Assignment Paper No. 203: Post-colonialism in Post-modernism: A Comparative Characterology of J.M.Coetzee’s Foe as an Appropriation of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe’

TOPIC OF THE BLOG:-

This blog is part of an assignment for the Paper 203 - The Postcolonial Studies - Sem - 3, 2024.

Post-colonialism in Post-modernism: A Comparative Characterology of J.M.Coetzee’s Foe as an Appropriation of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe’

TABLE OF CONTENTS:-

  ❍ Personal information

  ❍ Assignment Details

  ❍ Abstract

  ❍ Keywords

  ❍ Introduction

❍ The A-colonial Cruso: Crusoe without the Eurocentrism/Enthusiasm

  ❍ Mrs. Cruso and (De)Foe: The Metafictional/Feminist Battle over Authorship

  ❍ Friday and the Sounds of the Island: Silence and Truth

  ❍ Conclusion

  ❍ Work Cited 

PERSONAL INFORMATION:-

• Name: - Priyanshiba Kanaksinh Gohil

• Batch No: M.A. Sem 3 (2023-2025)

• Enrollment Number: - 5108230018

• E-mail Address: - priyabagohil7126@gmail.com

• Roll Number: - 21

Assignment Details:-

• Topic:- Post-colonialism in Post-modernism: A Comparative Characterology of J.M.Coetzee’s Foe as an Appropriation of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe’

• Subject Code & Paper:- 22406 - Paper 203- Postcolonial Studies

• Submitted to:- Smt. Sujata Binoy Gardi, Department of English, MKBU, Bhavnagar

• Date of Submission:- 20th November, 2024

• About Assignment:- In this Assignment, I am going to discuss Post-colonialism in Post-modernism: A Comparative Characterology of J.M. Coetzee’s Foe as an Appropriation of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe’

Abstract:   

J.M. Coetzee’s Foe is a rewriting of Daniel Defoe’s classic novel Robinson Crusoe. This paper presents a comparative analysis of four key characters in Foe and their canonical counterparts in Robinson Crusoe: Cruso, Susan Barton, Foe and Friday. It purports that by appropriating not only Defoe’s characters but also the author himself, Coetzee actively engages in palimpsestic dialogues with its canonical counterpart to explore the dynamics between the different socio-historical contextualization of novel writing in Defoe’s 18th century England and Coetzee’s Apartheid South Africa. From more general theoretical perspectives, this paper argues that in Foe, postmodern techniques, intertextuality and metafiction in particular, are central to its deconstructive approach toward the notion of post-colonial truth in silence.

In every story there is a silence, some sight concealed, some word unspoken, I believe.  

--Foe, Foe, J.M. Coetzee (1986: 141)

Keywords 

Post-colonialism, post-modernism, J.M. Coetzee, Foe, Robinson Crusoe, Literary appropriation, colonial discourse, Intertextuality, Narrative voice, Feminist theory, Subaltern studies, Cultural appropriation, Identity and Otherness

 Introduction

The South African Nobel laureate J.M. Coetzee is one of the most important figures associated with post-colonial literature in English. As David Attwell (1993: 122) has pointed out, Coetzee's novels tend to focus on the themes of power and authority, especially the complex dialectics they form under colonialism or its post-colonial legacy. However, according to Sebastian Smet (2004: 11), while these thematic concerns are still prominent, Foe departs from Coetzee's other works in its “predominantly postmodernist” qualities, including its self-reflectivity, metaphoricity, and allegorical potential. Its uniqueness also lies in the fact that it is a complex rewriting or adaptation of Daniel Defoe's canonical “founding father of the English novel” Robinson Crusoe.

