Jack London’s 1908 short story “To Build a Fire”, focuses on a man who is traveling through the Yukon in -°F weather, alone. “To Build a Fire” is set in Yukon, Alaska during its colder months, with no sun. The protagonist known only as “the man” has no first hand experience in such weather therefore underestimates the danger involved. After accidentally stepping knee-high in spring water, the man attempts to build a fire to dry himself off. At first he is seemingly successful in building the fire, until snow from the branches above fall onto the flames and blots them out. When trying a second time the man is too cold to hold anything and can not successfully light the fire. The man then becomes frantic and attempts to run back to camp, but the Yukon is much too large, and the man eventually freezes. The mood in this story is very …show more content…
London describes the landscape in great detail saying “North and south, as far as his eye could see, it was unbroken white, save for a dark hairline that curved and twisted from around the spruce-covered island to the south, and that curved and twisted away into the north, where it disappeared behind another spruce-covered island" (850). This quote contributes to the unemotional, and indifferent mood that we as readers get from the story. It represents the attitude nature has toward the man. The Yukon is an immensely vast landscape, "this dark hairline was the trail -the main trail- that led south five hundred miles to the Chilcoot Pass, Dyea, and the salt water; and that led north seventy miles to Dawson, and still on the north a thousand miles to Nulato, and finally to St. Michael, on Bering Sea a thousand miles and half a thousand more" (850). This shows that even when the man attempted to run back to camp he never had a chance. Nature never gave the man a chance. The landscape is so large that he would never have reached civilization in
In “To Build a Fire,” Jack London presents the story of a man against nature as he tries to survive in the harsh winter of the Yukon in the early 1900’s. He begins a nine-hour hike through, temperatures as low as -75 degrees Fahrenheit, and he plans to meet up with friends in the area. With him is a local husky, with whom he has little companionship. The narrator builds a fire to warm himself. However, as the fire starts to reach a good warming point, snow falls and douses the fire. Finally realizing that things are getting drastic, the man starts running for the camp in desperation, with hopes of warming his body and possibly getting help. Eventually though he falls from exhaustion. While on the ground, he falls asleep and
Jack London’s short story, To Build a Fire, is a heart-wrenching story of a man’s struggle to defy the forces of nature in the most extreme environment of the Yukon Trail, Canada. While warning against traveling alone, the man sets out by himself with only a dog at his side on a long journey across the pond in a frigid weather to meet his fellow campers. The man is full of hubris. He believes he can conquer Mother Nature, and this belief ultimately leads him to his tragic demise.
In the beginning of “To Build a Fire” the author writes “Ay had dawned and gray when the man turned aside from the main Yukon trail (London 64).” The author includes this to let the readers know that he is hiking out on a trial so that it appeals more to the imagination of where he is. The author then includes the character looking at his watch, giving readers a time to set the story. The author also includes, “Fifty degrees below zero meant 80 degrees of frost” Notifying the readers how cold it is it will be for this man on this hike. The author includes this so that they know that he will be facing cold hardships on the trail. In the “Essential Theme” by Richard F. Robbins, he states
Imperative: urgently necessary. In Jack London’s “To Build a Fire” building a fire is imperative for the man’s survival. While he was in the harsh Yukon environment, he falls into an ice trap, and his foot is frozen solid. Him not building a lasting fire ultimately led to his death, among him not listening to the old man’s advice to bring a partner, and him building a fire under a tree.
The main theme of “To Build a Fire” by Jack London is naturalism. Jack London has his own experiences in the Youkan that have been said to have links to the story To Build a Fire and his naturalistic viewpoints that have even influenced Ernest Hemmingway. This story was written in the early 1900’s describing a man and his dog who are new to the Yukon. The man and his dog plan on a nine-hour hike in -75° F weather. He is warned not to travel alone but the man thinking he is above nature takes on the adventure alone with his dog. As the sky begins and he begins to freeze because he broke through the ice. He builds a fire to thaw his limbs. Being an ignorant person, he builds the fire underneath a tree with snow on its branches causing the
Introduction "To Build a Fire," is a deplorable short story and film by Jack London. It centers on a man who made a choice to travel and explore Yukon alone. The environments of the place was not good as the temperatures were subfreezing. The forces of nature are not favorable and friendly at all. During his adventure, the man’s feet become wet when he falls into the water of a hot spring through the ice (London 122).
