Foe

Content Warning: The source material uses outdated, offensive terms for Black people throughout, which is replicated in this guide only in direct quotes of the source material. This guide also discusses racism and enslavement.

Susan Barton is an Englishwoman sailing back to Europe after an unproductive trip to the Americas. She left Brazil after failing to find her daughter who was kidnapped many years before. While onboard the ship to England, the crew revolts. They mutiny, kill the captain, and then set his body adrift in a small boat, along with Susan.

Susan is furious. She rows until exhaustion. Then, she slips over the side and into the ocean. She tries to swim toward an island in the distance but passes out. Susan wakes up on a beach with the shadow of a naked man cast over her. He is “a Negro with a head of fuzzy wool” and dressed only in rough pants (5). Susan tries to communicate in English and Portuguese. She needs water, but the man does not respond. When she sees that he is carrying a spear, she becomes afraid. The man silently beckons her away from the shore. They walk inland together through the sparse terrain, which is covered in sharp rocks coated in stinking seaweed. Insects bite Susan’s skin, and she pricks her foot on a thorn; the stranger carries her part of the way. She sees birds, apes, seals, porpoises, and fish.

The man leads Susan to “some kind of encampment” (8). Huts are built on a rocky outcrop using reeds, woven inexpertly together. As Susan looks out to sea, she spots the ship that set her adrift. The camp is home to a white European man, and Susan estimates that he is about 60 years old. His beard is thick, and his skin is tanned. The older man signals to the other to bring water. The European, Susan reveals, is Cruso. His animal skin clothes are cut in a vaguely British style. He is armed with a knife and a stick. As Susan tries to tell the story of how she was set adrift, she breaks down in tears, telling her whole story. She begins with her father. He was a Frenchman, who was forced to flee to England “to escape the persecutions in Flanders” (10). In England, he married a local woman and had children. Two years earlier, Susan explains, her daughter was kidnapped. Susan believes that her daughter was taken to the Americas, and she is searching for her lost child. She spent all of her money. Her ship was destined for Lisbon, but the crew turned on her and the captain. She tells Cruso how she rowed toward his island. Now, she says, she is his second subject. His first is Friday, his “manservant” (11). As the narrator, Susan explains that she has always struggled to piece together Cruso’s own story. Every time he told her how he arrived on the island, his story was different. She believes that his memory has been negatively affected by his time on the island.

The next day, Susan watches Friday cook lettuce and fish. When Susan asks Cruso why he does not even try to escape, he asks her where he would go. Susan knows that there is no point in encouraging him to escape; he wishes to remain “to his dying day king of his tiny realm” (14). She refuses the offer of his bed and sleeps on grass in the corner of his hut. When she wakes, Friday is cooking again, using a small stone stove to cook bird eggs. Susan describes the irregular pattern of rain, sun, and wind. The sound of the wind, in particular, makes her desperate to leave the island. Cruso gives her a knife, warning her not to stray too far from his so-called castle; otherwise, the island’s apes will violently attack her. The knife is unique among Cruso’s rudimentary possessions, as it actually seems like a purposefully designed tool. Cruso makes no effort to remember his time on the island. Susan cannot convince him to even keep a journal.

At night, Susan wraps up in the ape pelts that Cruso has collected. Most of his teeth have now been worn down, and he grinds them loudly to “still the ache” (19). When Susan explores the island, the experience of sitting on the beach in the sun is almost pleasant. Cruso is furious, however, insisting that she has wandered too far. She says she is “not a prisoner” and calms him down (20), at which point he promises to craft her a set of sandals so that she can navigate the sharp rocks. Despite his promise, the sandals do not arrive quickly.

Susan is told that Cruso has killed many of the island’s apes. They have retreated to the other side of the island due to his hunting. The apes are small, and Susan believes that they are harmless, though Cruso is insistent that they are vermin. Much to Susan’s annoyance, Friday will not listen to her. He only listens to Cruso, who issues orders to him. When Susan says as much to Cruso, he explains that Friday has a very limited vocabulary, so she must carefully word her instructions. Susan wonders why Cruso would not teach Friday more words, thus giving him someone to talk to. Cruso says nothing but tells Friday to sing a song. Friday hums a meandering tune, and when he is done, Cruso points to the inside of the man’s mouth. Susan sees that Friday has no tongue. Cruso explains that the enslavers who captured Friday in Africa cut his tongue out. Though Susan is shocked, the unperturbed Cruso says that this may be “for the best” (24). The revelation changes Susan’s attitude toward Friday. She no longer treats him like “any house-slave in Brazil” (24). Instead, she studies him closely. She feels pity for him, suddenly aware of the way in which her own tongue moves.

