Jack London: To Build a Fire

Jack London is famous for writing stories that humble people. As is the case for several other naturalist writers, London often portrays humans as being foolish and selfish. In many cases, such characteristics result in an unpleasant end of the human. Due to this, many readers establish the consensus that London degrades human beings to show the dark nature of our kind. However, if readers pay closer attention to the surroundings in the story, they would notice that London rather highlights other objects in an upgrading way to achieve his purpose.
A novel with the name Jack London stamped in the front page is expected to include elements of nature in it. These elements, though seemingly bland and plain in the chosen environment, are crucial to the story in that London achieves his intent by featuring such elements in a high-held standard. To illustrate, London portrays the elements as possessing wisdom that humans lack. In the “Call of The Wild”, the dog survives the harsh environment suddenly thrown to him when even experienced hunters from the winterlands perish. Although some might take this as an obvious feature of a lucky protagonist, London goes lengths to portray the dog in the way stated just above. Through such an upgrading of the nature, humans—the product of civilization—are humbled.
Yet, one might ask, then, why would Jack London choose companion animals such as dogs as his main instrument to humble the human kind. This is when the presence of an wolf-dog in the story “To build a Fire” becomes important. Since the element of nature was a hybrid of civilization and nature, the element could stay with and behave like a product of the civilization, while still possessing the old wisdom Mother Nature gave. London expresses such views in other works as well. In the “Call of The Wild”, the dog discussed previously could survive despite his originally coming from the summerlands by growing out of his old form.