John Griffith Cheney (better known to the world as Jack London) has written quite a lot in his not-so-long life. The themes of all his works are very similar: he wrote about life and about love for it.
This article will focus on the famous story of the great writer Jack London - "Love for life." A summary of the work, information about the history of its writing, as well as about the topics disclosed in it, you can find in the article.
Writer Biography
John Griffith was born in the city of San Francisco in 1876. He received the surname that the whole world now knows about thanks to his mother, who married the farmer John of London, when little John was not even a year old.
The life of young John was not easy: back in school, he began to work, distributing morning newspapers. And at the age of 14, he got a job at a cannery. After working a little there, Jack London soon goes to sea and becomes an oyster catcher. It is known that at that time the writer was heavily abusing alcohol, and his staff believed that he would not last long with this way of life.
Fateful swimming
In 1893, a momentous event took place in Cheney's life, thanks to which the whole world now knows about such a writer as Jack London. Love of life and all kinds of romantic adventures led him to the schooner, who was supposed to go to the Bering Sea to catch fur seals. This voyage impressed London very much and, in fact, became an impetus to the development of his work, which was based on a marine theme. The essay written by him at that time, "Typhoon Off the Coast of Japan," not only brought London the first prize, but also became the start of his literary career.
This was followed by other stories, short stories, novels and novels, which turned the ordinary sailor into a great prose writer. About two dozen novels and short stories, over 200 stories - this is the result of the writing activity of Jack London.
In the last years of his short life, Jack London suffered from kidney disease. One evening, John took a too large dose of sleeping pills to save himself from a severe attack of pain. Thus died the great writer Jack London, whose love of life was unlimited. It happened on November 22, 1916.
Jack London: The Love of Life Story
This work was written by London in 1905. The story is very small, only ten pages, and you can read it very quickly. Thanks to his travels, Jack London was well versed in geography. In all his works you can find fascinating and detailed geographical descriptions. In particular, in this story, the protagonist makes a long journey from the Big Bear Lake to the confluence of the Canadian river Coppermine in the Arctic Ocean.
The story "Love of life" was praised by many critics and famous personalities. So, the leader of the world proletariat, Vladimir Lenin, loved this work, calling it "a very powerful thing." It is known that Nadezhda Krupskaya read to Lenin exactly this story two days before his death.
"Love of life": a summary
It is worth recalling once again that the story itself is small, so it may be more advisable to read it directly and not waste time reading it briefly. Nevertheless, we suggest that you familiarize yourself with the retelling of the work "Love of Life".
The summary of the story is as follows: the two comrades went in search of gold, not calculating food supplies and ammunition. They began to starve and lost more and more of their strength. And then one day one of them tucks a leg, crossing a stream. He begins to lag behind his partner, and he, deciding not to help his comrade, goes on himself.
Comrade's betrayal and fight against hunger
The main character is left alone and continues on. With every kilometer he traveled, he thought more and more about food. On the way, he met deer, but he had no bullets to kill at least one of them. Once he almost caught a partridge, but she parted from his hands at the last moment. It seemed that he had no chance to survive, but something pushed him to move on. It was precisely this love of life. The brief clouding of reason was again replaced by a burning desire to survive, and new forces were found.
The hero of the story eats everything that comes across him along the way: berries, bulbs of plants ... Soon he only has one desire left - to eat! And it overshadowed all the other thoughts in my head.
And once he met a bear on the way. Gathering his last strength, he rose to his feet, took out a knife and looked the bear directly in the eye. To my great surprise, the animal did not touch the person.
Confrontation with the Wolf
The most striking pages of the story begin from the moment when the protagonist meets the wolf - as weak and exhausted as he is. The confrontation between man and the wolf lasts long enough. Neither one nor the other had the strength to attack the enemy. And the wolf just crawled nearby, waiting for the traveler to die, and it would be possible to eat him. But the main character does not give up, besides he was disgusted to think that his body could eat this vile, almost dead animal.
As a result, the main character pretended to be dead and waited for the animal to approach him. When this happened, he crushed the wolf with the weight of his body. He did not have the strength to strangle the wolf, and he pressed his teeth against his neck. The most terrible and unimaginable episode of the story is the one when a man kills a wolf with his teeth, drinking his blood in order to survive.
In the end, the hero goes to the sea, where he is seen by sailors on a whaling ship. And they were not sure that this is a person. So much he was patted and exhausted by the struggle for life.
The main characters of the story
The struggle for existence, survival - this is what lies at the heart of the story "Love for Life", whose heroes fight to the very end for this very life. Yes, it’s the heroes. After all, the wolf waged this struggle in the same way as man.
In the work we see two human characters: this is the main character (whose name is not mentioned by the author) and Bill is his partner. The latter decided to leave his comrade in trouble, but he did not say goodbye to a bag of his gold. The further fate of Bill is not known to us. But the main character, on the contrary, realizes very quickly that gold will not save him and easily parted with him.
Apparently, it is no coincidence that Jack London leaves his main character without a name, because this is completely unimportant in this context. He remains alone with his hunger and near death, waging a struggle for life.
The main idea of the work
In fact, the main idea of the work lies in its title - it is a love of life. The content of the story helps us understand this issue in more detail.
More specifically, the main idea of this story is the struggle of man with nature for the right to exist. And he, thanks to courage and perseverance (and, perhaps, just because he is a man), manages to emerge victorious from this battle. Thus, it is precisely the strength and superiority of Man over Nature that Jack London is trying to show here.
And if you dig even deeper, you can safely assume that the writer in his next work is looking for the answer to the eternal question: "What is the meaning of life?" This philosophical problem runs through all his work with a red thread.
The protagonist of the story, overcoming fear and hunger, forgetting about the injury, confidently entered the battle for his own life with a harsh and uncompromising nature. And he won. This cannot but arouse respect for the hero of the work and for the person as a whole. Despite everything, he managed to survive. Thus, Jack London tried to show his reader that a person is able to overcome the most terrible trials in order to survive, and that life is worth it to fight for it like this.
One of the most famous works in world literature of the twentieth century is the story of John Griffith of London "Love for life." The summary, of course, will allow you to get a general idea of it. However, in order to better feel, realize this story, it is better to read the work in the original.