Daniel Defoe

Paula Backscheider is the Philpott-Stevens Eminent Scholar in the Department of English at Auburn University. She is the author of several books, including Revising Women: Eighteenth-Century "Women's Fiction" and Social Engagement and Eighteenth-Century Women Poets and Their Poetry, both published by Johns Hopkins.

• List of Illustrations Preface Part I: 1660-1703Chapter 1. Fire and Plague Chapter 2.Merchant-Rebel Chapter 3. Bankrupt Chapter 4. Recovery Chapter 5. FugitiveChapter 6. Prison Part II: 1703-1714Chapter 7. Four Hundred Thousand Words Chapter 8. The Literary Effort of a LifetimeChapter 9. New Life Chapter 10. A terrible People Chapter 11. Political Maelstrom Chapter 12. The Goliath of the Party Chapter 13. A Team of Writers Part III: 1714-1731Chapter 14. Six Hundred Thousand Words Chapter 15. A Discontented People Chapter 16. A Penetrating Eye Chapter 17. The Whole World in Motion Chapter 18. Projects and Designs Chapter 19. Changes and Disasters Epilogue: Bred in the Bone Notes Bibliography Index

For the first time everything we know about Defoe is presented in a single orderly sequence..A searching study of a complex man, one that is coherent and credible for our times. New York Times Book Review A very considerable work of scholarship, and the first to give this prolific writer the extended treatment he after all deserves. Washington Post Book World Paula Backscheider spins this absorbing narrative with meticulous scholarship and lucidity. Independent on Sunday