Jack London

a.k.a. John Griffith London

Author Code: AJLX

London was raised in Oakland, California by his mother and step-father, whose name he took. Leaving school at 14, London sailed his sloop around San Francisco Bay, took work as a sailor to Japan, and rode around America on freight trains. By 1894, his observations of poverty and the working class, together with the writings of Darwin, Mark and Nietzsche had turned him into a Marxist Socialist. He returned to his education by finishing high school and entering the University of California at Berkeley in 1896, but the attraction of finding gold and fortune in the Klondike gold rush of 1897 led him to abandon his education once more. The following year, returning broke from the gold fields, London finally turned to writinig to make his living. His first book was the The Son of The Wolf (1900), which gained him recognition and some income. Some of his more outstanding works of this early period were Call of the Wild (1903), White Fang (1906) and Burning Daylight (1910) which all draw on his Alaskan experiences. In 1909, he published his autobiography, Martin Eden, which remains one of his best works. Some other notable works include The Sea Wolf (1904) and The Iron Heel (1907) which, though a futuristic fantasy, predicts the rise of fascism. London wrote over 50 novels during his career of 17 years and was one of the highest paid writers in America in his prime.