Just like that of his heroine, Defoe's life was marked not so much by destitution as trepidation, a constant skirting of the abyss.
The fear of the river is gone and the risk of sudden destitution much reduced.
Where much of the world sees destitution, corruption, and disease, MTV sees a growing audience in Africa.
Leaked proposals show the Conservatives' plan to strip under-25s of access to unemployment and housing benefits, condemning those whose families don't have much money stashed away to destitution if they get unlucky.
The former girlfriend of Mick Jagger, she's been close to death, destitution and drama for much of her life.
There are almost no roads, which averts much of the illegal logging, disease and destitution that often follows forest development.
His main objection to socialistic interference was the familiar one that too much of it would lead to splendidly equal destitution, as the old line has it, and that for people as presently constituted economic incentives were needed to spur them to produce.
Failure to anticipate and prepare for famine carries a huge cost in deaths, disrupted lives and livelihoods, and the destitution of large populations makes subsequent development much more difficult.
Even Canada -- which has a similar economy and distribution of wealth to the United States -- has a much lower poverty rate and does not permit the level of sheer destitution and misery found in the United States, including hunger, slums and the growing army of homeless people sleeping on park benches and in vacant buildings.
In January, 2010, after years of grinding destitution and harassment by police, Mohammed Bouazizi set himself aflame, not so much out of protest as — returning us to Dido — existential despair.
