The Fantastic Worlds of Jack London
Non-fiction - by Peter Jekel
Limited minds can recognize limitations only in others. Jack London
When one thinks of science fiction pioneers, the names of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne will certainly come to mind. In the Golden Age of Science Fiction during the 1940’s and 50’s, science fiction was dominated by such luminary writers such as Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke and A. E. van Vogt. Rarely, if ever, will the name of Jack London come up as a pioneer of the genre.
Jack London was an American writer who was a true writer’s writer. There is a saying in writing, “write what you know.” London obviously wanted to write about a lot of things as he endeavoured to experience all that the world offered in his all-too brief life; he died at the age of 40. London lived the lives that he portrayed in his stories and essays having worked as a laborer, factory worker, oyster pirate, a fish patrol officer, sailor, hobo, journalist (he covered the Russo-Japanese war for Hearst Newspaper Empire in 1904 and the Mexican Revolution in 1914 for Colliers) and a gold prospector. He used his life experiences in each of his writings, including his speculative fiction.
Perhaps the best known piece of London’s life is that he had travelled to the Yukon during the Gold Rush in September of 1897 at the youthful age of 21. There he took the treacherous route to the goldfields near present day Dawson City, Yukon, the Chilkoot Pass. He endured a little less than a year in the harsh land and returned home broke and debilitated. His net worth was only 4.50 in gold dust. In spite of the poor return on his adventure, it was this year that changed his life forever. It would make him a household name by providing fodder for some of the most enduring works of literature that survive to this day. White Fang and Call of the Wild and several short stories such as “To Build a Fire,” “The White Silence” and “In a Far Country” are discovered by a new generation of readers every year.
Less well known are his Klondike stories that have a speculative bent. In his 1900, “The Man With the Gash,” a greedy squatter settles into a log cabin, on the way to the goldfields near Dawson City providing shelter to passing gold rushers for a healthy fee. The entrepreneur, though running a profitable enterprise, begins to suffer from nightmares featuring robbers who steal his ill-gotten treasures. One of the robbers is a particularly persistent man who has a gash on his face. His dreams take on a reality at least in his mind so that the squatter starts to set up a number of hiding places in the cabin for his riches to stop the persistent robbers. Has the man lost his mind in his lonely quarters, or are the “man with a gash” and his gang real? Hard to tell but the avaricious tycoon believes them to be astral projections of people seeking to take his horde.
In 1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, of Sherlock Holmes fame, published his classic, The Lost World about an expedition to an isolated area of the Amazon Basin where prehistoric fauna including Stone Age humans and dinosaurs survive. London wrote a short story, “A Relic of the Pliocene,” in 1901, that more realistically looks at the possibility of beasts of the prehistoric past surviving to the modern day and packs more of a punch with its sad conclusion. A story is told of the last living mammoth being killed by a hunter in an isolated mountain valley.
Though London’s love of sailing may not be as well known a fact of his life as his travels to the Klondike, the roots nonetheless were deep. In fact, though it was his Klondike experience that immortalized him, the sea was his real passion. He began his love of the sea with fishing trips with his stepfather out into San Francisco Bay; London was born in San Francisco on January 9, 1876. As he grew older he would rent out boats to travel out on his own. At the age of only fifteen, he, with financial assistance from his aunt, Jenny Prentiss, bought his own sloop, called the Razzle Dazzle, to escape the grind of factory and laborer work. It was here that he earned the nickname of Prince of the Oyster Pirates, poaching the molluscs in San Francisco Bay. It also earned him quite a return, but since life as a pirate often ended with death or prison, London moved onto a more legitimate seaworthy experience, that of a California Fish Patrol officer. The stories of his exploits were captured in Cruise of the Dazzler and Tales of the Fish Patrol. In 1893, he joined a sealing cruise that took him as far as the shores of Japan.
London is also known to have attempted to sail around the world in his self-built ship, The Snark in 1906. He captures his voyage through the Pacific from San Francisco to Hawaii and eventually to Australia, in his Cruise of the Snark. London also captured his sailing experiences in a number of fictional tales found together in his collection of short stories, South Sea Tales, and his classic psychological thriller, The Sea Wolf with the immortal character, Wolf Larson, a vengeful sea captain who rescues the protagonist of the tale.
