Jack London Essay

Jack London, a substantial American, author was replete with venture and erraticness. He grew as a destitute child, but that didn’t block his future as a great author. He dropped out of high school, started enduring bad habits, and got arrested for vagrancy. London, an author of many short stories, novels, and fiction writing, was a prodigious author when it came to his writings. “In his brief life, London sought adventures in the far corners of the world, from the frozen Yukon to the South Pacific, writing gripping tales of survival based on his experiences”(Vitale 1). London’s life long influences take part within his writings and are mainly about man vs. nature or man vs. man. In London’s early years he was very adventurous. He went to …show more content…
In his short story, To Build a Fire, London writes a story where a young man travels many miles to find his array, who are all in the Yukon. The protagonist in the story is given the name, “the man”, who thinks he has the confidence to persevere into the exceedingly cold and frigid weather. “As he turned to go on, he spat speculatively. There was a sharp, explosive crackle that startled him. He spat again. And again, in the air, before it could fall to the snow, the spittle crackled” (London 2). We can tell that London writes and incorporates his life into his stories just like, To Build A Fire. In To Build A Fire, the man goes into the freezing cold thinking he can persist and persevere without any inconveniences. But, as time goes on, the man starts to fear that he may actually be starting to freeze to death. At the end, the man does indeed die by freezing to death. This relates to the time London was in the Yukon facing nature, just as the man had to face nature. In other stories, London writes about conflicts between man vs. man. In his story, A Piece of Steak, London symbolizes the need for survival into a piece of steak. “And a piece of steak was such a little thing, a few pennies at best; yet it meant thirty quid to him” (London