3. Jack London

Jack London is the praiser of strong willed people struggling with severe nature and tricks of fortune Jack London, born in San-Francisco had changed many jobs before he became a famous writer. He was a newsboy, selling papers in the streets, then he joined the oyster pirates, he shipped as a sailor on a schooner, sailed for the Japanese coast on a seal-hunting expedition. London tramped all through the United States, from California to Boston, and up and down. He returned to the Pacific coast by way of Canada, where he got into jail and served a term for vagrancy. “And the whole tramping experience made me become a Socialist; - Jack London wrote about himself. In his nineteenth year he returned to Oakland and started at the High School. After leaving the High School, in three months cramming by himself Jack London entered the University of California but “I hated to give up the hope of a University education; the famous writer remembered – and worked in a laundry and with my pen to help me keep on”.

In 1897 London left for the Klondike to prospect for gold. He came back without a dollar, but he brought valuable impressions unforgettable recollections.

His first literary trying was the article “Typhoon off the Coast of Japan”. The San Francisco “Call” offered a prize for a descriptive article. London recalled: “Very tired and sleepy, knowing I had to be up at half-past five, I began the article at midnight and worked straight on until I had written two thousand words, the limit of the article, but with my idea only half worked out. The next night, under the same conditions, I continued, adding another two thousand words before I finished, and then the third night I spend in cutting out the excess, so as to bring the article within the condition of the contest. The first prize came to me, and the second and third went to students of the Stanford and Berkeley Universities”.

Jack London’s first book was published in 1900: it was “The Son of the Wolf”. There appeared short-story collections about the North: “The God of His Fathers” (1901), “The Children of the Frost” (1902), “Love of Life and Other Stories” (1907).

These short-stories are usually called “North Stories”. The place of action brings them near together. But not only that. The likeness of characters brings them near together too. London shows the people which are strong and courageous. For the first time in the American literature. The North was showed as a real place. It was in the London short-stories. The main theme of his stories is the theme of the contradiction of real nature and bourgeois civilization. The capitalist society is contrasted with the severe North where life is very difficult but really free. The Northern nature is lifeless, feeble, monotonous terrible and grand, majestic. Comparing the nature with the man, Jack London stressed only the outward opposition: a little weak man and the mighty nature. This contrast is necessary to show all-conquering man’s forces. This contrast glorifies the Man because He, a little point on the great snow plain, has overcome, has won a victory over nature.

Imaging the theme “the Man and the Nature London tries to find the key, common to all mankind. For Jack London this key, common to all mankind, is the next a life is a struggle. A man lives while he is fighting. Sitka Charly must overcome great difficulties to get to a seashore (“Woman’s Courage”). His companions died of starvation (hunger). His face is frost – bitten. He is dizzy with weakness, but he is going forward, steady forward. And Jack London considers him a hero.

The nature is ruthless to a man; a snow plain fags a man by hunger and space, crashed down pine (breaks) fractures Mason’s spine. The last one is a very tragic scene: “Fifty feet or more from the trail towered a forty pine. For generations destiny had had this one end in view-perhaps the same had been decreed of Mason. He stooped to fasten to loosened thong of his moccasin. The sleds came to a halt, and the dogs lay down in the snow without a whimper. The stillness was weird not a breath rustled the frost – encrusted forest; the cold and silence of outer space had child the heart and smote the trembling lips of nature. A sigh pulsed through the air – they did not seem to actually hear it, but rather felt it, like the premonition of movement in a motionless void. Then the great tree, burdened with its weight of years and snow, played its last part in the tragedy of life. He head the warning crash and attempted to spring up but, almost erect, caught the blow squarely on the shoulder”.

In the same short-story we meet the man who is not afraid of the Nature. His name is Malemute Kid. Kid is one of the main London’s characters. He acts in many Nothern short-stories. He knows made of North life, disposition of its people, he has authority with them. In the “White Silence” he is a true friend of Mason. After Mason’s death Kid takes care of his wife and his child.

TASK:

I. Answer the questions:

1. Where and when was he born?

2. What jobs did he do?

3. Where did London go in 1897?

4. What was his first literary trying?

5. When was London’s first book published? What was its name?

6. What are “North Stories” about?

7. Who is one of the main London’s characters?

II. Retell the text in 15-20 sentences.

VI. Theatre and Cinema

London theatres.

1.How many theatres are there in Britain? In London?

2. Where are the majority of theatres locsted?

3. What do you know about the National Theatre Company?

4. What plays does the British National Theatre deal with?

5. What does the RSC mean?

6. Where can you watch the Royal Ballet Company’s performances?

7. Where in London can you watch operas?

8. Where is London’s theatreland?

9. What theatre will you choose, you want to see plays by Shakspear?

VII. Painting

1. Picasso [Ruiz Picasso], Pablo

Spanish painter, sculptor, draughtsman, printmaker, decorative artist and writer, active in France. He dominated 20th-century European art and was central in the development of the image of the modern artist. Episodes of his life were recounted in intimate detail, his comments on art were published and his working methods recorded on film. Painting was his principal medium, but his sculptures, prints, theatre designs and ceramics all had an impact on their respective disciplines. Even artists not influenced by the style or appearance of his work had to come to terms with its implications

With Georges Braque Picasso was responsible for Cubism, one of the most radical re-structurings of the way that a work of art constructs its meaning. During his extremely long life Picasso instigated or responded to most of the artistic dialogues taking place in Europe and North America, registering and transforming the developments that he found most fertile. His marketability as a unique and enormously productive artistic personality, together with the distinctiveness of his work and practice, have made him the most extensively exhibited and discussed artist of the 20th century.

TASK:

1. Answer the questions:

1. Is Picasso Spanish or French?

2. Can we call him a “versatile” artist?

3. What was his principal medium?

4. What art style was Picasso responsible for?

5. Can you explain the meaning of “Cubism”?

6. Can you remember any of his works and describe them?

7. Why is he the most extensively exhibited artist of the 20-th century? Give your opinion.

2. Find any reproduction of Picasso’s pictures, bring it into the class and describe it.

3. Retell the text.