In the first chapter of Foe, its protagonist Susan Barton, from a female perspective, retells a Robinso Nade story about how she spent a year with Cruso (Coetzee purposefully omits the “e” in Defoe's “Crusoe”) and Friday after she was stranded on an island. But in the later parts of the book her story stretches beyond the confines of Defoe's island and she brings Friday back to England, where she becomes preoccupied with negotiating authorship and discussing the philosophical implications of writing with the writer Foe, who, needless to say, is Defoe's eponymous fictional incarnation in Foe. Therefore, it can be said that by appropriating not only Robinson Crusoe's characters but also its author, Foe actively engages in palimpsestic dialogues with its canonical counterpart to explore the dynamics between the different socio-historical contextualization of novel writing in Defoe's 18th century England and Coetzee's Apartheid South Africa. This essay will thus examine this engagement by comparatively analyzing four key characters in Foe in relation to Robinson Crusoe: Cruso, Susan Barton, Foe and Friday. Through these analyses, it argues that in Foe, postmodern techniques, intertextuality and metafiction in particular, are central to its deconstructive approach toward the notion of post-colonial truth in silence.

The A-colonial Cruso: Crusoe without the Eurocentrism/Enthusiasm:

The term palimpsest originally refers to a manuscript page that has been reused for a new text after the original text has been erased or scrapped. Ashcroft and Griffiths link the palimpsest to postcolonial writers’ textual practices, where, in “writing back,” elements from classic European kinds of literature are appropriated to address colonial connections or indigenous realities. Understanding the palimpsestic dialogues J.M. Coetzee establishes between Foe and Robinson Crusoe requires examining how the canonical title character Crusoe is presented differently in the two texts. Defoe’s Crusoe is portrayed with passion in his activities on the island and his positive attitude toward life. Even before being stranded, Crusoe exemplifies the adventure capitalist, choosing the sea to fulfill his own dreams over the “life of ease and pleasure” (Defoe, 2000: 1) his family envisioned for him. His life in York serves as a frame narrative, revealing his vested interest in England's social system. This socio-historical identity remains intact even during his island years, foreshadowing his eventual return to

England. On the island for over 28 years, Crusoe familiarizes himself with the geography, builds his own house, domesticates plants and animals, and affirms his mastery through Friday, his manservant. Rather than losing faith or detachment from worldly affairs, his spirit toughens; upon his rescue and return to England, he organizes larger adventures and establishes trade in South America. Crusoe's "kingly" spirit, rooted in possession, is evident throughout: in his ambition for exploration, his economic individualism on the island, and his career as a maritime businessman. His surveying the island reflects this spirit:

 

"This was all my own... I was king and lord of all this country indefeasibly, and had a right of possession; and, if I could convey it, I might have it in inheritance as completely as any lord of a manor in England" (Defoe, 2000: 76).

  However, Coetzee’s Foe contrasts this portrayal. Susan Barton observes Cruso (spelled without the “e”) as “a truly kingly figure,” yet this depiction stems from her colonial mindset, unlike Defoe’s Crusoe’s first-person narration. Coetzee’s Cruso, in contrast, is marked by passivity and indifference. Unlike Defoe’s Crusoe, Cruso’s activities lack property relations or colonial ambition. When Barton asks if he plans to transform the island, Cruso dismisses the idea, suggesting his work is merely a way to pass time. His indifference aligns him with the island’s insularity, contrasting Crusoe’s ambitions for an external life. Cruso achieves an a-colonial existence, severing ties with his colonialist English identity. This divergence reveals the texts' differing attitudes toward Otherness. Defoe’s Crusoe, in Hegelian terms, represents a colonial nature-conqueror establishing a master-slave dynamic. Coetzee’s Cruso embodies autonomy, achieving mutual interdependence with nature. Foe becomes not just an analogue but a commentary, exposing colonial discourse's hostility in Defoe’s work. By reconstructing an a-colonial alternative, it critiques colonialism’s legacy with a vision of hospitality.

