The Call of the Wild

Another one of those books that seems to have gotten past me in my school days, I just recently read The Call of the Wild for the first time. Like many of these books that I'm discovering pretty much everyone else has read except me, I think I'm glad that I came at them as an adult, as I don't think I would have revisited them had I read them earlier, and I don't think I would have taken away as much when I was younger. Jack London's story about Buck, a St. Bernard-Scotch Shepherd who is kidnapped from his idyllic southern California home to be a sled dog in the 1890s Klondike Gold Rush is a powerful tale. We follow Buck's journey as he discovers that not all men are kind like his previous owners, learns to navigate the ins and outs of show more the sled dog's pack pecking order, and finally as he discovers the primal nature of his being as he eventually starts to venture out into the wilderness on his own. The imagery that London uses in describing Buck's discovery of that primal nature is remarkable; I think of anything else in the book, I enjoyed these sequences best. show less

Once again, I read The Call of the Wild because Jack London is on a list of authors who was born in January. I am doing this birthday challenge from The Dead Writers Society Literary Birthday Challenge.

For such a short story, this packs a huge emotional punch. Told in the third person, we follow a domestic dog named Buck as he is sold from a family to a life on the frontier in Alaska as a sled dog during the Klondike Gold Rush.

We have Buck learning that man was not to be trusted, though some men he would grow to tolerate, respect, and love. There of course were men and one woman that learned to have disdain for during his journey as well.

I swear, London managed to make me feel as if I was right there with Buck while he was traveling show more through Alaska. He managed to make all of the dogs feel like real live breathing dogs along with the humans who they were forced to take back and forth on trials. I seriously loathed the characters of Mercedes, Hal, and Charles. The character of John Thornton I found to be complex and moving with his love of Buck and Buck's love of him.

Reading about how Buck changed from a domestic dog to a half-wild thing to a wild dog running with his wolf brothers was astounding. Jack London had a way with words. Parts of the narrative were so brutal that it took my breath away.

“He felt strangely numb. As though from a great distance, he was aware that he was being beaten. The last sensations of pain left him. He no longer felt anything, though very faintly he could hear the impact of the club upon his body. But it was no longer his body, it seemed so far away.”

Reading about how Buck forced himself to survive and then eventually thrived under the love of John Thornton was moving. The flow of the book was excellent and London builds the story up until we get to the end.

The ending was heartbreaking and uplifting in turn. I really loved this book. First five star read of 2016 that went on my favorite list.

“But he is not always alone. When the long winter nights come on and the wolves follow their meat into the lower valleys, he may be seen running at the head of the pack through the pale moonlight or glimmering borealis, leaping gigantic above his fellows, his great throat a-bellow as he sings a song of the younger world, which is the song of the pack.”

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Where to start with this book. *The Call of the Wild* may be meant to toughen young readers to the harshness of the real world, but I would never ask my child to read this "classic." I read *To Build a Fire* as a kid and found it disturbing and sad, but was still able to admit it was well-written and worth reading.

The animal abuse and tragedy in this book were way too much.

I mean, this should be re-titled *A Series of Unfortunate Events*, but that already exists. Just when you think we get some happiness, it's snatched away. Like, this dog deserves his person. Let him have his person. Damn.

Buck goes through owner after owner, enduring cruelty and hardship at nearly every turn. Yes, Jack London's prose is powerful and evocative. Yes, the show more themes about civilization versus wildness are interesting from a literary perspective. But the relentless suffering inflicted on Buck made this an emotionally exhausting read in all the wrong ways.

When Buck finally finds John Thornton—a kind, loving master who treats him with genuine affection—you think, "Finally! This poor dog gets something good!" But even that happiness is temporary and ends in tragedy. It felt less like a meditation on nature's call and more like torture for the sake of it.

I understand this is considered a classic, and I can appreciate London's skill as a writer, but I just couldn't get past the unrelenting bleakness. If you're sensitive to animal suffering, skip this one. Life's too short to read books that make you this sad. show less

I read this for a February book club. I read it during my long-distant childhood as well.

London can write an action-packed story, for sure, and he does an excellent job of getting into the viewpoint of Buck, a coddled California dog who is stolen and shipped off to the Yukon to become a sled dog. It is a very violent tale, with many dog fights and cruelty; it has the feel of an honest, raw depiction of a hard place that required hardness to survive. This being London, too, it's also racist and has cringe-inducing dialects. There is still much merit to reading it, however, and it will make for a good book club discussion.

Abducted from his comfortable home in sunny California to satisfy the manic demand for sled dogs, Buck is carted off to Alaska at the height of Alaskan Gold Rush fervor. Though this new environment is unlike anything he has experienced previously, he's somehow able to call upon his ancient lupine heritage and instinct and adapt surprisingly readily to the life of a working dog in the cold north, passed off from handler to handler, some foolish and cruel and others caring and kind.

I first read The Call of the Wild in fourth grade, and I suspect that some of the vocabulary and nuances went over my head at the time, so I'm glad I picked it up again. Though there are some admittedly problematic themes viewing through a modern lens (animal show more cruelty, for one), at its core it is a thrilling tale of adventure from another more exotic time and place. show less

A classic. London captures your imagination with an adventure story told through the eyes of a (involuntary) sled-dog. The progression from what equals slavery to eventual freedom provides a unique context. Bucks ability to adapt is interesting, making the best of his situation. His growth through the book can easily parallel anyone moving from their late teens to adulthood. I have issues with London as a person (primarily his bigotry towards the Chinese); however, I can't deny his lasting legacy in adventure writing. This story is timeless...

A thrilling story about a dog named Buck, The Call of the Wild reads like a tale told by a gruff, wizened old frontiersman around a campfire. Written above all with the assured hand of a bona fide storyteller, it is possessing of beautiful prose and no small amount of pathos. It does what all great novellas/short novels do, which is feel much weightier than its page count would suggest. It manages to cover, in about 100 pages (depending on your edition), themes of love and loyalty, friendship and rivalry, law and order, the clash between the desire for solitude and for companionship and, most importantly, the boundaries between the civilized and the primordial.

In this latter respect it reminded me a bit of John Williams' later Western show more novel Butcher's Crossing, but in truth I recognised in London's turn-of-the-century novel evidence of his undoubted influence on American literature as a whole. London is an antecedent of Hemingway and, to a lesser extent, Steinbeck: two of my favourite writers, so this book was a real treat for me. Furthermore, I have always had a fascination with the Western genre (The Call of the Wild fits in this genre thematically if not geographically) and London's book epitomises everything I love about the American adventure novel. It is epic in its adventure, magical in its prose and thoughtful and profound in its message. You could submit the manuscript to the finest writers and editors and would not improve upon a single word. London makes you invest in this mere 'story about a dog'; The Call of the Wild will, by the end, win over even the most intractable sceptic. If all this sounds like hyperbole, then read it yourself (it is only short, after all) and then come back to tell me how wrong you were. show less