Jack London (1876-1916)[1][2][3][4] was an American author who wrote "The Call of the Wild" and other books. This collection includes many of his best known tales.
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"Raw and Raked, Wild and Free..."
...that was the way Jack London saw life, and the more he lived it the more enamored of it he became. "All I saw," he once wrote, "was glamor of conquest, of scarlet adventure and yellow gold. ...The life was brave and wild, and I was living the adventure I had read so much about."
Brilliant, poetic, swift with violence and action, his stories clearly illustrate the unique spirit of his unbridled genius. Critics admitted that the young firebrand -- "while frightfully primitive" -- was challenging Poe, Kipling and Melville as a one-in-a-million storyteller. The tales in this volume have been thrilling readers for nearly half a century. --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.
...that was the way Jack London saw life, and the more he lived it the more enamored of it he became. "All I saw," he once wrote, "was glamor of conquest, of scarlet adventure and yellow gold. ...The life was brave and wild, and I was living the adventure I had read so much about."
Brilliant, poetic, swift with violence and action, his stories clearly illustrate the unique spirit of his unbridled genius. Critics admitted that the young firebrand -- "while frightfully primitive" -- was challenging Poe, Kipling and Melville as a one-in-a-million storyteller. The tales in this volume have been thrilling readers for nearly half a century. --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Not Just Wolf Stories,
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This review is from: The Best Short Stories of Jack London (Paperback)
The Best Short Stories of Jack LondonAs I enter my second childhood, I am re-reading my favorites from my first childhood. Right now I have a shelf of books checked out from the Library: Robert Louis Stevenson, Jules Verne, Edgar Allen Poe and Jack London. London could write about watching paint dry and make it interesting. His reporter's eye missed nothing; he had a gift of observation and recording life. From his oystering days in San Francisco, to gold panning in the Klondike, to the South Seas, he was a masterful writer. Occasionally his socialist moralizing becomes tedious, as in "People of The Abyss", but for plain exposition he has few equals. London was one of those fortunate writers who achieved fame and considerable wealth in his lifetime, which ended at the age of forty. This collection contains some of the best of his short stories."The Story of Keesh," "The League of the Old Men," and "To Build A Fire" among them. After reading the latter, I know I'm not going out in the woods without a down sleeping bag, propane stove, and GPS.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Some seminal tales from a master storyteller...,
By Schmathan "Minister of the Dharma Bum" (Matthews, N.C.) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Best Short Stories of Jack London (Mass Market Paperback)
For all their moods of isolation, Jack London crafted some soulful stories filled with a kind of humanity that is outside of conventional terms. All of these stories are worth delving into, often more than once even, but the opener 'To Build a Fire' packs a whallop to the gut that has never left me. The narrator's struggle to keep warm, originally one of pride and daring that slowly is reduced to one of futility says all that needs to be evoked about the cold, merciless disposition of Mother Nature towards a sole human being struggling to overcome, but if you are a glass half-full person, as I have known to be on occasion, you just might find the beauty an' enormity of the world around you in even such a tragedy. I am no socialist or existentialist (in fact I'm a Christian) but I find much of worth in Jack London's writings. This is a good place to start.
4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent Writing.,
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This review is from: Best Short Stories of Jack London (Mass Market Paperback)
Occasionally a writer creates a story that is both horrible and wonderful; TO BUILD A FIRE is one of these stories. Reading it I thought of some negative criticism I had recently read about London's writing. I think the critic is full of it. TO BUILD A FIRE and much of London's writing is high octane, powerful stuff.
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First Sentence:
DAY HAD BROKEN cold and gray, exceedingly cold and gray, when the man turned aside from the main Yukon trail and climbed the high earth-bank, where a dim and little-travelled trail led eastward through the fat spruce timberland. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
muskeg berries, fur thieves, pearl buyers, sick wolf, old uns, sulphur creek, dog drivers Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Malemute Kid, Captain Warfield, Tom King, Petite Jeanne, Big Ivan, Axel Gunderson, Holy Cross, Narii Herring, Tanana Station, Captain Oudouse, Peter Gee, Sister Alberta, Stowsher Bill, Ali Choon, Bill King, Father Roubeau, Hudson's Bay Company, Louis Savoy, Russian Seas, South Sea, Stuart River, United States, Yeddo Bay New!
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Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
DAY HAD BROKEN cold and gray, exceedingly cold and gray, when the man turned aside from the main Yukon trail and climbed the high earth-bank, where a dim and little-travelled trail led eastward through the fat spruce timberland. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
muskeg berries, fur thieves, pearl buyers, sick wolf, old uns, sulphur creek, dog drivers Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Malemute Kid, Captain Warfield, Tom King, Petite Jeanne, Big Ivan, Axel Gunderson, Holy Cross, Narii Herring, Tanana Station, Captain Oudouse, Peter Gee, Sister Alberta, Stowsher Bill, Ali Choon, Bill King, Father Roubeau, Hudson's Bay Company, Louis Savoy, Russian Seas, South Sea, Stuart River, United States, Yeddo Bay New!
Books on Related Topics | Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Citations (learn more)
This book cites 2
books:
1
book
cites this book:
- To Build a Fire and Other Stories (Bantam Classics) by Jack London in Front Matter (1), and Front Matter (2)
- Lost Face: Lost Face, Trust, That Spot, Flush of Gold, The Passing of Marcus O'Brien, The Wit of Porportuk, To Build a Fire (Pine Street Books) by Jack London on page 58
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