His 1918 “The Red One,” is a somewhat dated tale of adventure to the Solomon Islands that has a speculative bent. A geologist is investigating a mysterious sound that rings out regularly from the mountainous interior of the islands. The sound is claimed to be the sound of the Devil himself. Our intrepid explorer is captured by the natives, that unfortunately, are described as head-hunting cannibal beasts, more apelike than human. During his captivity our protagonist learns of a mysterious red sphere, known as the Red One or The Star-Born from which the sound emanates and to which the island residents offer sacrifices.
Jack London was also a social activist. Early in his life, in 1894, he travelled the United States as a hobo riding the rails on freight trains as a member of Charles T. Kelly’s industrial army made up of around 1500 unemployed individuals. The army was a protest group borne out of the financial panic of 1893, their mission to press the federal government to assist the many unemployed. He moved his socialist agenda forward to become a member of the Socialist Labor Party in 1896. He would give speeches at the Oakland City Hall Park for which he was sometimes arrested. In 1901, he left the Socialist Labor Party and joined the newly formed Socialist Party of America. He even ran as a socialist mayoral candidate in San Francisco in 1901 and 1905, but never had success in the political arena. His beliefs are collected in his essays on socialism in The War of the Classes and Revolution, and Other Essays. He later felt that the socialist cause had lost its fervour and left it behind him in 1916.
In addition to his socialist political exploits and his life as a hobo, London sought to further experience the lives of the impoverished. In 1902, he moved to London, England, where he lived in the slums of the east end, capturing his experiences in The People of the Abyss. London’s political beliefs of a perfect socialist utopia and his empathy for the poor can also be found in a number of his works of speculative fiction.
Philip Wylie wrote a science fiction classic in 1951, The Disappearance. In the story, in the span of one afternoon, the Earth is broken into two parallel universes, men only in one universe and women only in the other. Explorations of love, relationships and sex are analyzed and even redefined in both of the new worlds; the story truly reveals how our society depends on the interconnectivity of all people, retaining its impact even today.
London wrote in 1897, a similar tale, “The Strange Experience of a Misogynist.” Whereas Wylie’s story truly looked at the interrelatedness of men and women, London’s story is more of a window into an earlier world, that of when the story was written. In London’s tale, a misogynistic bachelor wakes up from a dream where all women have disappeared. Society quickly disintegrates in the absence of women, as the men are unable to take on the domestic tasks of washing or cooking and instead become drunk and disorderly eventually leading to total societal collapse. Society gradually disintegrates into anarchy as the men of the day fight to survive. Though really not a flattering view of women and their role in society, it also is a sad statement of men portraying them as having an almost childlike dependence.
In his 1908 “Goliah,” a small group of industrialists controls everything in the world. The group’s leader and his cadre are invited, on threat of death to an isolated Pacific Island by what can be described as a megalomaniac socialist, to discuss plans to reconstruct society in its entirety. Only the leader of the industrialists accepts the invitation whereas the others who fail to show die of a mysterious ailment that dissolves their cells. The United States Navy launches an assault on the island with disastrous results. The Japanese Navy too is destroyed by the mysterious islanders to begin the process of disarmament of world powers. Private property becomes a thing of the past, child labour is outlawed and women are employed in factories. Work days are reduced to two hours and retirement is at forty-eight. Somewhat of a utopian vision for its time with some very progressive ideas (women working) and a reduced workweek.
His socialist bent continued in his 1908, “A Curious Fragment.” A 29th century document is found centuries later. The document is a military speech about a wandering labourer in the 26th century encouraging fellow labourers to learn to read (it was apparently a capital crime to teach reading to the working class) and to revolt against their working conditions. It is a very pessimistic vision of capitalism and certainly envisions a very bleak future if our world continues along its current path.
“The Strength of the Strong,” published in 1911, recounts the narrative of a “prehistoric” human speaking to his three grandsons about the history of their people. In particular, the narrator describes how society evolved from a system of individuality and lack of cooperation into a system of government where the tribal council looked after all aspects of the people’s lives.
