Jack London

White Fang Jack London

For the most part, London educated himself. As a young boy in 1885, London read Ouida's long Victorian novel Signawhich he later credited as having a big impact on his literary success. The next year, he went to Oakland Public Library where he met Ina Coolbrith, a librarian (that later became California's first poet laureate) who encouraged his learning. London began working at Hickmott's Cannery In 1889 where he worked for 12 to 18 hours a day. This was hard for him and he sought a way out. With money he had borrowed from Virginia Prentiss, London bought the sloop Razzle-Dazzle and became an oyster pirate. London got a job as member of the California Fish Patrol when his sloop became damaged beyond repair only a few months after he got it. In 1893, Jack London joined the crew on the sealing schooner Sophie Sutherland which was bound for the coast of Japan. He got back to the United States when the country was in the grip of the panic of '93 and Oakland was swept by labour unrest. He undertook exhausting jobs in a jute mill and a street-railway power plant. Thereafter, London joined Coxey's Army and began his career as a tramp. In 1894, London was charged with vagrancy and he spent 30 days at the Erie CountyPenitentiary at Buffalo, New York. In The Road, London described the horror's he experienced in the penitentiary as unprintable and indescribable. London finally returned to Oakland and attended Oakland High School. He wrote a number of articles for The Aegis, Oaklandhigh school's magazine."Typhoon off the Coast of Japan" was the first work he published and it is an account of his sailing experiences. John Heinold, who owned the bar where London would often go to study, lent him tuition money to attend college after London shared the desire with him. After passing his certification examsin 1896, London was admitted to his dream college the University of California, Berkeley. However, he never graduated because he had to leave in 1897 due to lack of sufficient funds for his tuition. Jack continued to study at Heinold's saloon while he was in college. It is here that he met the sailors and adventurers who would influence his writing such as Alexander McLean. Larsen, the protagonist in London's novel The Sea-Wolf, was based on McLean.