Jack london

1876-1916

Jack London is prolific American novelist and short story writer, whose works deal romantically with the overwhelming power of nature and the struggle for survival.

Jack London was born in San Francisco, California to the unmarried Flora Wellman and William Chaney. John Griffith Chaney was renamed John Griffith London, later called "Jack," when William denied that he was his father, and Flora instead married John London, Jack's stepfather. His early years were spent in San Francisco, where he began reading classic stories at the age of eight, an interest that would only continue to spread when the London family moved to nearby Oakland two years later. London's youth was marked by poverty. At the age of ten he became an avid reader, and borrowed books from the Oakland Public Library.

Jack attended school up to the eighth grade and took on a number of different jobs ranging from a newspaper route¹, being an oyster pirate in San Francisco Bay, and a factory laborer. About this he wrote in his autobiographical “John Barleycorn”.

After leaving school at the age of 14, London worked as a seaman, tramped across the country as a hobo² and worked at a variety of odd jobs. As a sailor on a sealing cruise he sailed as far as Japan. The experience of the cruise formed the basis of his future sea stories. As a member of Kelly’s Industrial Army he took part in the march of unemployed on Washington. In 1894 he was arrested in Niagara Falls and put in prison for vagrancy³. These events he described in the story “Road”.

Without having much formal education, London educated himself in public libraries. About age of 19 he attended Oakland High School for a short time and then had a year at the University of California. Then he had to get a job because had no money to pay his tuition. Later he became interested in the Socialist Party, influenced no doubt by his days as a factory laborer, and this anti-capitalist political philosophy would shape his later writing as well. He grew interested in the writings of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Herbert Spencer. He was intrigued by socialism and Darwin's concept of the "survival of the fittest," two ideas that would influence his later writings. Eventually London went to the University of California at Berkeley in 1896.

In winter of 1897 London joined the gold rush to the Klondike. He returned after a short time, empty-handed and discouraged by the rugged, icy weather. Jack made a return trip later that year, reaching the Yukon Territory but he did not find any gold. Although he got no gold, he had found something better. The wonderful stories written after him were based on the life he had lived and on what he had seen in the North.

Soon after, Jack was offered a steady job as a postal worker, but he turned it down in hope that he could support himself by writing. Fortune smiled upon him, however, when short story "To the Man on Trail" was published in 1899. After this initial victory, popularity came more easily to London. His book “The Son of the Wolf” (1900) gained a wide audience.

London married his first wife Bess (Elisabeth Maddern) in 1900, but left her and their two daughters three years afterwards. It was not until the serialized publication of “Call of the Wild” in the ‘Saturday Evening Post’ during the summer of 1903 that London became a national sensation, separating from Bessie in favor of the new love of his life. London married his secretary Charmian Kittredge, whom he considered his true love, in 1905.

In 1901 London ran unsuccessfully on the Socialist party ticket for mayor of Oakland. He started to steadily produce novels, nonfiction and short stories, becoming in his lifetime one of the most popular authors. In 1902 London went to England, where he studied the living conditions in East End and working class areas of the capital city. His report about the economic degradation of the poor, “The People of the Abyss” (1903), was a surprise success in the U.S. but criticized in England. In 1904 London journeyed to Asia to serve as a war correspondent in the Russo-Japanese Warm, writing “The Sea-Wolf” among other works, publishing furiously upon his return, and involving himself in the Socialist Party of Oakland.

Tired of urban life, London then bought a huge ranch complex in Glen Ellen, California, north of San Francisco, honeymooning soon after with Charmian in the Caribbean. He writes firsthand newspaper reports about the devastating San Francisco Earthquake of 1906, publishing “White Fang” (1906) soon after. By this time, London had enough money to build a magnificent boat named the Snark, fit to travel around the world, setting sail with his wife on a planned seven year world voyage in 1907. In 1907 they sailed to Hawaii and Tahiti, where London met with the native headhunters. In 1908 they visited the Fiji islands, the Solomon Islands and Sydney, Australia. Having suddenly fallen ill, he had to cancel the rest of the planned trip and returned to California, much to his intense disappointment. He sold the Snark and spent time on his ranch in Glen Ellen for the next few years, publishing “Martin Eden” (1909), “South Sea Tales” (1911), and “Smoke Bellow” (1912). In 1912 he took a sea voyage around South America, but the following year brought great tragedy to Jack London's life. In 1913 his nearly completed dream mansion on the ranch property, Wolf House, burnt to the ground in a mysterious fire; his jealous ex-wife Bessie bothered him again; Charmian miscarried her pregnancy; and the ranch itself had a poor year for crops. He nevertheless published “John Barleycorn” (1913) and “The Valley of the Moon” (1914). In 1915 Jack went to Mexico as a news war correspondent during the Mexican Civil War. Returning to California, London wrote one more novel, “The Star Rover”, and also resigned from the Socialist Party he had worked for so devotedly throughout his life because of its lack of "fire and fight." Debts, alcoholism, illness, and fear of losing his creativity darkened the author's last years. One of his most popular books, “Hearts of the Three”, published posthumously in 1920. London died young, on November 22, 1916. It is suggested that he committed suicide with morphine. Whatever the cause, it is clear that London, who played the various roles of journalist, novelist, prospector, sailor, pirate, husband, and father, lived life to the fullest.

