Washington 1
Dustin Washington
Kara Lybarger-Monson
English 1B
12 September 2016
Short Fiction Essay In “To Build a Fire” by Jack London, he gives an intriguing and trembling feeling as we follow an unnamed man is making his way through the freezing white snow of Yukon. As the story goes, on you cannot help but be latched onto his journey and wanting to know what will happen next. Although from an outside perspective it may seem initially boring or bland, slowly this unnamed man becomes a focal point that has you wanting to continue reading more and more. This story grabbed my attention by connection a regular man with a challenging life experience, along with a harsh environment with little to no help which ultimately test his
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Then we find out he has a companion with him, a husky who doesn’t seem to enjoy the weather but stays loyal to the man in hope to get warm and get rest soon. The narrator also gives us a hint on the temperature by explaining how the unnamed man would spit and then his saliva would turn into an icicle then shares how there is still nine hours ahead for his journey.
As far as the setting goes, it is given to us on the very first page that the unnamed man is traveling in Yukon, Canada and this is all taking place during the great Klondike Gold Rush which took place between 1896 and 1899. Taking this into consideration, we have to realize that this man is in the freezing cold with no form of communication, limited supplies, and a dog to take care of. So as you can imagine from his perspective he is probably distraught and to make matter worse his dog slips through some ice and gets his feet wet. In an attempt to warn the dog up, the unnamed man begins to build a fire. Shortly after he breaks through the ice himself and has to build another new fire to dry and warm his own
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Beginning to lose feeling in his hands, he plots to kill the dog and then use its insides to keep his own hands warm. This plan is ruined because when he eventually catches the dog he can’t even use his hands to kill it so he has to let it go. From the man’s personal perspective, the setting contributed by being freezing weather and leading to him losing feeling in his hands and ultimately losing his peace of mind and self-control.
Finally, the story comes to an end with the man takin one last shot and sprinting to try to get to his destination as fast as possible. In a failed attempt, he collapses and drifts off into a sleep then shortly afterward dies. In this case this may even be a blessing because the man is not in pain or suffering anymore because he is dead. I believe that the irony in this story is similar to many, as humans we try to be in control and don’t take warnings but in the end as much as we try man cannot defeat nature.
In conclusion, this story was my favorite because when I began to read I just wanted to get it over with. After reading on and seeing the imagery and structure used by the author I was able to put myself in the setting with the unnamed man and relate with
...s and explications focus on the setting of the narrative and its graphic description, but few point out the undeniable change that takes place within the man as he attempts to ward off death. London incredibly sets up this realization as he builds the man to be overconfident, yet green to the Yukon. Tragedy is unavoidable for the man, it is how he reacts and deals with struggles of his journey that define his character and ultimately allow him to prevail with dignity. Though this change is short-lived in the story, the man dies almost instantaneously as the revelation is made, I am certain that the man would have a greater appreciation and sense of significance for his delicate life had he miraculously survived.
After the man had built one successful fire that was put out by snow falling from a spruce tree above them, he attempted and failed to build another (1819). He decided he would kill the dog to warm his hands by keeping them hidden from the cold in its carcass, and so he tried to lure it close to him by speaking softly to it (1820). The dog however noticed that this was suspicious, since the man only talked to the dog in a harsh way, and so he knew not to approach the man (1820). At this point, the man's confidence is not as prominent as it was when they began the trip. After his multiple failures of not paying attention to the climate around him and failing to build a fire to save himself, he is acting out of panic. When the man tries to call the dog to him in a softer tone, the dog takes this as a warning sign, since it is different from how the man had always acted before. The dog knows what to do in these situations, while the man is blinded by his confidence until it is too
The man doesn't care about the dog just as nature doesn't care about the man. The man only has the dog to help him along his journey. Shortly after the man had nearly fallen through the ice the narrater said, “Once, sensing danger, he made the dog go ahead. The dog did not want to go. It hesitated until the man pushed it forward.”(68) The man uses the dog for
The man finally comes to the realization that he is going to die; he lies down in the snow and falls into a comfortable sleep. The dog stays with the man for a while confused and wondering why he is laying in the snow, he curiously walks up to the man and sniffs; the smell of death fills his nostrils. The dog leaves the man and searches for the other food and fire providers. In London’s “To Build a Fire”, he displays the perseverance that the man undergoes in various stages as he faces his imminent death. When the man starts this journey, he is unaware of the fate that Mother Nature has in store for him.
In Jack London’s “To Build a Fire”, London is portraying the typical american individual through his anonymous timberman; self-reliant, brave, and unwavering. In the short story, a man goes out into the Yukon Territory in search of profitable business. His priority is to build a fire to warm his limbs and his furry follower. The story largely focuses on the conflict between nature and man, as we see this man furiously try to race against the cold’s quick overtaking of his body.
He lacks imagination of what could happen to him in the tundra of the Yukon. “The trouble with him was that he was without imagination,” (London, 525) Lo...
