Jack London

“ Jack’s friends say that the cause was a desire for two women at the same time; but I don’t believe that a mature, intellectual man will kill himself for such a reason, unless his moral forces have been sapped by years of self-indulgence.
It was the “Martin Eden” ending, which had haunted Jack London all his life, and which in the end he made a reality. What a shame, and what a tragedy to our literature, that capitalist America, the philosophy of individualist greed and selfishness, should have stolen away the soul of this man, with all his supreme and priceless gifts! ”

“ Jack London received his early education at the public schools of Oakland and helped to increase the family income by selling newspapers after school hours. Later he engaged in salmon-fishing, oyster-pirating, schooner-sailing, and other precarious and adventurous enterprises on San Francisco Bay. At the age of sixteen he shipped before the mast on a sailing-vessel, and in 1893 he made a voyage to Japan and went seal-hunting in the Behring Sea. In 1894 he tramped through the United States and Canada, leading the life of a “hobo” and gathering sociological data at first hand. ”

“ He was too much a man, and too much an unusual type of man. Young yet, barely thirty-six, eminently handsome, magnificently strong, almost bursting with a splendid virility, his free trail-stride, never learned on pavements, and his black eyes, hinting of great spaces and unwearied with the close perspective of the city dwellers, drew many a curious and wayward feminine glance. He saw, grinned knowingly to himself, and faced them as so many dangers, with a cool demeanor that was a far greater personal achievement than had they been famine, frost, or flood. ”

“ Jack London, born in California in 1876, was forced to find his West in Alaska—and in alcohol. He was what he and his followers liked to call the virile or red-blooded type, responsive to the "Call of the Wild," "living life naked and tensely." In his talk Jack London was simple and boyish, with plenty of humor over his own literary and social foibles. His books are very uneven, but he wrote many a hard-muscled, clean-cut page. If the Bret Harte theory of the West was that each man is at 244 bottom a sentimentalist, Jack London's formula was that at bottom every man is a brute. ”

“ It made life possible to us. It was in such reflections as these, miles and miles from any land, that the words of Jack London rang again in my ears: "Life that lives is life successful. The achievement of a difficult feat is successful adjustment to a sternly exacting environment." Well, we strove to accomplish, and our environment was savage. Supreme courage and unwavering vigilance alone could enable us to adjust ourselves, and come alive out of the welter of foam and frothing waves that assailed the little Snark the greater part of her perilous voyage to Hawaii. ”

“ More than seventeen years ago, in May 1899, Jack London's first story, "A Thousand Deaths," was published in The Black Cat. Doubtless many of our readers are already familiar with the facts concerning its publication as they are here set forth.
In Martin Eden, the book which more than any other of his is autobiography, London tells the old story, of an author's struggle for recognition. Martin Eden is about to go back to coal heaving, despairing of fame as a writer, when a letter from "The White Mouse" informs him of the acceptance of his story, "The Whirlpool." ”

“ During my long stay in Oakland, I had ample opportunity to get intimately acquainted with both Jack and Mrs. London; indeed, we were all like one big happy family. Fame and popularity have not spoiled them. Jack is just like a big schoolboy, good-natured, frank, generous, and Mrs. London is just a grown-up schoolgirl. They are good comrades, always helping each other in their work. Mrs. London I found to be as full of grit as any of us—as we were later to discover, there was hardly a thing on board that any of the men could do that she couldn't do ”

“ I was standing in my father's jewellry store after supper on the evening of Monday, November 12, 1906, when a messenger boy p004 came in and handed me a telegram. The instant I saw the little yellow envelope, something told me that this was the turning-point in my life. With trembling hands I tore it open, my heart beating wildly with excitement. It was Jack London's reply, the fateful slip of paper that was to dictate my acts for several years to come.
The telegram was dated from Oakland, California, a few hours earlier in the day. "Can you cook?" it asked. ”

“ And so, at the beginning, let me add my testimony to that of Jack London, in saying that the horrors with which Molokai is associated in the average mind, simply do not exist. The sensationalists have done their work well. To the four corners of the earth they have disseminated their ghastly fictions, with a persistency truly wonderful; and the people of every nation, hungry for things that are gruesome, have pounced greedily on all that was offered. ”