During his short life (40 years) London wrote over fifty novels and dozens of short stories and became, at the time, America’s most famous author. For a while, he was one of the most widely read authors in the world. He embodied, it was said, the spirit of the American West, and his portrayal of adventure and frontier life seemed like a breath of fresh air in comparison with nineteenth-century Victorian fiction. The main theme of his books was the struggle of individual to survive and achieve success.

CHECK YOUR KNOWLEDGE:

1. How could you describe Jack London’s childhood?

2. What ideas did he support in his youth?

3. What role did trips to the Klondike play in London’s life?

4. What ‘roles’ did he play in his life?

5. What lays in the basis of Jack London’s works?

“LOVE OF LIFE” is one of the best London’s short stories about the North.

Read the whole story and answer the questions:

1. What is the setting of the story?

2. Give a rational reason why Bill does not answer when his name is called.

3. What does the man feel as he looks around?

4. Why does he hurry to the top of the hill despite the pain in his ankle?

5. Where is the man headed? What will he find there?

6. Besides the swollen ankle, what is the man’s greatest problem?

7. What does the fox represent?

8. What are the only two things the man has had to eat?

9. How does nature reflect the man’s feelings?

10. What does the man do with the pack and items he has been carrying?

11. How does he manage to avoid a bear attack?

12. What are the man’s thoughts on death?

13. What has happened to Bill?

14. How does the man kill the wolf?

15. What unusual behaviour does the man show after the first few weeks after his rescue?

16. Does the story end happily?

“MARTIN EDEN”

In this novel Jack London used many facts from his own life.

In an American port San Francisco there lived an ordinary, rather rude lad Martin Eden. Martin Eden, a strong man and talented worker, belongs to a working-class family. His parents died, his brothers dispersed along the world in search for happiness, his sisters hardly made both ends meet. Martin earned his life by a hard sailor’s labour. He got to know a world of the ordinary sea toilers’ world very well. One day Martin stood up for a student on a ferry, whom a group of slightly tight guys wanted to beat. The student invited Martin to his house on dinner to show gratitude. There Martin gets acquainted with the student’s sister Ruth Morse¹, a girl from a rich bourgeois family, also a student of the University, and falls in love with her. He decides to become her equal in knowledge and culture. He must make a career for himself and become famous. The action of the novel develops in two plans: personal - Martin’s love to Ruth – and social – Martin’s struggle for making society recognize his talent of a writer.

At last, in two years, Martin achieves success. But money, which he has enough now, doesn’t make him happy. He generously endowed his sisters, his friend, and his flat owner. And what then? Even Ruth, who is ready now to become his wife, doesn’t attract him: a love affair with her is buried in his soul long ago. After all Martin understands that a change in the respect to him of the society is caused by the only one thing – publishing of his books and public’s recognition, that is – determines by a size of his bank credit.

Martin is seemed to be able of finding his own happiness, having escaped from civilization to the islands of the South Seas, living in a reed hut, catching sharks and hunting for wild goats. He buys a ticket on the ship sailing to Haiti. But here he is also looked at as a travelling celebrity. He becomes reserved. Life becomes agonizing. And somewhere in the ocean space Martin throws himself out of a porthole of a cabin into the ocean abyss and gives up all the scores with life.

DISCUSSION:

1. What does the hero have in common with Jack London and in what ways are they different?

2. What made Martin study?

3. Why did the editors refuse to publish Martin’s works?

4. When Martin and Ruth were discussing the problem of his education and Martin said that it took money, Ruth answered, "I hadn't thought of that". Why do you think she said so? What else shows that the young people belonged to different strata of society?

5. Was it luck for Martin to meet Ruth? Explain.

6. Why couldn’t Ruth appreciate Martin as a writer?

7. What helped Martin achieve success and glory?

8. Why was Martin unhappy?

9. Did Martin love Ruth? Prove your answer.

10. Why did Martin Eden commit suicide?

WRITING:

• You are the editor whom Martin Eden sent his story. Write a letter explaining why you can/can’t publish his story.

• Imagine Martin Eden turned to you for advice. Explain him what to do with his relationships with Ruth.

1 apex – highest point; culmination

1 “Счастье Ревущего стана”

1 solicitation – seduction

2 succumb /sə'kʌm/ - surrender, give in

1 advent – arrival (usually important)

2 fathom – measure of six feet, esp. in depth soundings

3 coax – persuade gradually or by flattery

1 bandage – strip of material used to bind a wound etc.

2 laundry – прачечная

1 ivy-vine – climbing evergreen tree with shiny five-angled leaves

2 still – not moving

1 failure – unsuccessful person

2 daub – a bad picture

3 pneumonia / nju:′mounjə/

1 a newspaper route — a district of mail delivering

2 hobo – US wandering worker; tramp; unemployed

3 vagrancy – living as a tramp

1 Morse / mo:s/