The “To Build a Fire” story by Jack London was my favorite in this semester. It dealt with two components of the human personality that need to be well-expressed, yet balanced. Yes, one has to be proactive, self-motivated, and forward-moving with will and courage, knowing what he or she wants to reach and accomplish. Yet, caution, being aware of the expected circumstances, and taking dangers seriously have become a must, especially when there is a chance to learn from others’ experiences. Reinventing the wheel is a waste of valuable time as everybody knows, and endangering our lives only because one would sometimes rejects the advice or belittle it, is not wise or intelligent by any means.
Hello, everyone I chose "To Build a Fire" by Jack London, this is a history about how our mind can deceive us, and sometimes work against us. It has moments of hope, desperation, happiness, and sadness. It's about a man, who decided to travel through the Yukon River in Canada with the old camp on Henderson Creek as his destination.
Within To Build a Fire, the gold-seeker or man who is portrayed as the main character in the story is appearing to have difficulties with what nature or the landscape was throwing at him. Alike in both reality and the story, the freezing cold temperatures were a constant threat to the gold-seekers who may have been unprepared for what they might have expected. The reality part of the extreme cold is adequate to how the extreme cold was described in the story because in both references it was in the negatives somewhere between -20 degrees Fahrenheit in temperature and well below -50 degrees Fahrenheit. Besides the extreme cold, both the reality and the story comparison can be
For This assignment, I choose a story from Jack London the name of the story is "To Build a Fire."
Jack London’s “To Build a Fire” is an examination of one man’s journey through the Yukon wilderness, alone in less than ideal conditions. The man was feuding with the weather throughout the story. The ice trap caved in and the man was wet from his knees down. As a result of the cold weather, the man’s hands became numb and he could not build another fire. Since the fire was not built he evoked symptoms of hypothermia and surrendered his life to death.
Jack London’s “To Build a Fire” is a story that follows a man’s journey through Yukon trail as he fights to survive. The man ended up finding out that being alone was not the way to survive in minus seventy-five degrees Fahrenheit weather. The battle between man and nature was the theme throughout the story and nature won in the end. “It was a clear day, and yet there seemed an intangible pall over the face of things, a subtle gloom that made the day dark, and that was due to the absence of the sun” (125). This was the first sign that the trip down the trail would be a difficult one. Even though there is only one main character the setting makes the man a dynamic character because it brings him challenges throughout the story.
The opening scene establishes our main character’s inability or lack of care towards his own survival. ‘To Build a Fire’ begins with our main character, a man, hiking the Yukon trail on a bitter cold day. He had no supplies and did not care. “It was a clear day, and yet there seemed an intangible pall over the face of things, a subtle gloom that made the day dark, and that was due to the absence of sun. This fact did not worry the man.” The last sentence shows his state of mind and the reader what they will get into. ‘This fact…’ the last sentence of the quote begins this way to establish its’ dry and dark humor. “But all this—the mysterious, far-reaching hair-line trail, the absence of sun from the sky, the tremendous cold, and the strangeness and weirdness of it all—made no impression on the man. It was not because he was long used to it.” The ‘absence’ of the sun is gone, leaving a dark dreary sky with a foreboding mood attached. Describing the cold as ‘tremendous’ and foreign to the man is a nod to the reader to how this character sees the environment. It seemed as the
In "To Build a Fire" by Jack London, the setting plays a significant role throughout the entire short story. Jack London uses certain techniques to establish the atmosphere of the story. By introducing his readers to the setting, prepares them for a tone that is depressed and frightening. Isolated by an environment of frigid weather and doom, the author shows us how the main character of the story is completely unaware of his surroundings. The only world the man is truly accustomed to, is his own. Never being exposed to such a harsh climate, draws us to the conclusion that the environment is the determining factor of his survival, as well as his dog 's too. Anything that the man and his dog comes into contact with, creates an anticipation for disaster in the story.
To build a fire is a short story written by Jack London. It is a story about an individual’s choice. The main character’s self-centeredness overcomes him, as he tries to survive the wintery weather in his travel in the Yukon Trail. He made a choice of ignoring the weather warnings, which evidenced danger in his journey. There were warnings like the absence of fellow travelers due to the cold season, but his egoism made him still embark on the journey alone, despite the warnings. The protagonist’s pride and arrogance leads to a regrettable outcome, as it leads to his downfall. The protagonist made the wrong choices because of his egotism, and arrogance and they led to his downfall. He defied nature due to his lack of logical judgment, and