ABSTRACT
When Daniel Defoe wrote what is sometimes thought to be the first novel in the English language, his protagonist, Robinson Crusoe, treated the island on which he was shipwrecked in a manner similar to that of Adam and Eve tending the Garden of Eden: when supplies he could rescue from the wreck ran out, the riches of nature were the sign of God’s continuing Providence. But even by the time Defoe was writing, the word “providence” had changed its meaning from “abundance and bounty” to “management and governance.” Crusoe records that it took him 12 years to make a loaf of bread out of discarded barley, but are we meant to marvel at the infinite power of God, or the careful management that prevented Crusoe from making a single loaf when he had husbanded just enough, and forget that he would need more corn to ensure a continuing supply? Whichever, Defoe has succeeded in reminding his community about the way they depend on the work of others for making their daily bread. This essay will argue that, for Defoe, when reconnected to the process of production, people are able to gain more of a sense of their place in the world.
