of his imagination” (Foster 195); not only was Crusoe a victim of a shipwreck, he was also a victim of his own powerful imagination. His imagination developed itself into the thoughts of ownership, his constant fear of the unknown and his battle with religion. Crusoe was in an endless circle of paranoia because of his overactive imagination; as Crusoe stated “I went so far with it in my Imagination that I employ’d myself several Days to find out proper Places to put myself in Ambuscade” (Defoe 143). He got to a point where he was dependent on his imagination in order to survive on the island; from his idealization that there were cannibals on the island, to his thoughts that God had an ultimate plan that he had to