The Importance of Instincts In Society

            “To Build a Fire” is a tale by Jack London, which, on the surface appears to be a cut-and-dry story about a man trying to pit himself against nature, and how nature always wins. Oh yeah, and there’s a dog. If one delves a bit deeper, though, the story starts to reveal itself to be about a man battling himself; nature is merely the testing medium (and there’s a dog). In “To Build a Fire,” Jack London uses the man as a symbol to represent mankind, and his constant struggle to bend nature to his will, whilst the dog represents the pure instinct of animals; man needs to become more like animals to survive.

            The story “To Build a Fire,” was written in 1908, right in the midst of the naturalism movement.  “Naturalism was [a] … movement in American literature from the 1890s until the 1920s” (Matterson). Naturalism was a very realistic writing style that portrayed situations without sugarcoating them, and, like the end of London’s story, things didn’t always end well. Some other themes of naturalism included man having little to no control over what happens to him in the cosmic scheme of things, and the limitation of imagination in contemporary society.

            The first detail that ties into the naturalist view is that the main character is left unnamed through the whole story. One reason Jack London left this man without name and without title was to lessen the blow of his death. It’s tougher to care as much about someone if you don’t even know their name. Authors habitually make characters, main characters particularly, very relatable in stories so that even less imaginative readers can vicariously live the story, rather than just read it, and easier comprehend what happens; that’s also why they pick certain points-of-view to tell the story from. One of the best methods of making characters relatable is by making them similar to the story’s projected audience. Since almost everyone alive has a name, most authors give the characters names to make them more relatable. Jack London chose to go the opposite route and still accomplish the same end: he chose to make the character more relatable to everyone by not giving him a name. London also doesn’t list many distinguishing characteristics except for the main character having a beard and chewing tobacco. In short he’s a generic “everyone” character due to lack of distinguishing characteristics: he could have any name, come from anywhere, and be in just about any time period.