London calling

Wolf: The Lives of Jack London

Boozer, brawler, prospector, tramp, pirate, adventurer and campaigner for social justice, Jack London was all of those things, but much more.

Born fatherless into a dirt poor working-class Californian family in 1876, London was growing up as his country was attempting to raise itself from the dust of what became known as the Long Depression of 1873-79.

The family moved from place to place to eke out a living as best they could and, like many post-depression households, no sooner were they on their feet when they were knocked down again by hard times.

Despite the harshness of his childhood, London did benefit from formal schooling and, thanks to his mother’s efforts, was already able to read when he started school at six years of age.

He became an avid reader and showed great flair as a composition writer while at school.

Jack’s life changed course when at 17, and encouraged by his mother Flora Wellman, he entered a competition in The San Francisco Call for a prize of $25 for the best descriptive article.

At the time he was a “work beast” in a jute mill – one of many back-breaking jobs he experienced – earning €40 a month for a 13-hour day.

Typhoon Off the Coast of Japan, the first story ever published by Jack London, told of his experiences during a deep-water voyage in the sealing schooner Sophie Sutherland. By 17, London had lived more, in terms of worldly experiences, than many men three times his age.

His almost cinematic descriptive powers and unique literary articulation won him first prize, with the second and third awards going to students at California and Stanford universities.

It was only right and fitting that his mother had been so instrumental in his decision to make a living not as a hard drinking, brawling, law breaking work beast, but as a writer.

The author, James L Haley, might also have written a biography of Flora Wellman, a music teacher and spiritualist who claimed to have a connection to the spirit of a native American Indian, Plume. She also, for a time, had a connection to William Chaney, an astrologer, with whom she lived in San Francisco.

When she became pregnant he demanded she have an abortion, but she desisted and baby John – who would become known as Jack – was born.

Jack’s mother was mentally destabilised by this whole episode and the baby was placed in the care of a wet nurse, former slave Virginia Prentiss, who became a second mother.

When, in 1876, Flora married John London, a disabled civil war veteran, Jack came to live with the newly married couple who moved around the San Francisco Bay area before settling in Oakland.

Jack had abiding and fond memories of his mother, his wet nurse and his stepfather.

Life with his family was far from idyllic, however, and Jack was expected to provide financial support whenever it was needed, which was almost always. At high school he worked as a janitor. Prep school didn’t last very long when his gift as a writer caused too much jealousy among the blue-nosers who made no distinction between privilege and ability. This eventually led to his expulsion. Against all the odds, at 20 years of age, he was a student at Berkley university despite having felt way out of his depth while taking the entrance exams.

With his family in penury and frustrated at what he saw as the pointlessness of many aspects of college education, especially studying subjects which would not help realise his dream to become a writer, London dropped out after his first six-month semester.

Nonetheless, he would evolve to become one of the best known and best paid American writers of his generation who, incidentally, also introduced surfing to an audience outside Hawaii.

“While there were ways in which London was never a child, there were also ways in which he never grew up,” states the author in what is a captivating study that covers so much ground with perhaps too much haste. To the end of his days London continued to booze, brawl and womanise.

He also found time to travel extensively, develop his Californian ranch and indulge his passion for sailing.

Wolf is the story of a man who was a mass of contradictions – the socialist with a penchant for servants; the adoring husband (twice married) who couldn’t resist the ladies; and the globe trotter who was happiest when at home with his horses, dogs and pigs.

At 40, London, who had been plagued by ill health which the author attributes to travels in disease-ridden tropics, alcohol and raw meat (his favourite food was barely cooked pressed duck), died after injecting morphine which he regularly used as a painkiller. The question of whether or not it was suicide remains unanswered.

While his death was, and still is, intriguing, his life was considerably more so and while Haley hardly left a stone unturned he could have spent more time examining what lurked beneath some of them.

Nonetheless, Wolf is a glorious achievement which will encourage readers to seek out more about and by Jack London.