Origin: U.S.A.
(Import costs included in the price)
It will be shipped from our warehouse between Friday, July 05 and Wednesday, July 17.
You will receive it anywhere in United Kingdom between 1 and 3 business days after shipment.
To Build a Fire: And Other Short Stories
London, Jack
Synopsis "To Build a Fire: And Other Short Stories"
To Build a Fire and Other Short Stories Jack London "To Build a Fire" is a short story by American author Jack London. There are two versions of this story where one was published in 1902 and the other in 1908. On an extremely cold winter day, a man who remains unnamed throughout the story, and his native wolf-dog go onto the Yukon Trail after being warned of the dangers of traveling alone in extreme weather conditions by an old man from Sulfur Creek. With nine hours of hiking ahead of him, the man is expecting to meet his associates ("the boys") at a camp in Henderson Creek by that evening. The man is accompanied only by his dog, whose instincts tell it that the weather is too cold for traveling. However, the weather does not deter the man, a relative newcomer to the Yukon, even though the water vapor in the man's exhaled breaths and the saliva from the tobacco he is chewing has frozen his mouth shut. It is here where London's use of symbolism of "heat (sun-fire-life) and cold (darkness-depression-death)" immediately creates a sense of impending doom. As he hikes along a creek, he takes care to avoid pockets of unfrozen water hidden beneath thin layers of ice. He stops to build a fire and thaw out so he can eat his lunch, and soon after continues hiking. Shortly following his trek he breaks through the ice and soaks his feet and lower legs.
Jack London (1876-1916), seudónimo de John Griffith Chaney, es uno de los grandes escritores estadounidenses de los albores del siglo XX. Su mundo se inspira en una interpretación muy subjetiva de la filosofía de Nietzsche y se construye a partir del principio de lucha por la supervivencia. Nacido en San Francisco, fue esencialmente un niño autodidacta que leía con avidez los fondos de la biblioteca pública. Con diecisiete años se embarcó en su primera goleta, rumbo a Japón. Tras varias experiencias como marinero y vagabundo -razón por la que también fue encarcelado-, London acudió a la Oakland High School y, posteriormente, a la Universidad de California, que tuvo que abandonar por problemas económicos. Como muchos, sufrió la fiebre del oro hasta que, finalmente, se dedicó a la escritura.