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During a time when man had gold fever, and philosophical views plagued the minds of many, one man took these views and turned them into great outdoor adventures. John "Jack" Griffith London, a twentieth century author, wrote The Call of the Wild, other novels, and short stories that depict the philosophical views of the time and added adventure to them by using his own life experiences that carried thousands of men including himself to the Klondike in search of gold. In Winter 1876 San Francisco John and Flora London shared the joy of childbirth in the celebration of their only child together. They named the baby boy John Griffith London, or Jack for short.
He became the twelfth child of his father, for through his first marriage he had eleven children. Jack London's family was stricken by poverty. His father had many trades, however worked mainly in truck gardening (McCracken 370). After Jack's graduation from grammar school, which he attended in Oakland, Jack read many novels, mainly ones about romance, travel, and adventure. He took many odd jobs to make ends meet (Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia). Jack had ambitions for a life at sea.
At age fifteen Jack London bought a boat of his own, called Razzle Dazzle. He became an oyster pirate, sailing the San Francisco Bay robbing oyster beds and becoming a heavy drinker. Jack had many hard times. He spent some time as a hobo and spent some time in prison. At the age of nineteen he entered high school. Hard work enabled him the privilege of attending The University of California at Berkley.
Less than a year passed and he gave up school to try and support his family and person a writing career. He did not sell any of his work (Kunitz and Haycraft 844). He joined the gold rush to the Klondike in the summer of 1897. The group stopped along the Yukon near about the Stewart River for winter.
London became vary ill with Scurvy and was forced south for survival. Upon his re entry to San Francisco Jack learned of his fathers death. He could not find work of any kind, so once again he tried his hand at writing. His first writing, a story about life on the Yukon, was accepted by a magazine called Overland Monthly. He was in demand by other magazines. Jack London had finally found his niche.
He was also starting a family. He married Elizabeth Modern and had two daughters, Joan and Bess. He wrote his first novel shortly after this engagement entitled The Call of the Wild. He became famous however fame could not cover his depression (McCracken 371). Soon after his new fame, Jack London went to the Russo-Japanese War as a correspondent for The San Francisco Examiner.
Upon his return to the USA he was sued for divorce. The day after the divorce was final Jack London remarried a woman by the name of Chairman Kittredge. The two of them set forth on a voyage around the world. The crew and Jack became vary sick and were forced to abandon the trip within a two year time. "He was constantly sick with Uremia and was warned to alter his diet and habits. " (McCracken 372) "On the morning of November 22, 1916, he was found unconscious and died that evening. " (McCracken 372) Uremic poisoning was ruled the cause of his death, however a note pad on his night stand had a calculation of the amount of morphine it would take to kill a man, and on the floor were empty vile's of that such drug. (Kunitz and Haycraft 844) "Like his autobiographical hero Martin Eden, he had taken refuge in suicide. " (Kunitz and Haycraft 845) The second half of the nineteenth century called American fiction writers to turn to Europe and France for inspiration. Upon Jack London's arrival, he had an edge over the writing population because unlike the other writers that created adventure stories entirely off their head, he saw way to use real life experience and the use philosophy to create realistic and powerful stories full of adventure. London wrote the novel The Call of the Wild as a twist off of one of the biggest philosophical theories, Charles Darwin's theory of evolution (Magill 1144).
As in this novel and his other stories he used philosophy to aid "him in conceiving his stories as parables that tested and commented on contemporary thought. " (Magill 1145) "The leading discussions of late nineteenth century social science were at the center of London's fiction" (Magill 1145) meaning he had an issue of philosophy of some shape or form demonstrated in all of his writing. Some of London's other novel's themes were based on the concept of racial hierarchy, and the American Credo of success. In writing stories with the presence of mind in philosophy he used his own experiences, like the unsuccessful journey the gold rich Klondike in Alaska to make the stories adventurous and pleasurably entertaining (Magill 1146). London gradually takes away all human contact around the main character, Buck, until there is none left, and he is own his own as a wild savage. (Magill) He ends the novel with a sentence that shows London at his absolute best. (Unger 470) "When the long winter nights come on and the wolves follow their meat to the lower valleys, he may be seen running ahead of the pack through the pale moonlight or glimmering borealis, leaping gigantic above his fellows, his great throat a-bellow as he sings a song of the younger world, which is the song of the pack. " (London) "At first glance The Call of the Wild seems to be entirely outside any traditional society and therefore free from its tensions, but in fact the narrative reveals various sorts of relations to the patterns of such a society. " (Unger 470) In the novel Call of the Wild, there are three main characters and many secondary characters that fill the novel full of adventure. Buck is a cross breed of St.
Bernard and Scottish Shepherd. He is a vary large demanding presence with a great deal of intelligence, as well. A Spitz is another dog of great presence, that leads a particular dog sled team. A Spitz had many savage traits that he used to keep the rest of the sled team in line. Buck and he did not see eye to eye.
The final main character is a man by the name of John Thornton. John Thornton is a man with a big heart that could not stand by when he saw buck being bea...
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Research essay sample on The Call Of Jack London
