Daniel DeFoe, Master Liar?

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"And after all, what is a lie? `Tis but

the truth in masquerade"

Lord Byron (1)

Moll Flanders, a potent character of Defoe's, is haunted by her past, and as such, is driven to tell her story. Many literary scholars believe Defoe intentionally mislead readers to believe that Moll Flanders was a real person. Defoe has therefore often been dubbed as a liar.

The dictionary definition of a lie is:

To speak untruthfully with intent to mislead or deceive (2)

Plots in other fictitious works, such as those by Shakespeare, were known as fiction due to their unlikely content, but in Moll Flanders it is harder to distinguish between fact and fiction. The debate begins when attempting to conclude as to why Defoe is a liar. Is it his realistic fiction or, as the dictionary definition suggests, his intent to mislead his audience?

Moll Flanders was written with accurate political, economic and social truths. Such truths are brought to the reader through Defoe's description and attention to detail, creating believable imagery. The very steps of a journey away from Moll's crime is one example:

I crossed the street...I went through into Fenchurch Street...Thames Street, near Billingsgate... (p210)

The purpose of such passages, as mundane as they appear, is to add substance to the realism of the work. Defoe has created Moll to be a real person with experiences and feelings. Generalising and brushing over the surface of her life may not have produced the same effect. This insight offered to us, which differs from the level of insight offered by plays and poems, allows the reader to be as empathetic with Moll's position as Defoe attempted to be. Defoe, through his empathy, reached into the depths of Moll's psyche, ...

... middle of paper ...

...ary of Quotations. HarperCollins. P418

Bibliography

Primary texts

Chaucer, G. 1996. The Canterbury Tales. Penguin. London

Defoe, D. 1994. Moll Flanders. Penguin. London

Thackeray, W. 2001. Vanity Fair. Penguin. London

Secondary texts

Collins Concise Dictionary. HarperCollins (2000)

Dictionary of Quotations. HarperCollins (2000)

Rice,P. and Waugh,P. 1996. Modern Literary Theory. Oxford University Press: New York. 64-66

Internet resources

http://www.bopsecrets.org/rexrth/cr/7.htm 2004.

http://www.litnotes.co.uk/index.htm 2004.

http://www.firstthings.com/fsissues/ft9906/reviews/zaleski.html 2004.

www.sparknotes.com/lit/mollflanders/ 2004

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