Not many readers follow the adventures of Robinson Crusoe as far as China, or even realize he went there. But the first volume of the famous story was such a success that author Daniel Defoe quickly wrote a second volume the same year, 1719, which took the protagonist to China. It was natural in some ways that China should provide the exotic and interesting locale for the second tale, since it was by that time a rich part of the Western imagination, known from the writings of Marco Polo and other travelers.
Frances Wood, who is curator of the Chinese collections at the British Library in London, begins her book, "The Lure of China," with the earliest accounts of China, explaining how descriptions of "its splendour created legendary Cathay" (the ancient sobriquet for China that is nowadays only retained in the name of the Hong Kong-based airline and a few hotels).
The first missionaries and travelers wrote about it with enthusiasm and bewilderment at the variety of fruits, the curious objects used in daily life, the beauty of the arts, the luxury of imperial life, and the strangeness of the language.