Jack London: One Of The Best Novelists

Many years ago, reading was very important part of everybody’s life. People bought books a lot, they tried to find definite book and sometimes it was very difficult. Many people read books at night using the candle light, because there was no lamps and electricity at those times. So people sacrificed by many things in order to read at least some pages of new book or popular book. At those times benefits of bilingualism were indisputable because bilingual person could read different books that were not translated.

What we see nowadays? It’s sad, but with development of all hose technologies people have less time for reading books. From one hand, nowadays it is not a problem to find a good book in the Internet and you don’t even need to buy it. From the other hand, not many people use Internet for reading books. Now we don’t have any problems with electricity so we can read a book in a good lighted room without any harm to our eyes. Moreover we can listen to some books because they have audio versions. So development of technologies gives many opportunities to read but at the same time there are many other activities that displace reading brusquely. That very sad of course and nobody knows why some centuries ago people were fighting for a book and now books are not important and reading is becoming something not as valuable as before.

However there are writers that anybody should know. And who knows, maybe after reading this article somebody will open a book or find it in the Internet and read at least some pages. Because reading is really great and it improves your imagination greatly. Moreover you will become more literate and will be able to write good essays. But if you have some difficulties with that now and ready to visit online classes you can do it and get help on our site. We can write essay for you and you can read other essays and maybe find something you need.

Novelists: who are they?

Nowadays not every person will answer this question. So let’s get some information about genre called Novel and people who wrote in this genre. So, to say in simple words novel is a genre of literature and it has some features:

• it has large volume(has many pages)
• as usual it’s written as a narration(not as a poem just as a simple story)
• describes some fictional peoples and their adventures(but the world around them is real and all that adventures might happen in a real life)
• genre firstly came into literature and became popular in 18th century

So, as you know some facts about novel you can easily guess that novelist is a writer who wrote his books mostly in genre of novel. What is interesting about novelists and other authors that they have different popularity in different countries. As some Americans say they know nothing about Jack London and his novels. However in Soviet Union, for example, he was very famous and popular. But besides that, he wrote really great novels and that is the reason why everybody should know at least anything about him. Of course there are many other good novelists you can read like: Daniel Defoe and his famous book “Robinson Crusoe”, William Thackeray and his “Vanity of fair” and of course Jerome K Jerome and his novel “Three Men in a boat”. There are many others famous novelists, but Jack London is also very good however not as well known in the USA and Britain as other novelists. So let’s talk about him and his novels.

Jack London and his famous novels

It would not be a good idea to tell all biography of this writer with all that dates and facts. You can find full biography and other facts about writer following this link if you are interested in biography. Now let’s just look at some things about him that will be interesting for us further in this article. Just try to keep these things in your head now and then you will understand why.

Fact number one is connected with a Gold Rush. Everybody could hear about this and if to say in general Gold Rush was a process when many people migrated to some cities and places where gold was discovered. Jack London was one of those people and he himself joined Klondike Gold Rush. To get there, there were different ways. Some people get there using sledges and sledge dogs. Others get through a Pacific ocean using ships. These will be mentioned again further.

Fact number two is connected with animals. Jack London liked animals and he defended them. For example he even created an organization which goal was to defend animals and especially those in circus. Because Jack London saw some cases of a cruel treatment with animals and he could stand that. This fact will also be mentioned again further.

The best way to know author is by reading his books. Of course here we can’t put a book but we can analyze some novels of Jack London in order to understand what his main themes were and what is interesting in his style of writing. Like this essay and want something similar? Read about us and order an essay or read other interesting essays on our site.

Some novels which you should know about

Here we will look at three novels written by Jack London and try to connect two facts from his life mentioned above with these novels.

Two novels which have something in common are called “White fang” and “The Call of the Wild”. In both these novels life of dogs is described. But this is not life in usual conditions and environment. This is a cruel and harsh life in conditions of a Gold Rush. As it was mentioned above, Jack London participated in this process and maybe being impressed by those adventures he wrote these two novels and some other stories. Although they have something in common they have dissimilarities. Let’s look shortly at plot of each novel so you will be able to search what is similar and what is different.