The man's feet sank into the water. Although the water was not deep, his legs all the way up to his knees were soaked. The man had become annoyed because the accident has now caused him to delay his arrival at the camp. He would have to build a fire to dry himself and his clothes. He walked over to some small trees, that were covered in snow. In their branches were pieces of dry grass and wood. He put several large pieces of wood on the snow, under one of the trees. On top of the wood, he put some grass and dry branches. He then took out his matches, and lighted the fire. To keep the fire growing he added more and more wood. He then rested for a while and continued to on his way to the mining camp. After a while he stopped to start his second fire, which did not really turn out so great because he leaned up against a tree to cut the string from his boots. He did not notice that his fire was under a branch covered in snow, so leaning against it caused the tree to shake and eventually the snow fell and put the fire
London’s uses the real hardships of the Alaskan wilderness to bring “To Build a Fire” to life. The story is a linear piece of literature that has little to no actual conversation, and demonstrates London’s descriptive talents as he describes the cold and unforgiving land. Thus, the reader of the story can quickly determine with all the foreshadowing that London’s story will not be a happy one. The man in this story can be described as arrogant of the dangers around him, and is unaware of his own frailty (London 596-605).
When the narrator introduced the main character of the story, the man, he made it clear that the man was in a perilous situation involving the elements. The man was faced with weather that was 75 degrees below zero and he was not physically or mentally prepared for survival. London wrote that the cold "did not lead him to meditate upon his frailty as a creature of temperature, and upon man's frailty in general, able only to live within certain narrow limits of heat and cold."(p.1745) At first when the man started his journey to the camp, he felt certain that he could make it back to camp before dinner. As the trip progressed, the man made mistake after mistake that sealed his fate. The man's first mistake was to step into a pool of water and soak his legs to the knees. This blunder forced the man to build a fire to dry his wet socks and shoes so his feet would not freeze and become frostbitten. When the man began to build a fire he failed to notice that he was doing so under a large, snow laden spruce tree where he was getting his firewood. When the man had a small fire that was beginning to smolder the disturbance to the tree caused the snow to tumble to the ground and extinguish the fire. "It was his own fault or, rather, his mistake. He should not have built the fire under the spruce tree. He should have built it in the open."(1750).
Jack London creates a setting that is hostile and “cold”. The story is set in the wilderness of the frozen Yukon, during the harsh winter months, when “there was no sun nor hint of sun” in the sky. The character that London introduces is isolated from the world. “The man” doesn't have a companion; only the dog that follows him.
As the plot unfolds, I feel the story's protagonist falls victim to several factors brought into play at once: his inexperience with the severity of the Klondike winters, his inability to envision the possible consequences of his decision to travel alone in such weather, a series of unfortunate events during his trip, and the misjudgment exercised in his attempts to survive those incidents. Though quick and alert, the man's lack of imagination renders him unable to visualize what might happen to a man traveling without a companion should adverse circumstances arise in such severe weather in an uninhabited landscape. When he indeed finds himself in dire straits as a result of getting wet in the brutal freezing weather, he once again fails to imagine how quickly the cold will threaten his life and consequently misjudges the severity of his situation. His poor judgment causes him to make one mistake after another until he finds himself incapable of extricating himself from his situation. It seems obvious that had he made himself more familiar with the culture of the land and paid attention to the warnings of the old-timer on Sulpher Creek, he might have chosen to delay his trip and live to travel another day. Had he understood the importance of fostering a relationship with the dog, a native Husky with inbred instincts regarding the native climate, the dog would have interacted differently with him, maybe warning him of the danger of the weather through its actions or perhaps providing help, either by sharing its body heat or by going for help. However, instead he held little regard for the dog and the dog reciprocated: "there was no keen intimacy between the dog and the man.
feelings in the man and the dog, of a constant battle with this world of
He knew that it was 75 degrees below zero and that his body was numb but he didn't care because he thought he could handle it. Even when he was about to die he thought, "freezing to death is not as bad as people thought it was"(1772) and "when he got back to the states he could tell the folks what real cold was. "(1772) Obviously the man did not take the situation seriously. Instead of dying with dignity he thought about himself "running around like a chicken with its head cut off."
...e of them fell through and got wet. Since both of these situations had consequences, the reader can foreshadow that this expedition is not going to end well for the man. The man not being on the dog’s side and listening to it got him in the last situation. He built his last fire underneath a tree and the snow melted and fell onto the fire and put it out. His ignorance and overconfidence in his survival skills and not trusting the instincts of the dog eventually led him to his death.
Jack London starts early in the story to set a foreboding feeling: "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 traveled trail led eastward through the fat spruce timberland." (London) It is this feeling of doom and gloom that accompanies us throughout the reading of the story, and also is typical of the wonderful language of the story. With this London is foreshadowing the ending of the story where the man dies, a victim of his own pride and stupidity. Also creating the dark and dreary theme is London's "ability to create a gripping narrative based on realistic detail and on a sense of atmospheric gloom reminiscent on the work of Edgar Allan Poe." (Hogge) The manner in which London tells his story is what makes the story great.