Daniel Defoe.
The Consolidator: or, Memoirs of Sundry Transactions from the World in the Moon. Translated from the Lunar Language, by the Author of The True-Born English Man [Daniel Defoe]. London: Benj. Bragg, 1705.
The
Life, Adventures, and Pyracies, of the Famous Captain Singleton:
containing an account of his being set on shore in the island of
Madagascar, his settlement there, with a description of the place and
inhabitants: of his passage from thence, in a Paraguay, to the main land
of Africa, with an account of the customs and manners of the people : his
great deliverances from the barbarous natives and wild beasts : of his
meeting with an Englishman, a citizen of London, among the Indians, the
great riches he acquired, and his voyage home to England : as also Captain
Singleton's return adventures and pyracies with the famous Captain Avery
and others. London: J. Brotherton, J. Graves, A. Dodd, and T. Warner,
1720.
Another
copy.
The
Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York,
Mariner: Who lived eight and twenty years all alone in an
un-inhabited island on the coast of America, near the mouth of the great
river of Oroonoque… Written by himself. The fourth edition. To which is
added a Map of the World, in which is Delineated the Voyages of Robinson
Crusoe. London: W. Taylor, 1719. —The book went through four editions in
its first year.
Another
copy.
The Third
edition.
The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe; Being the Second and Last Part of His Life, and of the Strange Surprizing Account of his Travels Round three Parts of the Globe. Written by himself. The Third Edition, Adorned with Cuts. London: W. Taylor, 1722.
A Journal of the Plague Year: Being observations or memorials, of the most remarkable occurrences, as well publick as private, which happened in London during the last great visitation in 1665. Written by a Citizen who continued all the while in London. Never made publick before. London: E. Nutt, J. Roberts, A. Dodd, and J. Graves. 1722. —This account is so plausible and detailed that it is still often cited as a first-person account of the plague, though in fact Defoe was probably four or five years old in 1665. In 1721, the plague raged in Marseilles, and all Europe was alarmed; for the next two years, treatises on the plague and accounts of its effects were the most popular genre in English publishing, and many accounts of the 1665 plague, and comparisons of it to the current one at Marseilles, were rushed off the presses. This is Defoe at his opportunistic best, making the most of a popular mania and giving the public exactly what it wants better than anyone else could do it.