It is said that Defoe did not find a publisher for his sea novel at once

It is said that Defoe did not find a publisher for his sea novel at once. By the time he came to write "Robinson...", the sixty-year-old De Foe, as he styled himself, was already a well-known journalist and writer in England. And, as John Winterich wittily put it, had he died before writing the novel, his gravestone would have had to be a monument as tall as the Washington Monument (which has a lift inside!) in order to carve upon it the titles of all the more than 250 works by which the author was remembered by the English. To general relief, no such gravestone ever appeared in any churchyard of Albion.

As is well known, the book about Crusoe is based on the true story of the quarrelsome sailor Alexander Selkirk, who informed the captain of his ship that he would sooner not go aboard than listen to his jibes. And so he stayed on an island of the Juan Fernández archipelago for three years.

The affair became a sensation, and Defoe is believed to have been among the reporters who interviewed Selkirk, freed from his island captivity, when he returned home. This version, however, remains disputed, and it has even been suggested that author and prototype were not merely unacquainted, but that Selkirk may never have known of the existence of a book about his life. This is so even though "Robinson Crusoe" became the most popular publication in the country, was followed by a sequel in three parts, and was reissued countless times.