Critical Response: Jack London
Jack London, a well known American author, has written a fair share of truly classic works. The Call of the Wild and White Fang are staples of middle and high school reading requirements. His other novels, such as The People of the Abyss and Sea Wolf are not as well known, but are still regarded as brilliant pieces of literature by many scholars. Lesser known are his many volumes of short stories; "To Build a Fire" being the most popular. I cannot say that I have read even a small percentage of London's works, but from what I have read, I noticed some recurring similarities.
During the semester in class, we have learned how authors utilize various elements of writing to make their point more prominent. For Jack London's earlier works, his Yukon setting and rugged, adventurous characters appear quite frequently. Such is the case with the three stories I chose to study; "Love of Life," "The League of the Old Men," and "To Build a Fire." Along with this, I believe that the theme of survival appears in these three, as well as many other stories from London. I took it upon myself to try and find out why London used survival as his main theme. To demonstrate this recurring theme, I will give a brief synopsis of the three stories.
"To Build a Fire" is a story about a man who is traveling alone in the frozen Yukon. He knows that it is not safe to be traveling when it is so cold, but stubbornly keeps moving. He falls through a crack in the ice, wetting his feet. In order to stay alive, he must build a fire, warm his feet and move on. Despite several attempts, the man fails and dies. Of the fourteen pages within "To Build a Fire," eight of those are devoted to the events of the man trying to make a fire; the other six mainly focus on the setting. The man's determination to build the fire is evident-a simple annoyance at the beginning leads to a frantic demise at the end. The plot was as simple as one man's attempt to survive against nature.
During the March 1986 edition of the Journal of Modern Literature, Lee Clark Mitchell of Princeton University opens his article “‘Keeping His Head’: Repetition and Responsibility in London’s ‘To Build a Fire’” by critiquing naturalism’s style of storytelling. Mitchell claims naturalism as a slow, dull, and plain way of capturing an audience; and Jack London is the epitome of this description. Mitchell states, “[London’s] very methods of composition prompt a certain skepticism; the speed with which he wrote, his suspiciously childish plots…have all convinced readers to ignore the technical aspects of h...
Jack London has written a classic short story in the 1908 version of "To Build a Fire." This is the classic story of man fighting nature. In most genres (e.g. movies, novels, short stories) the main character comes out on top, however unlikely that is. Jack London takes literary naturalism and shows the reader how unmerciful nature is. Much like Stephen Crane in "The Open Boat," in which the one of the characters dies, London doesn't buy into that "has to have a good ending" contrivance. Through analysis of two London's letters (to R.W. Gilder and Cloudesly Johns) these two versions of "To Build a Fire" come alive with new meaning. Although there are many differences on the surface, both stories use his philosophy as expressed to Johns and both teach a moral lesson, one which will not soon be forgotten: "Never travel alone."
The short story “To Build a Fire” by Jack London is a comprehensive story that tackles the struggles of a newcomer trying to survive a day in the Yukon with very harsh and cold weather. The man travels with a big native husky and tries many times to build a fire but fails due to his inadequate personality. The man repeatedly lets his ignorance and arrogance dictate his decisions which soon leads to his demise. The theme of the short story “To Build a Fire” by Jack London is that being ignorant, arrogant and foolish can lead to bad decisions.
Van de Walle, J., , F., Karp, K. S., & Bay-Williams, J. M. (2010). Elementary and middle school mathematics, teaching developmentally. (Seventh ed.). New York, NY: Allyn & Bacon.
More and more people each year will suffer the consequences of being overweight, until they are informed on the most basic way of losing weight. This method is guaranteed to work for some better than others. All it takes is self discipline and hard work and eventually you will achieve your goal weight and once again become healthy and not have to worry about the countless health risks that obesity comes
When Jack London wrote "To Build a Fire" he embraced the idea of naturalism because it mirrored the events of daily life. Naturalism showed how humans had to be wary at every corner because at anytime death could be there, waiting for them to make a mistake and forfeit their lives. He used naturalism, the most realistic literary movement, to show how violent and uncaring nature really is and how no matter what you do nature will always be there. London also presented the basic idea of Darwinism and the survival of the fittest, basically if you are dumb you will die. Collectively, London used naturalism to show how in life, humans can depend on nothing but themselves to survive. "To Build a Fire" is a short story that embodies the idea of naturalism and how, if one is not careful, nature will gain the upper hand and they will perish.
Jack London was an American man of many talents, which included being an author, journalist and a social activist, despite being minimally educated. Nonetheless, he was undoubtedly most recognized for his short stories and novels that fixated on the harsh, cold climates that Mother Nature crafted. London focused on a deeper level of the wild and the literary devices in his work are littered throughout every one of his novels and short stories, including The Call of the Wild, White Fang, as well as “To Build a Fire.”
To begin, school uniforms are economic. When schools have a uniform policy, it makes it easier on the children and parents. It is convenient because a child can just go to their closet and pick out a uniform and be ready for school. It is also very cost effective. Parents can outfit their children twice a year, warm and cold weather uniforms, rather than spending hundreds of dollars trying to keep up with expensive, name-brand clothing. In addition to being economically beneficial, school uniforms also help reduce distractions in the classroom.
Mathematical dialogue within the classroom has been argued to be effective and a ‘necessary’ tool for children’s development in terms of errors and misconceptions. It has been mentioned how dialogue can broaden the children’s perception of the topic, provides useful opportunities to develop meaningful understandings and proves a good assessment tool. The NNS (1999) states that better numeracy standards occur when children are expected to use correct mathematical vocabulary and explain mathematical ideas. In addition to this, teachers are expected
All children learn differently and teachers, especially those who teach mathematics, have to accommodate for all children’s different capacities for learning information. When teaching mathematics, a teacher has to be able to use various methods of presenting the information in order to help the students understand the concepts they are being taught.
School uniforms in public schools are becoming increasingly popular across the nation. The public school system would benefit greatly if this policy were to be adopted. Opposition is always a factor when trying to make changes. Taking all things into consideration, the positive effects would be far greater than the negative effects. School uniforms should be required in public schools because their use would lead to higher education, less violence, and lower cost to parents.
Sherley, B., Clark, M. & Higgins, J. (2008) School readiness: what do teachers expect of children in mathematics on school entry?, in Goos, M., Brown, R. & Makar, K. (eds.) Mathematics education research: navigating: proceedings of the 31st annual conference of the Mathematics Education Research Group of Australia, Brisbane, Qld: MERGA INC., pp.461-465.
Kirova, A., & Bhargava, A. (2002). Learning to guide preschool children's mathematical understanding: A teacher's professional growth. 4 (1), Retrieved from http://ecrp.uiuc.edu/v4n1/kirova.html
Mathematics is a school subject that people have mixed feeling about. Many of my personal friends complain about math and express their dislike and hatred towards the subject. I, on the other hand, seem to enjoy math most of the time. Although I sometimes feel angry when I continue to get a certain problem incorrect, I always put my best effort into finding my mistake and fixing it. I have had some amazing math teachers, but I’ve also had some very bad ones. I think that my teacher has a huge effect upon how well I will learn that subject, which can be considered good or bad. I have always realized that math is a very important topic, so I have consistently worked very hard to learn it. My current math course is strengthening my basic mathematics
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