Jack London

The Cruise of the Dazzler. Jack London

The Cruise of the Dazzler is an early novel by Jack London, set in his home city of San Francisco. It is considered a boy's adventure novel. In the novel, Joe Bronson, dissatisfied with his dull life at school, runs away and joins the crew of a sloop he sees in San Francisco Bay. He finds the captain is involved in criminal activities. The nautical activities on board a sailing boat are authentically described, and there are convincing descriptions of boats enduring stormy weather at sea. London, in his autobiographical novel John Barleycorn, describes how in his youth he bought a sloop called the Razzle Dazzle from an oyster pirate called French Frank. In The Cruise of the Dazzler, the captain of the Dazzler is known as French Pete, who, like French Frank, drinks to the success of business ventures. London himself became an oyster pirate. Joe Bronson, instead of studying for a school exam, goes out kite-flying with his school friends; on their way back he gets involved in fights with gang members in a poor part of the city. After he fails the exam the next day, he walks out of school and takes a ferry across the bay to Oakland. Looking at the boats on the wharf, he imagines the exciting life on a boat.