Though not entirely comfortable with the novel form of writing—London felt better with a short story or novella, as it allowed his active mind to move onto different projects quickly—he did write his famous novel The Iron Heel, based on the fictional Everhard Manuscript. It is a classic of dystopian literature, rivalling the enduring success of George Orwell’s later 1948 published, 1984.
In The Iron Heel, between 1912 and 1932, the Oligarchy also known as the Iron Heel, arises in the United States. Eastern Asia has been conquered by Japan and India (India was under British control until 1947) is an independent nation. Europe has become a socialist dream whereas North American countries have developed oligarchies of their own. London is silent about South America, Australia and Africa, though. The Oligarchy is a monopoly of trusts, better described as robber barons, who squeeze the middle class by bankrupting small and medium sized businesses.
Jack London was also known for writing supernatural stories with a difference. There may be a clue as to where he came up with some of his ideas in this genre of literature. He was born as John Griffith Chaney, on January 12, 1876 in San Francisco. His biological father was probably William Chaney, though he was raised by his mother and stepfather, John London. It is interesting to note that Jack’s mother was a spiritualist and his suspected father, William Chaney, was a journalist and well-known astrologer, as London clearly defined himself as an atheist, somewhat of a rebellious idea when he was alive at the turn of the century.
His lack of spiritual beliefs did not stop this intrepid writer from tackling stories of the fantastic, perhaps getting fodder for his literary ideas from his parents. At the time of London’s writing, tales of the supernatural were told by the likes of Charles Dickens, Arthur Machen, Edgar Allen Poe, Oscar Wilde, Elizabeth Gaskell, M. R. James and Guy de Maupassant, which all followed the guide set forth by M. R. James. All Victorian era ghost stories required the pretense of truth, a feeling of terror, no gratuitous bloodshed or sex (very Victorian), no explanation of the ghost and a setting of the present of the writer. Instead, London’s tales of the supernatural were unlike those of his contemporary writers. He broke the mold by adding explanations to the mystic realm.
In 1895, he wrote “Who Believes in Ghosts!,” and it really was not your average ghost story. The protagonist, a believer of ghosts, wants to prove to his two doubting friends that the soul lives on after death. He takes them to a reputedly haunted house where the two settle into a game of chess. When they try a second game, they are prevented from moving or speaking by an unknown entity in the house. Finally they are able to start a new game. The new game takes on a tension that builds to a hatred that breaks out in violence, violence that is actually mirrors a murder that happened years before; the previous owner, a chess master murdered a celebrated opponent years before.
His 1906 story, “Planchette,” involves a Ouija board where predictions of a future begin to come true. The Ouija board acts as more of a window into the future rather than a portal to the “other side” depicted in a number of subsequent stories involving the board.
“The Mahatma’s Little Joke,” published in 1897, begins with a debate between two friends about the disintegration and reintegration of material via psychic powers. The debate is arbitrated by a student of Buddhism who has become a full-fledged Mahatma. The Mahatma subjects the two to psychic energy that causes the two friends to switch consciousnesses. This theme has been used many times in Hollywood with a number of films switching personalities between individuals, often between men and women or children and adults.
He continued with the theme of the bizarre in his 1899, “A Thousand Deaths.” In fact, this was his first professional publication, the story having been printed in the periodical, The Black Cat. In this story, a drowning man is rescued and resuscitated by a revolutionary method of bringing people back from the brink of death. This is not unlike a modern 1990 film (and its 2017 remake), Flatliners where a group of medical students experiment with near death experiences.
In his 1899 “The Rejuvenation of Major Rathbone,” a chemist tries to extend human lives. The chemist does so by the creation of a lymph solution that prevents the wearing out of cells. His first experiment is with an old Newfoundland dog that, instead of lying around as a sixteen year old dog, comes out as a puppy. The chemist then moves on to others including his “Uncle Max'' and his good friend, “Aunt Debby.” It is probably the first tale of rejuvenation. Other science fiction writers came later with stories of rejuvenation such as George Allan England’s 1911 The Elixer of Hate, Arthur Conan Doyle’s 1923 Sherlock Holmes mystery, “The Creeping Man,” W.W. Jacobs’ 1902, “The Monkey’s Paw,” and Aldous Huxley’s 1939, “After Many a Summer'' and of course, Stephen King’s modern classic, Pet Sematary.
