39,327
edits
Robinsonade: Difference between revisions
m
update links
m (revise quote template spacing) |
m (update links) |
||
Line 7:
Rescue me before I fall into despair, oh""''|'''[[The Police]]''', "Message In A Bottle"}}
A Robinsonade is a plot about characters being stranded in the wilderness far away from civilization, and forced to live off the land in order to survive. It takes its name from the 1719 novel ''[[Robinson Crusoe]]'' by Daniel Defoe, which spawned enough imitations that its name was used to define a genre. The term was coined in 1731 by the German writer Johann Gottfried Schnabel in the Preface of his work ''Die Insel Felsenburg''.
At its heart, the Robinsonade is a [[Conflict|Man vs. Nature conflict]]. The characters are forced to battle for survival. Sometimes they succeed in style, turning their desolate location into taste of paradise; sometimes they fail, descending into a pit of savagery. How easy this survival is depends on the location and the skill level of the person stranded. Depending on the work, the characters might find themselves in a bountiful paradise or an exceptionally hostile enviroment. Sometimes the person is already a skilled survivor before they become marooned, but more often they are forced to undergo a difficult learning process full of [[Character Development]]. Additional conflicts can also be introduced. If a group of characters are marooned together, the Robinsonade allows for a variety of interpersonal interactions. Another variation is to have the location inhabited by natives, who can be either hostile or a helpful.
Line 13:
The [[Deserted Island]] is the archetypical setting of such stories. The island serves to keep the characters on it trapped, allowing attempts to get off the island to move the story forward. However, the location need not be an island. Any sufficiently isolated [[Wild Wilderness]] will do. In [[Science Fiction]], [[Recycled in Space|a deserted planet]] can be substituted for the island.
While many such works try to depict nature in a realistic manner, others delve into the realm of [[Speculative Fiction]]. Characters may be forced to deal with some sort of strange phenomenon, such as [[Eldritch Abomination|Eldritch Abominations]], [[Everything's Better with Dinosaurs|dinosaurs]], [[The Killer Shrews|mutant man-eating shrews]], or [[Beast Man|mutant animal human hybrids]]. This is especially likely if they are trapped in a [[Lost World]].
If a character is marooned alone or is willingly choosing solitude, he may [[Go Mad From the Isolation]]. Compare with [[Bottle Episode]].
Line 71:
* ''[[Lost in Space]]'' where the family was even the Robinsons [[In Space]]!
** For most of season 1 they were stranded on an unknown planet. At the beginning of season 2 they managed to take off, only to crash land on an almost identical planet. D'oh! At least in season 3 they managed to actually get back into space.
* ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'': Kirk maroons Khan in the episode "[[Star Trek/Recap/S1
** Khan and his augments actually made a fairly good living on the world they were marooned on. Then a nearby planet exploded and it promptly became a [[Crapsack World]] and [[Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan|Khan's wife died...]]
* ''[[Flight 29 Down]]'' was a show about a bunch of kids and a pilot who got stranded on an island after their plane crashed. They split up, and the show focuses on one group of kids, while the others are off-screen with the pilot for most of the series.
| |||