Borrowing (from) Crusoe

Abstract

This chapter considers the Robinsonade within the framework of the children’s collection of Cork Public Library in the post-revolutionary period of the early twentieth century. It examines how the repeated purchasing of copies of Robinson Crusoe for circulation to Free State children may be interpreted within the context of the Gaelic Revivalist movement. Furthermore, two specific texts are considered: T.C. Bridges’ Martin Crusoe: A Boy’s Adventure on Wizard Island (1920), a self-conscious Robinsonade, and a 1936 account of an Irish missionary’s experiences in Africa, African Adventure, by Father James O’Mahoney. The chapter argues that both texts exhibit characteristic Robinsonade qualities (the colonialist impulses of which are framed by ennobling justifications), and, ultimately, that the colonial novel was in many ways compatible with post-colonial Ireland’s nationalist ideology.