From the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction . . . Daniel Defoe

From the virtual pages of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction: Daniel Defoe, who died on this day in 1731 …

(?1660-1731) UK merchant, professional spy and man of letters born Daniel Foe, becoming Defoe in the 1690s after he began to write; the extremely prolific author of many works of various kinds, though the huge canon of unsigned works once attributed to him has been convincingly diminished (to somewhere slightly in excess of 300 titles). He is best known today for his novel The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner (1719) and its sequels [for fuller details, see Checklist], which, while not sf, provided a fundamental model for many sf stories (> Robinsonade). . .

Read the full entry at The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.