The Soldierly Imagination: Narrating Fear in Defoe's Memoirs of a Cavalier

Abstract

(1720) is at the centre of two confl icting, yet equally convincing, textual readings by two of Defoe’s biographers, Maximillian E. Novak and Paula R. Backscheider. Novak foregrounds Defoe’s longterm admir a tion of military matters, arguing that the protagonist is “Defoe’s ver sion of the ideal cavalier—brave, idealistic, fair.”1 Novak points out that, as the text evolves, the young man learns that certain sorts of hero ism are ineffective, such as Prince Rupert’s tendency to pursue and plunder fl eeing regiments, while neglecting problems at the centre of the battle. And he labels one moment at the end of the text as disturbing—a moment in which the Cavalier has to engage in a mas sacre in a private home. He suggests that the soldier never recovers from this experience, but does not discuss the Cavalier’s response in depth. Novak’s approach to the memoirs primarily places the work within the traditional model of the military memoir, with its emphasis on martial accomplishments, heroism, stoicism, and soldierly duty.2 In contrast, Backscheider argues that Defoe’s work primarily critiques war, that the power and appeal of the work