Larsen And Van Weyden Compare And Contrast

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In Jack London’s The Sea-Wolf (1992), a young Humphrey Van Weyden is thrown overboard from the ship, the Martinez, in a collision with a ferryboat. After he struggled in the cool San Francisco Bay he is pulled into a seal-hunting ship, the Ghost. On the ship the captain, Wolf Larsen, and Van Weyden become intellectual friends. As the voyage continues Larsen and Van Weyden start to become enemies because of their disagreement in the philosophy of Captain Larsen. The captain and Van Weyden are both well-educated men but differ in strength and desire. Both Larsen and Van Weyden are intellectually gifted human beings. This intellect is displayed when the two sit down in Larsen’s cabin and talk for hours on philosophers, scientist, and well-known authors: “Against the wall, near the head of the bunk, was a rack filled with books. I glanced over them… Shakespeare, Tennyson, Poe, and De Quincey. There were scientific works… Tyndall, Proctor, and Darwin. Astronomy and physics…”(43). Larsen’s intelligence leads to his creation of a navigation tool that tells your location using stars, which …show more content…

The want-to attitude of Humphrey is greater then that of Larsen because he is passionate to rebuild the Ghost to get home and leave Endeavor Island. Van Weyden’s motivation and desire is the only reason why him and Maud where able to live because both are determined to survive. Larsen’s desire slowly decreases as the book wears on because of his lack in care or effort of anything, for he accepts death and starts to kill himself to end life. This lack of desire is because of his slow paralysis from the excruciating headaches he experiences while he his on the Ghost. Larsen’s condensing desire goes against his Darwinian philosophy of survival of the fittest, and this condensing is what gives Van Weyden a want to attitude to repair the Ghost so he is as far away from Larsen before he tries to kill him and

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