“White Fang” is a story of a dog whose mother was half-dog and half – wolf and father was a wolf. The story has parallel plot lines and begins with description of group of men who struggle for their lives against cruel nature of Alaska. Another main plot describes life of a pack of wolves and then birth of little wolf. This little wolf will become a White fang. Once when he went to drink some water he met a tribe. His mother came to defend him but people took both them to their tribe. That’s how White Fang appeared among people. Then he had very difficult life and different treatment. He changed some owners he was a sledge dog, dog who fought against other dogs but finally he found a good man, or good man found White Fang. You can find detailed plot in the Internet or better to read this book because it really interesting. It describes life of dog and attitude of people towards this dog. Jack London shows all types of people through their attitude towards White Fang. He shows how human can live in peace and love with dog or how dog can hate his owner if this owner is cruel and bad. At least you can watch a film adaptation of this book. There are some of them so you can choose any you like.

“The Call of the Wild” is also a story about dog. But it is little bit differs from White Fang’s story. The hero of this novel is a dog called Buck - St. Bernard-Scotch Shepherd. So he was powerful and big. He lived happily in a family of judge. However one day Buck was stolen by a gardener, who needed some money, and shipped to Seattle. That’s how his happy life turned into a harsh reality. He began his new life: life of a sled dog. By the way, this novel also describes actions connected with a Gold Rush. So Buck became a sled dog however he had never done that before. The situation was also very difficult because of climate changes and because Buck was with another dogs who were aggressive towards him especially at first. This novel is about mutual relations between dog and his owners. This novel shows tragic destiny of dog and how his adaption to new and new conditions.

So as to look at these two novels we can find some similarities. First is that both dogs are the main heroes of these books. Both they got in very difficult life situations and had to adapt to all these conditions. Another common feature of the novels is that both of them depicted attitude of people towards dogs and in both of these novels main heroes got to different types of people, different owners. By this way Jack London wanted to show how attitude of the owner can change the dog. Another common thing is that both Buck and White Fang were in environment of dogs that were aggressive towards them and both White Fang and Buck were made to struggle with these dogs and finally they both became leaders.

What is different? These novels are quite similar but these are two different stories about two different dogs. Beginning of destiny is different for them. If White Fang was born in the wild and only then picked up by people Buck lived happily as a pet and then he was put in harsh conditions. So White Fang appeared in hard situation at the beginning of his life while Buck was quite mature when he found himself harnessed in sledges. Another difference is that endings are different. Here we won’t tell how these two novels are ended but “The White Fang” has good and happy ending, while “The Call of the Wild” ends tragically and very philosophically.

The third novel very different from two novels above is called “The Sea-Wolf”. As it was mentioned, one of the ways to get to one of Gold mining locations was through a Pacific ocean. So Jack London might possibly saw this ocean by himself and this story was born after his feelings. But it’s just a hypothesis. The main hero of this novel is a writer and literature critic Humphry Van Weyden, who travelled to his friend. One day when he crossed a bay and got into a shipwreck. He lost his consciousness and when came to senses he found himself on a board of a whaling schooner. He got to know that the captain of the ship is very complicated person with awful temper. All called him Wolf Larsen. Instead of helping to Humphry, Larsen made him stay at the ship as a cabin boy. So imagine what difficulties Humphry had to overcome. He had never been on a board of the ship for such long time before. And now he was made to do different obligations. However as time passed he adapted to new conditions however hard it was. He became a competent part of a crew. The story is also concentrated about thought of the main hero about captain of the ship and about his teammates. The novel is full of adventures and chilling moments.

To sum up it can be said that as usual main heroes of Jack London’s novels are people or animals who got into a hard conditions and had to struggle for their lives. The author shows how human can adapt to different life situations and what will to life person can demonstrate. Hope these novels were interesting for you and maybe, you will open them one evening in order to read some pages. Try them, because it’s worth to be read. And you will open a new world for yourself: world of Alaska and Pacific Ocean. Jack London is a master of describing different places so your imagination will draw a lot of scenes for you, just relax and read these awesome novels.