Essay on The Setting of To Build a Fire by Jack London

In “The Interlopers” The setting helps you better comprehend the story and how the characters are feeling. “It was an open winter,

It isn't difficult to see how the changing climates affect the characters’ moods as well. Many of the squabbles between Jim and Antonia and hardships faced by the two families occur in the fall or winter, whereas the author focuses on the more pleasant aspects of life and the prairie when the weather is glowing. The very lives of the men and women on the frontier are almost entirely dictated by the world surrounding them. They learn to live by the months and the weather, and develop symbiotic relationships with the land they till. As proved in the novel through the characters, the more work man puts into the earth, the greater reward he will receive.

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

The short story "To build a Fire" by Jack London, tells about the relationship between man and nature. The story takes place in the Yukon during one of the long night. The main character who is unnamed travels with a dog along a small trail to a mining camp. The man leaves against the advice of a local and after a short time realizes that he should have waited. The temperature is extremely cold because the mans spit freezes before it hits the ground. The main obstacle of his journey is the many covered springs that mean death to whoever falls into them. The man sends his dog in front of him to make sure that the trail is safe. Eventually the dog falls into one of the springs and gets his paws wet.

Readers of all ages, literature lovers, and book fanatics often find conflicts within their own lives just as the characters of the stories they read do. Some are able to find a way to overcome and conquer, while others get stuck behind or can not find a way to beat them. In Jack London’s short story called “To Build a Fire,” the main character conflicts with mother nature, who keeps tearing him down at every possible point. The main character, who is only referred to as the Man, is battling his way alone through the harsh temperatures of the Yukon. On this journey he runs into many obstacles and challenges. The Man does not listen to the advice he is given, leading to his inevitable death at the end. The most notable theme London builds

Some stories can have an emotional impact on readers, but every so often a story will reach out and help the reader escape into it. Jack London’s “To Build a Fire” is a fascinating story with a remarkably well described setting, and geographical descriptions of the surrounding Yukon areas. It portrays an overconfident man, whom because of his lack of intuition and stubbornness, succumbs to natures unforgiving climate.

In the short story “To Build a Fire” by Jack London, the protagonist foremost values his pride, which leads to his demise. The story starts off with the protagonist taking a detour in the Yukon so that he could survey the trees in the area (he was doing this so that he could send logs down the river to the gold prospecting camp, where he would sell the wood to the prospectors for money). But, the protagonist’s pride blinds him from what could have and should have done to ensure his survival in the Yukon. About halfway through his journey, he accidentally breaks through the ice on the spring and his foot falls into the water. At the temperatures mentioned in the story (seventy below zero), if he did not dry himself properly, it could lead to serious frostbite and/or death. So, he was forced to build a fire, and the “fire was a success. He was safe. He remembered the advice of the old timer on Sulphur Creek, and smiled. The old-timer had been very serious in laying down that no man must travel alone in the Klondike after fifty below. Well, here he was; he had had an accident: he was alone; and he had saved himself. Those old-timers were rather womanish” (London 8). The man keeps feeding the fire and gets ready to take his (frozen and potentially dangerous) footwear off, and feels content and a sense of satisfaction of disproving the old-timers. But, just as it seemed to be that the fire was stable and strong, snow that was on the branches of the spruce tree he was under fell

Often times, settings aid in setting a tone for a piece of writing. In "Rough Road Ahead: Do Not Exceed Posted Speed Limit" by Joe Kurmaskie, the setting is able to instill varying emotions into the author. The desolate desert that Kurmaskie is trapped in elicits feelings of hopelessness and debilitation. After trusting someone for directions, he has gotten lost; which has led into severe dehydration, desperation, and exhaustion. Throughout Kurmaskie's period of weakness, he was also furious due to the misdirection. The further Kurmaskie traveled into nothingness, the worse his feelings and physical state would progress.

In Jack London's “To Build A Fire” the story follows a man and his dog in the Klondike and their obstacles of trying to get to the boys which are his compatriots. The story revolves around the winter and how mankind reacts to the wild. The author uses nature to illustrate the poem’s tone by vilifying nature and using it as an obstacle.

The man is also weak in the face of nature as nature tortures him with the physical accidents the man suffers. He firstly begins when his cheekbones and nose went numb and becomes worse as he looses touch and grasp of his hands, finishing off with the freezing of his corpse and sudden stiff death. London exclaims about the accounts the man has suffered, “This man did not know cold.” (London, 487) and “He was loosing in his battle with the frost.” (London, 493) I do agree because the man is a new comer, a chechaquo, meaning that it is the man’s first contact with such freezing environment. The man constantly through out the story efforts in combating against the forces of nature that he can not control the reason being because he was inexperienced to such environment, therefore the man is bound to be with the odds and like London exclaims, loose his battle with his environment. The environment shaped him such that it proved he is not fit enough to live in the extreme cold.

The setting is in the country of Ireland, where it is usually bleak and dismal most of the time. Since the weather in Ireland is not great, the winter blues comes over the people of Ireland. In this story, I feel like the reader that each character is majorly affected by the setting. I think the author might have chosen this setting to give the reader more of a way to understand the characters by giving them a background to live in. As the reader, I think if the author gave the

The cold, hostile environment in the story relate to its meaning by moderating the gloomy sky. In my opinion climate is used all throughout the story to emphasize the unfriendliness and selfishness of the characters. The weather was very cold and so were the characters.

lead his readers to believe that the man will suffer a tragedy in the end

“To Build a Fire” is a short story written by Jack London. It is viewed as a masterpiece of naturalist fiction. “To Build a Fire” features a miner who is traveling to the Yukon Territory with a dog as his companion. The miner is the protagonist and the dog companion is called the foil. The dog plays off of the traits of the protagonist. “The central motif of “To Build a Fire” concerns the struggle of man versus nature.” (Short Story Criticism) The most argued point in the short story is the reason of the protagonist death. “Some critics believe that it was his lack of intuition and imagination that lead to his death, while others say that he dies because of panic.” (Short Story Criticism) The protagonist in “To Build a Fire” struggles in

“To Build a Fire” by Jack London is a short story about a man traveling through the Alaskan Yukon to meet up with his friends for lunch. The author keeps the character nameless and refers to him only as “The Man” which is used to show a connection between humanity and nature. The story shows the hardships the man goes through to get to his destination through the Alaskan Yukon, yet unfortunately doesn’t make it. The conflict is a man versus nature theme which contrasts strong and direct relations of the hardships in nature. Throughout this analysis, I am going to explore the conflict between the man and the merciless nature he has to go through before his death.