Jack London also wrote some truly science fiction stories. One tale was a variant on the famous novel by well-known science fiction author, H. G. Wells’, 1897 The Invisible Man. In London’s version, the story, “The Shadow and the Flash,” involves a sibling rivalry, both trying to outcompete with one another to create the ultimate chemical invention. They create a formula that when painted onto a person or thing renders it transparent. One brother creates a chemical that achieves invisibility but with one problem, the periodic emission of a rainbow flash of light. The other creates a formula that will not reflect any light at all; however, in the light a shadow is still cast.
London also wrote a story in 1914 that when one looks at it, appears to be somewhat of an eerie premonition of things to come. In his “The Enemy of All the World,” a malformed genius with outstanding capabilities of learning and scientific achievement, launches a campaign to dominate the world between 1933 and 1941, all due to a neglected and unhappy youth. It culminates in a German-American War in 1939. Eerie, when you think that Adolph Hitler took control of Germany in 1933. Hitler, like London’s character, had a sad upbringing with an overbearing father who died in 1903. Hitler also wanted to become an artist and tried to enter the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts in 1907, an endeavour that he failed.
London, in 1910, wrote a story that appears to be somewhat of a modification of Robert Louis Stevenson’s famous novella, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. “When the World Was Young” begins with a burglar breaking into a San Francisco mansion only to find a sleeping wild man. As the story evolves, we find that this “wild man” is actually the owner of the mansion, successful businessman by day and ancient wild man of the Stone Age by night.
London wrote an interesting novel, The Star Rover, that is probably better described as a series of connected short stories rather than a true novel in keeping with London’s talent for writing shorter fiction. It follows the imprisonment of a university professor in San Quentin. Prison officials attempt to break the professor’s spirit by means of a torture device known as “the jacket.” The professor figures out how to withstand the torture by entering a trance-like state, that allows him to walk amongst the stars and experience past lives.
Before Adam was another novel of London first serialized in Everybody’s Magazine in 1906 and 1907. It has some resemblances to the earlier 1895 science fiction story by the master, H. G. Wells, The Time Machine. Whereas Wells’ story involves humans divided into different species in the far distant future, London’s story sees different human species in our distant past, Before Adam follows the story of a man who dreams that he is living the life of an early human, one of the Cave People; a majority of the story is told from the point of view of the early hominid alter ego. Other humanoid species are identified as the Tree People who are more animal-like and the Fire People who are the most advanced. It is particularly interesting when one considers that it is now theorized that several species of humans did exist around sixty to fifty thousand years ago, with Neanderthals of Europe, modern humans, Denisovans of Asia, Homo floresiensis of Indonesia, Homo luzonensis of the Philippines, and possibly some isolated pockets of Homo erectus in Asia.
2073 is sixty years after an epidemic known as the Red Death has depopulated the planet in London’s The Scarlet Plague. James Smith is one of the survivors of the terror who now live as hunter-gatherers in a depopulated world.
Jack London also wrote an alternate history long before they became vogue. His 1910, “The Unparalleled Invasion,” begins with the success of the Japanese in the Russo-Japanese War in 1904 to 1905. As Japan expands into areas of eastern Asia, it modernizes the conquered states using itself as the model of success. China is rejuvenated and its population explodes leading to expansion into other regions and ultimately forcing the Japanese back to their island home. The Chinese continue their expansion eventually displacing the French occupying Indonesia. Though interesting as a tale of an alternate history, it truly is reflective of the xenophobia that was rampant in London’s America at the time of his writing.
London was a truly great writer who is remembered for a number of his well-known works, especially those that take place in the short span of time that he had spent in the Klondike. Less well known are his stories of speculative fiction which not only expand on London’s adventures, but also form a body of work that should place the author into the company of his speculative fiction pioneer peers.
Who can imagine what his pen may have written if he had lived beyond his young age? We will never truly know. There is speculation, if one reads his semi-autobiographical novel, Martin Eden and his autobiographical novel John Barleycorn, that London actually committed suicide. With his lust for life, the speculation is probably inaccurate. More likely his youthful death was brought on by illnesses acquired during his adventures in the Yukon and in the South Seas as well as his alcoholism. In spite of an early demise, his plentiful body of work lives on speaking to the adventures of a writer’s writer.