《野性的呼唤》英文书评

A Review of The Call of The Wild

I About Jack London

Jack London(born Jan. 12, 1876, died Nov. 22, 1916), whose life symbolized the power of will, was the most successful writer in America in the early 20th Century. His vigorous stories of men and animals against the environment, and survival against hardships were drawn mainly from his own experience. An illegitimate child, London passed his childhood in poverty in the Oakland slums. At the age of 17, he ventured to sea on a sealing ship. The turning point of his life was a thirty-day imprisonment that was so degrading it made him decide to turn to education and pursue a career in writing. And his experiences of searching for gold in the Klondike (in Canada) left their mark in his stories. His work embraced the concepts of unconfined individualism and Darwinism in its exploration of the laws of nature. He retired to his ranch near Sonoma, where he died at age 40 of various diseases and drug treatments.

Jack London is best known for his books The Call of the Wild, White Fang, and The Sea-Wolf, and a few short stories, such as "To Build a Fire" and "The White Silence." In fact, he was a prolific writer whose fiction explored their geographies and their cultures: the Yukon, California, and the South Pacific. He experimented with many literary forms, from conventional love stories and dystopias (反乌托邦，政治讽刺小说) to science fantasy. His noted journalism included war correspondence, boxing stories, and the life of Molokai lepers. A committed socialist, he insisted against editorial pressures to write political essays and insert social criticism in his fiction. He was among the most influential figures of his day, who understood how to create a public persona and use the media to market his self-created image of poor-boy-turned-success. He left over fifty books of novels, stories, journalism, and essays, many of which have been translated and continue to be read around the world.

II Plot

Buck is a dog who leads a comfortable life in a California ranch home with his owner, a judge, until he is stolen and sold to pay off a gambling debt. Buck is taken to Alaska and sold to a pair of French Canadians who were impressed with his physique（体形，体格）. They train him as a sled dog（雪橇犬）, and he quickly learns how to survive the cold winter nights and the pack society by observing his teammates. Buck is later sold again and passes hands several times, all the while improving his abilities as a sled dog and pack leader.

Eventually, Buck is sold to a man, his wife, and her brother who know nothing about sledding nor surviving in the Alaskan wilderness. They struggle to control the sled and ignore warnings not to travel during the spring melt. As they journey on, they run into John Thornton, an experienced outdoors man, who notices that all of the sled dogs are in terrible shape from the ill treatment of their handlers. Thornton warns the trio（三重奏）against crossing the river, but they refuse to listen and order Buck to mush（前进）. Exhausted, starving, and sensing the danger ahead, Buck refuses. Recognizing him as a remarkable dog and disgusted by the driver's beating of the dog, Thornton cuts him free from his traces and tells the trio he's keeping him. After some argument, the trio leaves and tries to cross the river, but as Thornton warned the ice gives way and they drown.

As Thornton nurses Buck back to health, Buck comes to love him and grows devoted to him. Thornton takes him on trips to pan for gold. Thornton and his friends go to their camp and continue their search for gold, while Buck begins exploring the wilderness around them and begins socializing with a local wolf pack. One morning, he returns from a three-day long hunt to find his beloved master and the others in the camp have been killed by some Yeehats (Native Americans). Buck finds some of them in the camp and kills them to avenge Thornton, later finding other members of the tribe, then returns to the woods to become alpha wolf (领头狼) of the pack. Each year he revisits the site where Thornton died, never completely forgetting the master he loved.

III My Opinions

The law of club and fang

Through Buck’s experiences living in the wild, Jack London wants to tell us that the world is dominated by those who are much stronger and more powerful than common people, and only the stronger ones could exist. This is the law of club and fang. Buck gradually realizes the law and begins to obey the law after he is stolen and taken to the wild. The savage environment which is full of tricks, dangers and deaths turns him to be more powerful and cunning. Finally, he becomes the leader of his team. Similar to the wild, our society becomes crueler and crueler, and