“ Complement of the Snark in Solomon Islands:
Mrs. Jack London, Mr. Jack London and Martin Johnson in the centre. Imglst
"Fallible and frail, a bit of pulsating, jelly-like life—it is all I am. About me are the great natural forces—colossal menaces, Titans of destruction, unsentimental monsters that have less concern for me than I have for the grain of sand I crush under my foot. They have no concern for me at all. They do not know me. They are unconscious, unmerciful, and unmoral. ”

“ This evening when the boy brings the
skins, I shall be pleased to give him, in an envelope, for you, a
tangible return for your musical composition.
"Please put the price on each skin, and also let me know for what sum
all the skins will sell together.
"Sincerely yours,
"JACK LONDON."
Now, thought I, I have him. No skins, no tangible return; and evidently he is set on receiving that tangible return.
At seven o'clock Eliceo was back, but without leopard skins. ”

“ Then the white teeth of Bright closed on his mackinaw jacket, and he pitched into the snow. To live! To exist! He fought wildly as ever, the centre of a tossing heap of men and dogs. His left hand gripped a wolf-dog by the scruff of the back, while the arm was passed around the neck of Lawson. Every struggle of the dog helped to throttle the hapless sailor. Jan’s right hand was buried deep in the curling tendrils of Red Bill’s shaggy head, and beneath all, Mr. Taylor lay pinned and helpless. ”

“ Meanwhile Lit-lit, divining the Factor’s errand, had crept in under the rear wall of the lodge, and through the front flap was peeping out at the two logomachists by the mosquito smudge. She was flushed and happy-eyed, proud that no less a man than the Factor (who stood next to God in the Northland hierarchy) had singled her out, femininely curious to see at close range what manner of man he was. Sunglare on the ice, camp smoke, and weather beat had burned his face to a copper-brown, so that her father was as fair as he, while she was fairer. ”

“ I shall not give you the address of Johnny Upright. Let it suffice that he lives on the most respectable street in the East End—a street that would be considered very mean in America, but a veritable oasis in the desert of East London. It is surrounded on every side by close-packed squalor and streets jammed by a young and vile and dirty generation; but its own pavements are comparatively bare of the children who have no other place to play, while it has an air of desertion, so few are the people that come and go. ”

“ The instant they struck this glare ice Harrington came to his knees, holding precariously on with one hand, his whip singing fiercely among his dogs and fearsome abjurations hurtling about their ears. The teams spread out on the smooth surface, each straining to the uttermost. But few men in the North could lift their dogs as did Jack Harrington. At once he began to pull ahead, and Louis Savoy, taking the pace, hung on desperately, his leaders running even with the tail of his rival’s sled. ”

“ And Skysail Jack and I peered and knew each other under the wreckage.
Men such as he are privileged, even in a prison, so that he dared an infraction of the rules by speaking to me in a cracked and quavering voice.
"You're a good one, Standing," he cackled. "You never squealed."
"But I never knew, Jack," I whispered back—I was compelled to whisper, for five years of disuse had well nigh lost me my voice. "I don't think there ever was any dynamite." ”

“ It is Mr. London’s purpose, he declares in his preface, to “enlighten, to some slight degree,” the minds of a few capitalists.
218“It is an interesting thought-provoking volume, to be read and pondered, but truths and half truths are so interwoven that it is scarcely a safe guide.”
“It is marred somewhat by repetition and lacks the coherence and cogency of a logical whole. With all these defects, however, the ‘War of the classes’ is no whit inferior in the vigour of its style and the sweep and rapid movement of its thought to any of Jack London’s work.” ”

“ The Pellys had found no moose, and had robbed my cache. And so had the three white men; but they lay thin and dead in their cabin as passed. After that I do not remember, till I came here, and found food and fire, - much fire."
As he finished, he crouched closely, even jealously, over the stove. For a long while the slush-lamp shadows played tragedies upon the wall.
"But Unga!" cried Prince, the vision still strong upon him.
"Unga? She would not eat of the ptarmigan. She lay with her arms about his neck, her face deep in his yellow hair. ”