Mrs. Cruso and (De)Foe: The Metafictional/Feminist Battle over Authorship

The female perspective of Foe’s primary narrator, Susan Barton, has led Chris Bongie (1993: 264) to label the book as a kind of “feminist revisionism.” Subsequently, debates have arisen about whether Barton’s ideologies and behaviors constitute feminist empowerment. Critics such as Chris Bongie (ibid) and Robin Runia interpret Barton as an independent free spirit who possesses a sense of responsibility and uses her femininity to achieve her goals. Conversely, critics like Radhika Jones, Dana Dragunoiu , Jamie Snead, and Rosemary Jolly highlight her reliance on men in the story and her ultimate fatalistic lack of substance, as evidenced by her persistent inability to write her own story. However, as mentioned in the introduction, the uniqueness of Foe lies in its participation in the postmodernist “favoring of the signifier over the signified”. Thus, feminist critiques of the text should focus on the telling of the story rather than its content. Gayatri Spivak (1990: 12) and Laura Fisher (1988: 43) argue that Barton’s femaleness is tied to her struggles with English patriarchy, colonialism, and her battle with the male writer Foe over issues of authorship, writing, and truth. This essay examines Susan Barton’s characterization in the intertextual/metatextual relations between Foe and Robinson Crusoe.

1. Firstly, Susan Barton is Coetzee’s invention, as she does not appear in Defoe’s original text. Nevertheless, her role is significant. 
2. The travelogue narrative of the first chapter, the epistolary records of the second, and 
3. the philosophical discussions of the third are all presented as Barton’s narratives.

 Readers follow her from the island to England, then Bristol, and finally to Foe’s house. Among the four chapters, only the events of the first—her island experiences—strongly connect to Robinson Crusoe. Her story before rescue could fit into Defoe’s plot without altering it. However, subsequent events, such as Crusoe’s death, Friday’s life in England, and Barton’s interactions with Foe, diverge from Defoe’s narrative. This raises critical questions:

• How should Foe be categorized in relation to Robinson Crusoe? 
• Is it an alternative plot, a sequel, or something else?

Foe’s identity as a writer is central here since Barton depends on him to document her island experiences. Foe, a reference to Defoe before he added the aristocratic “de” to his name, suggests that the story Barton wants him to write could eventually become Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. By merging a fictional character with a real-life author in a metafictional dialogue, Coetzee illustrates that Foe is a “story about another story,” the background from which Robinson Crusoe germinated. In this way, Coetzee subverts Defoe’s canonical work both formally and thematically. Formally, Barton’s narrative precedes Robinson Crusoe fictionally but follows it factually, reversing their relationship and blending chronological and spatial orders. Thematically, Barton’s concerns that Foe might omit her from the story highlight Coetzee’s postcolonial critique of authoritarian discourses that erase individual agency and alternative histories.

Secondly, Barton’s travelogue in the first chapter reveals her colonial mindset, akin to Defoe’s Crusoe. Yet, after Crusoe’s death, her situation increasingly resembles that of the colonized. As L. E. Ciolkowski (1998: 2) theorizes, a female colonizer’s identity is precarious, shaped by the patriarchy’s sexual colonization and imperial colonizing of the Other. Spivak underscores the limitations of Barton’s feminism, noting her unconventional profession as a prostitute and her perceived freedom and independence. However, Barton’s relationship with her “burden” the story she wants Foe to write is pivotal. Marais notes that “burden” historically meant “child,” linking Barton’s storytelling to pregnancy. Her burden mirrors a pregnant woman awaiting childbirth, intertwining storytelling with sexual potency. This explains her rejection of a girl claiming to be her daughter and her grief over a dead child she encounters, which symbolizes her parental anxiety and storytelling responsibility. Barton’s conception of the story through her sexual relationship with Crusoe underscores this dynamic.

Ironically, Barton’s obsession with having the story told and her perceived inability to tell it reverses the pattern of textual colonization. Her efforts to preserve the story fuse her colonial identity with that of the colonized. This fusion reflects her frustration: “Mr. Foe, I must have my freedom!... It is worse than the island!”. Barton’s struggles with Foe highlight the tension between feminism, authorship, and authority. Despite her narrative presence, Barton is reduced to a vehicle for storytelling, underscoring Coetzee’s critique of superficial political appropriations. Ultimately, Barton’s battle with Foe is ethical, political, narratological, and ontological. As Coetzee implies, a voice is essential for feminism to be heard.