Susan presses Cruso to finish her shoes, which displeases him. He finally makes the sandals, and Susan is able to get to know the island. She finds a hidden spot, which feels like “the one place reserved for [her] on an island owned by another” (26). As much as Cruso annoys her, she refuses to confront him, as he is her only companion on the island. She is thankful to not be on her own. When Cruso becomes very sick, Susan spends 12 days nursing him back to health. While Cruso is sick, Friday refuses to enter the hut. When she does see Friday, Susan is so irritated by his behavior that she smacks his “little reed flute” away from him (28). Eventually, Cruso’s health improves. He returns to his previous, belligerent self.

A dramatic storm knocks the roof from Cruso’s hut and destroys other parts of the camp, including Cruso’s meticulously planned, but empty, garden. The storm rages for days, and Cruso becomes sick again. Susan spends the night beside his bed. She feels his feverish hands reach out to touch her. Though she is reluctant at first, she eventually allows him to “do as he [wishes]” (30), and they have sex. In the morning, she inspects the damaged garden and reflects on her time with Cruso.

While exploring the island, Susan sees Friday riding a log across the water like a canoe. He takes seaweed from the water and then throws a scattering of white petals on the surface. Later, when Susan is inspecting the part of the camp where Friday lives, she finds a bag of these white petals. She wonders whether what she saw was some kind of “superstitious observance” (31), which suggests to her for the first time that Friday may be a more introspective person than she realized.

Susan feels a need for more tools. She has heard that Friday and Cruso survived a shipwreck near the island; the ship is now beneath the sea, a short way off the shore. She suggests that they dive down to the ship to find tools. Cruso does not approve. He does not need tools, pointing to the array of garden terraces that he has built as evidence. He has terraces but no seeds to plant in his garden, as the terraces are intended for “those who come after” (33), who will have brought their own seeds. He continues to work on his garden, and as she watches him, Susan cannot help but see him as “foolish” (34).

Susan becomes bored. There is nothing for her to do, and Cruso does not have any stories to share with her. She has no interest in helping him build his terraces, but she spends some time making clothes from the pelts of the apes killed by Cruso. One item reaches over her head, with flaps to keep out the maddening sound of the wind. Sitting in her tattered clothes, she dreams of being rescued. The only thing that can break Susan from her state of boredom is the completion of small tasks. Other than the one time when Cruso was sick, he and Susan do not have a sexual relationship. While Susan has no interest in Cruso, she begins to think that—if she ever gave up all hope of being rescued—then a child might alleviate her loneliness. She would do “whatever necessary” to have a child in such circumstances (36).

Cruso lectures Susan on the state of law on the island. He insists that there are no laws, as laws only exist to control people whose desires have become “immoderate” (36). Susan points to the lack of murder on the island as an example of law. Cruso points out that there is no punishment on the island, so there can be no laws. In turn, Susan begins to think of her time on the island as a punishment in its own right.

Friday comes back into the camp, dragging a feverish Cruso with him. The sickness has returned, and Susan cares for him again, even though she believes that he will not recover this time. The following day, a passing ship sends a boatful of men to the island. Their arrival scares Friday, who rushes to the side of the island where the apes live. Susan convinces the sailors to take her and the sickly Cruso to their ship. When Cruso wakes and realizes that he is not on his island, he begins to struggle. He is too sick and weak to fight back, however. Susan also speaks to the captain of the ship about Friday. She feels a “duty” to try to help him escape the island as well (39). The captain sends a party of men to find Friday while he eats aboard the ship, with Susan as his guest. During their dinner, the man suggests that her story would make a fine book. The modest Susan claims to not know how to write such a story in an interesting way. The captain says that she could hire a ghostwriter to tell her story, but she worries that such a person would fill her book with lies. The sailors return with Friday, but Susan notices that he seems sad. She leads him to the part of the ship where Cruso is sleeping. She assures him that he will be free.

During the voyage to England, Susan sleeps next to Cruso. She tries to reassure Friday, with little success. The doctor of the ship thinks that Cruso is dying. On the captain’s suggestion, Susan pretends that Cruso is her husband so as to avoid any suggestion of scandal. Though Susan is convinced that the captain is a “true gentleman” (42), she refuses his sexual advances. Cruso becomes sicker, to the point where Susan believes that he is dying of “the extremist woe” (43). She worries that he cannot bear to be away from his island. Now, she sees herself as his captor and him as her prisoner. She asks him to tell her about his life, but he cannot respond. Susan makes wild assurances of what they will do together in England, hinting even that they might buy seeds and return to plant them on the island’s terraces. He holds her hands, and tears fall from his eyes. When the ship is three days from England, Cruso dies. Susan rises from his bedside and tells Friday. The crew bury Cruso at sea, at which point Susan begins to notice the men studying her carefully. She imagines what they think about her. Susan appoints herself as the heir to everything Cruso owned, which includes “the story of his island” (45).