“ Jacob Welse regarded him gravely.
"Ah! There will be?" he asked, picking up hope.
Frona looked inquiringly at her father.
"Jams are not always nice," he said, with a short laugh. "It all depends where they take place and where you happen to be."
"But the river! Look! It falls; I can see it before my eyes."
"It is not too late." He swept the island-studded bend and saw the ice-mountains larger and reaching out one to the other. "Go into the tent, Courbertin, and put on the pair of moccasins you'll find by the stove. Go on. You won't miss anything. ”

“ In dim and fiery ways a feeling of possession mastered him. It seemed that all that was necessary was for him to walk up to this Joy Gastell, take her hand in his, and say "Come."
It was in this mood that he discovered something that made him forget empery over the white feet of woman. At the valley rim he blazed no corner-stake. He did not reach the valley rim, but, instead, he found himself confronted by another stream. He lined up with his eye a blasted willow tree and a big and recognizable spruce. He returned to the stream where were the centre stakes. ”

“ By JACK LONDON "Burning Daylight" is just the kind of a story that Jack London loves to write the story of the struggles of a strong man in a world of strong men. Moreover, it is a story which he has written purely for the story's sake he does not preach anything in it. This fact will make it appeal to those who dislike to have their socialism, or whatever it may be, mixed up with their fiction. ”

“ He was a weird figure of a man. Aged and lean, long-faced, hollow-checked, with matted, sunburnt hair that fell below the shoulders of his buckskin shirt, his face was distorted with hatred and helpless rage. Holding his long rifle in his bridle-hand, he shook his free fist at Cedar City.
“God’s curse on all of you!” he cried out. “On your children, and on your babes unborn. May drought destroy your crops. May you eat sand seasoned with the venom of rattlesnakes. May the sweet water of your springs turn to bitter alkali. ”

“ He watched the stallion out of sight through the lilacs, seeing visions of fair Shire colts mighty of bone and frame and free from blemish, then turned, as ever he turned to the immediate thing, and spoke to his body servant.
"How's that last boy, Oh My? Showing up?"
"Him pretty good boy, I think," was the answer. "Him young boy. Everything new. Pretty slow. All the same bime by him show up good."
"Why? What makes you think so?"
"I call him three, four morning now. Him sleep like baby. Him wake up smiling just like you. That very good." ”

“ And he continued to stand, listening to her laugh herself merrily away from Graham and on across the house to her wing, from the porches of which she continued to laugh as she teased and chided Oh Dear for fancied derelictions.
From far off came the dim but unmistakable trumpeting of Mountain Lad. King Polo asserted his lordly self, and the harems of mares and heifers sent back their answering calls. Dick listened to all the whinnying and nickering and bawling of sex, and sighed aloud: "Well, the land is better for my having been. It is a good thought to take to bed." ”

“ Dag Daughtry complied and in his excitement of interest pulled off the top of another quart of beer for himself.
"Go on, go on, sir," he murmured huskily, wiping his lips, "and the treasure-hunting graft. I'm straight dying to hear. Sir, I salute you."
"I may say, steward," the Ancient Mariner resumed, "that I was born with a silver spoon that melted in my mouth and left me a proper prodigal son. Also, that I was born with a backbone of pride that would not melt. Not for a paltry railroad accident, but for things long before as well as after, my family let me die, and I . . . I let it live. ”

“ Jack London first acquired fame through his spirited and vigorous short stories of Alaskan life, wherein men of primary passions and appetites struggle for mastery. Each succeeding volume of his tales has served to increase his vogue. ”

“ The Japanese are great practical jokers in their quiet way. We found Nakata p298 trying to show the naked women how to wear Mrs. London's clothes. He succeeded very well, until he accidentally tickled one of them, and immediately they all jumped a good arm's length away from him; and as those on whom he had succeeded in getting dresses did not know how to get them off, and for fear of being tickled would not allow him to touch them, there was no washing done.
Next morning, Jack called all hands and they heaved anchor, while I started the engine and we steamed out of the harbour. ”