A young man goes to sea against his father's advice, survives storms, slavery and shipwreck, and finds himself alone on an island with a knife, a musket and twenty-eight years to fill. The inventories, the calendar cut into a post, the footprint: Defoe built the survival story in one attempt and no one has improved the frame. Here with paintings of tropical shore, storm and improvised shelter, and Gilded Library ornament of ship's wheel, skin parasol and a print in the sand.