“The Call of the Wild” is London’s best-known and most often studied. Along with “White Fang,” it was inspired by a year London spent in the Yukon chasing gold and thousands of others.
Historical Context
The Klondike Gold Rush was a period in the late 1800s, approximately from 1886 to 1899, during which thousands traveled to the Canadian Klondike in search of gold. After gold was discovered in 1868, men from around the country, the United States, and abroad traveled to this northern Canadian region (just east of what would later be Alaska), hoping to make their fortune.
The region was hazardous, freezing, and consistently snow-covered. Around 100,000 people, known as prospectors, traveled to Canada. They traveled through Dyea and Skagway in Southeast Alaska and followed one of two different passes, the Chilkoot or White Pass, to the Yukon River. There, they sailed to the Klondike.
Each team included a pack of sled dogs responsible for pulling all the supplies (including a year’s worth of food). The loads were incredibly heavy and often required multiple trips. Some teams took years of trips to bring all of their supplies to their intended destinations.
Towns like Dawson City sprung up along the route to accommodate the prospectors. Indigenous populations were negatively affected. Groups like the Hän were moved off their territory to accommodate the prospectors.
Gold mining in the Klondike peaked in 1903 after the introduction of heavy machinery. Around the same time, interest in traveling to the Klondike declined, and the population of Dawson City, which reached 30,000 people at the height of the Gold Rush, fell.
Those who traveled to the Klondike were subject to starvation and disease. People died from scurvy, meningitis, typhoid, and the cold, as well as from physical violence (the latter was the second most common cause of death).
During this time, scholars believe that around 120,000 Native people died from diseases and violence brought into the region by prospectors and others seeking to benefit from the Gold Rush.
Author Background
Jack London was a man who lived a life of struggle. Born into poverty in San Francisco, he worked a series of brutal, physical jobs throughout his youth—sailor, oyster pirate, and laborer—before discovering a love for writing. But his journey to the Yukon in 1897 during the Klondike Gold Rush truly set him on the path to literary fame. London spent nearly a year in the harsh northern wilderness, braving the cold, illness, and hunger. He didn’t find the gold he had hoped for, but he found something far more valuable: inspiration.
Jack London was among those who traveled to the Klondike in search of his fortune. He joined the groups headed North in 1897 and traveled up the Chilkoot Trail. While there, he submitted stories to various magazines, many of which were later included in short story collections.
It’s believed that London never fully recovered from his year in Canada. Upon the occasion of his death, he was suffering from morphine addiction, kidney failure, alcoholism, and still feeling the lasting effects of diseases he was exposed to in the Klondike (including scurvy).
London’s early works, such as “The Son of the Wolf” (1900) and “The Sea-Wolf” (1904), also reflected his rugged life experiences. “The Call of the Wild” stands out because it wasn’t just a tale of survival—it was a story drawn from London’s hardships and his thoughts on human nature, evolution, and the fight to stay alive.
While he did not find his fortune there, he did find inspiration for his novels. His time in the Klondike, including his suffering, the violence he saw, and his experiences with sled dogs, all inspired the plot of “The Call of the Wild.“
Cultural Context
In the early 1900s, American society was gripped by rapid urbanization, industrialization, and a growing interest in science. Once seen as something to conquer, the wilderness started to symbolize a lost freedom in a world increasingly ruled by machines and city life. “The Call of the Wild” reflected these tensions between civilization and nature, with Buck’s journey representing a return to a more primal, unspoiled way of life.
London considered Charles Darwin and his theories on evolution another major source of inspiration for his novel. At the time London was writing “The Call of the Wild,” Darwin’s theories dominated the scientific world, and London utilized many of them in his plot.
The idea of “survival of the fittest,” drawn from Darwin’s work, “The Origin of Species” (1854), became popular. It influenced people’s thinking about social order, the economy, and personal relationships. London used Buck’s transformation from a domesticated dog to a wild beast to critique society’s growing distance from nature and its harsh, unforgiving realities. He seemed to suggest that, despite our trappings of culture and order, survival and power were still the forces that ruled our world.
Literary Context
“The Call of the Wild” fits the adventure fiction genre but goes deeper than an exciting tale. It’s also a work of naturalism, a literary movement that sought to portray life as brutal, raw, and often indifferent to human suffering. Writers like London were reacting to the Romanticism of the 19th century, where nature was seen as a source of beauty and inspiration. Instead, London and other naturalists portrayed nature as something that could crush a person—or a dog—without a second thought.
“The Call of the Wild” breaks from the typical adventure story by placing a dog, Buck, at the center. Unlike “Treasure Island” by Stevenson, where men hunt for treasure, Buck’s journey is about survival and instincts in the harsh North. London’s focus isn’t on human ambition but on nature’s raw forces. Compared to Kipling’s “The Jungle Book,” where Mowgli straddles two worlds—human and wild—Buck fully embraces the wilderness, leaving behind all signs of his tame life. Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” also deals with the clash between civilization and wilderness, but it’s more of a metaphor for the darkness in men’s hearts. For Buck, the wild isn’t symbolic; it’s real and strips away all softness. London’s story shows the wild as a place where instincts rule, standing apart from other adventure novels by spotlighting the power of nature rather than human will or triumph.
Critical Reception
In 1903, Jack London sold the publication rights for his novel “The Call of the Wild” to MacMillan. Since its initial publication in 1903, the book has been translated into dozens of languages and sold worldwide, never out of print.
“The Call of the Wild” was a hit immediately after publication. H. L. Mencken said no other writer of London’s time could write as well as he did in this book. A New York Times reviewer, back in 1903, mentioned that if nothing else, the vivid dog fights would make it popular with readers. The Atlantic Monthly described it as a powerful story that wasn’t polished or pretty but raw and real.
The book cemented London’s place in American literature. The first 10,000 copies sold out fast, and it’s still one of the most read and taught books in schools today. Published in 47 languages, it gave London the success he needed and built a loyal following that stayed with him throughout his career. This novel proved that London’s tales of the wild had staying power, becoming a fixture in the world of literature.
Modern Relevance
Though over a century old, “The Call of the Wild” still feels relevant today. Its themes of survival, the pull of nature, and the fight for dominance in a harsh world resonate in our own time, especially as we confront environmental crises and reflect on humanity’s place in the natural world. Buck’s journey back to the wild can be seen as a call for modern readers to reconnect with nature and to remember our roots in the earth, even as we live in a world dominated by technology.
Over the years, “The Call of the Wild” has been shaped into many forms. In 1935, Clark Gable played in one of the earliest film adaptations. Then came the 1972 version with Charlton Heston, and most recently, the 2020 film starring Harrison Ford. These movies retell Buck’s story, though some stray from the book, softening the rough edges of the screen. There was also a TV series in the late 1990s that added new characters to Buck’s world. The story has even been brought to life on the stage and adapted for radio broadcasts. Some stick close to Jack London’s original words, others bend the tale to fit what today’s audience might want. Still, the heart of the story, a dog’s fight for survival, remains as gripping as it was when it was first written.