[Elfsea] interesting historical tidbit-- source for Robinson Crusoe??

Betsy Marshall betsy at softwareinnovation.com
Wed Mar 12 18:46:59 PST 2003


CRUSOE'S FIFE CONNECTION QUESTIONED

One of Fife's most famous sons Alexander Selkirk, believed to be the
inspiration for Robinson Crusoe, may not have been the man depicted in
the story after all according to new research to be published later this
year.

Travel writer Tim Severin suggests that Selkirk may not have been the
inspiration for Daniel Defoe's classic novel The Life and Strange
Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe but instead it was a former
surgeon marooned on a desert island after being sent to the Caribbean as
a convict.

He claims to have uncovered links between Defoe and the castaway surgeon
Henry Pitman, who wrote a pamphlet on his experiences, during research
at the British Library. Pitman was shipped to Barbados after taking part
in the Duke of Monmouth's unsuccessful rebellion against James II in
1685.

Along with other convicts he escaped the appalling conditions in a small
boat but was marooned on a small island off Venezuela. In 1689, 30 years
before Defoe's Robinson Crusoe he wrote about his experiences in a
pamphlet entitled The Relation of the Great Suffering and Strange
Adventures of Henry Pitman Chirurgeon (surgeon).

It includes a similar location as described in Robinson Crusoe and even
mentions an Indian tribesman who Severin suggests could be the
inspiration for Crusoe's Man Friday.

However despite the new claims tourist chiefs in Fife stood by Crusoe's
connection with Alexander Selkirk and his birthplace of Lower Largo,
which helps draw thousands of visitors to the East Neuk, saying they
wouldn't give up the Crusoe connection without a fight.

The chief executive of the Kingdom of Fife Tourist Board Patrick
Laughlin said, "Regardless of other new evidence emerging, what no-one
can take away is the extraordinary adventures of Alexander Selkirk which
in many ways were more amazing that the fictional Robinson Crusoe.

"We will continue promoting the story that Selkirk was the basis for
Crusoe. Fife is not going to give him up without a fight."

Selkirk was born in 1680 and ran away to sea at the age of 15. He was
marooned on the island of Juan Fernandez 400 miles west of Valpariso,
Chile in 1703 and survived by eating the goats that populated the
island. It is said he ate 500 goats in four years!

He was rescued in 1709 and returned to Scotland where he joined the navy
and later died on a voyage to Africa aged just 41.





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