 Friday and the Sounds of the Island: Silence and Truth

As Coetzee has emphasized in his interview with Attwell , in Robinson Crusoe, Friday is a handsome Carib youth with quasi-European features but in Foe, he is a black African. Similar to Susan Barton, Friday in Foe also has a continuous presence as he follows her back to England and lives in Foe's house. But while Defoe's Friday, whose name is given to mark his subservience to Crusoe‟s rationalization and mastership, learns European languages and adopts Christianity from Crusoe and thus plays a clear colonized role, Coetzee‟s Friday is full of mysteries, the most significant among which is his missing tongue. 

According to Derek Attridge, post-colonial readings of the story tend to interpret Friday‟ 's silence as a boycott for ventriloquism, both in his own refusal to be ventriloquized and Coetzee‟s refusal to ventriloquize for him. Essentially, Friday‟s silence is a kind of allegorical speaking nonetheless: its solipsistic reticence in its own ontology blatantly highlights the obvious political and epistemological limitations of colonial discourse, a position from which even “the critical, self-convincingly marginal, and feminist colonial discourse”, represented by Susan Barton, cannot entirely escape. So instead of liberating the perspectives of the formerly oppressed, as the feminist appropriations of canonical texts are wont to do, Coetzee commits further violence on his Friday and renders him tongue-less and subsequently robs him of his capability to tell his own story altogether. Gone with Friday‟s tongue are the stories of his life, of how he lost it (whether it‟s Crusoe who cut it off?), of his mysterious behaviors, of how he thinks about the island days, about England and about his life in general. Truth has thus become a myth, and through this philosophical manipulation, Coetzee reaches out to the readers to advocate that Truth, might as well just be a myth, because even if Friday can speak and has a story, it would just be one among many fabricated discourses doomed by the lack of their verifications.

This ontological nihilism of Truth is most evident in the ending where the mysterious heterodiegetic narrator dives into the sea to explore one of the many myths in Barton's story Friday's flower-scattering rituals only to find that “this is not a place of words. Each syllable, as it comes out, is caught and filled with water and diffused. This is a place where bodies are their own signs. It is the home of Friday”. This revelation renders the struggles for truthful stories futile and thus deconstructs the stability of Truth altogether, because the answer lies in “Friday‟s home "the place that witnesses, feels, but never tells.

Sue Kossew points out that this “unsatisfactory closure” is typically postmodernist in its “soft and cold, dark and unending” echoing. Indeed, judging by Ihab Hassan‟s four defining features of postmodernism unpreventability, indeterminacy, fragmentation and metafiction, the whole ending chapter of the book presents to be very postmodernist. The entrance of a heterodiegetic narrator into Foe's house simultaneously renders the narrative indeterminable and metafictional, and his descriptions
about the deaths of Barton and Foe and the utterance of Friday form huge contrasts with the narrative of the former chapters and shatter the whole book into a status of un-presentable fragmentation.

In such fragmentation, the boundaries between the fiction, the metafiction and reality are all broken down in the end when the narrator transforms from the one who searches to the one who is absorbed by Friday‟s mysterious utterance: “his mouth opens...from inside him comes a slow stream, without breath, without interruption..it flows upon...me...it beats against my eyelids, against the skin of my face” .

Though in the fictional events of Foe Friday remains a quasi-oxymoronic existence a voice without sound, a shadow without a body, a substantiality without substance, allegorically speaking, Coetzee's Friday actually is more like an omniscient clairvoyant, who silently observes the flowing and intersecting of the never-ending production of (counter-)discourses just like the “walking eyes”  he draws for Barton “nothing is hidden from the eyes”.

