Defoe, Daniel: - Daniel Defoe (1660-1731) served as a soldier, sold ship insurance, succeeded in the hosiery business, failed in the brick business, and worked as a political secret agent. But his main career was journalism. To support his wife and six children, he wrote over 560 books, pamphlets, and papers. On a couple of occasions, his peppery prose landed him in prison for embarrassing people in power. He was almost sixty years old when he turned to fiction. A Scottish sailor's real-life adventures inspired him to write Robinson Crusoe (1719), which was an instant bestseller.