Conclusion

In summary, this essay has comparatively analyzed four key characters in Coetzee's Foe against their canonical counterparts in Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. Firstly, it has been argued that the contrast between the activeness of Defoe's Crusoe and the passivity of Coetzee's Cruso corresponds to their ideological differences regarding the treatment of the Other, and through this contrast Coetzee negatively comments on Robinson Crusoe's colonial discourse.

Secondly, the philosophical battle between the female castaway Susan Barton and Defoe's fictional incarnation in Foe has shifted the focus from post-colonial critique to the power of storytelling, and how this power always precedes struggles of any other kind. Finally, the silence of Coetzee's tongue-less Friday not only denies any post-colonial accessibility to the narratives of truth but philosophically deconstructs the stable and structural notion of Truth altogether. From these characterological analyses, it can be observed that there is a deep pattern in Coetzee's postmodernist (re-)construction of these key characters, and it is formed by two layers of post-colonial deconstructive forces. First, he deconstructs the canonicity of Defoe through the literary politics of textual decolonization (through Cruso); second, he then self-reflectively deconstructs the ventriloquizing processes of the political agenda of literary appropriation itself through a postmodern/post-structural interpretation of discourse construction/storytelling.

In the end, by writing a complex intertextual novel like Foe,

Coetzee makes the readers aware of the agnostic “dark mass” hidden behind every told and untold (hi)story, without uncovering what it contains or implies.

 

Work Cited: 

Attridge, Derek. J.M. Coetzee and the Ethics of Reading. Scottsville: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2004 https://australianhumanitiesreview.org/2005/07/01/reading-the-other-a-review-of-derek-attridges-j-m-coetzee-and-the-ethics-of-reading-literature-in-the-event/

Academia, Post-colonialism in Post-modernism: A Comparative Characterology of J.M. Coetzee's Foe as an Appropriation of Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. Subalternspeak: Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 4(1), 87-98 https://www.academia.edu/19600888/_Post_colonialism_in_Post_modernism_A_Comparative_Characterology_of_J_M_Coetzee_s_Foe_as_an_Appropriation_of_Daniel_Defoe_s_Robinson_Crusoe_Subalternspeak_Journal_of_Postcolonial_Studies_Vol_4_no_1_2015_Oct_87_98_India_editor_and_peer_reviewed_MLA_Index_

Attwell, David. J.M. Coetzee: South Africa and the Politics of Writing. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/J/bo3641919.html

Bongie, Chris. “‘Lost in the Maze of Doubting’: J.M. Coetzee’s Foe and the Politics of (Un)Likeness.” MFS Modern Fiction Studies 39.2 (1993): 261-281https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/26284215.pdf

Ciolkowski, L.E. “Visions of Life on the Border: Wonderland Women, Imperial Travelers, and Bourgeois Womanhood in the Nineteenth Century.” Genders 27.1 (1998): 1-20. https://www.colorado.edu/gendersarchive1998-2013/1998/02/01/visions-life-border-wonderland-women-imperial-travelers-and-bourgeois-womanhood

Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Written by Himself. Ware: Wordsworth Classics, 2000 https://www.gutenberg.org/files/521/521-h/521-h.htm

Hassan, Ihab. The Postmodern Turn: Essays in Postmodern Theory and Culture. Ohio: Ohio State University Press, 1987 https://archive.org/details/postmodernturnes0000hass/page/n3/mode/2up

Hegel, G. W. F. (1979). Phenomenology of spirit (A. V. Miller, Trans.). Oxford University Press.

Sanders, Julie. Adaptation and Appropriation, Forum for Modern Language Studies, Volume 53, Issue 1, January 2017, Pages 117–118, https://doi.org/10.1093/fmls/cqw047

Snead, Jamie. “Foe vs Foe: The Battle for Narrative Voice in Coetzee’s Foe.” Rollins Undergraduate Research Journal, 2.1 (2010): 1-10.https://scholarship.rollins.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1013&context=rurj

Spivak, G. C. (1990). Theory in the Margin: Coetzee’s Foe Reading Defoe’s “Crusoe/Roxana.” English in Africa, 17(2), 1–23. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40238659

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