The Trails of Street Dog to Become a Sledding Dog

Call of the Wild by Jack London
Reviewed by Daniel Schatt


In Jack London's Call of the Wild, a dog named Buck learns to survive by himself. The theme of this book is survival. For four years Buck lived in Judge Miller's house. In those four years Buck did not need to use any survival skills, because the Miller's fed him, and protected him. Buck was then stolen by some men who tried to break him down. Buck was put on a train where the people who stole him tried to train him to become a sled dog. While they were training Buck they got him angry, so angry that he attacked one of the men and bit his hand. After that he was beaten, and he learned not to attack a man with a club. Buck was then sold to Perrault and Francois who needed a sledding dog. While learning to sled Buck encountered fighting with other dogs, especially Splitz the head dog of the sledding team; He also encountered wolves and man.

When Buck was sold to Perrault and Francois , he was not accepted by a couple of dogs named Splitz and the Sol-kes. The dog named Splitz hated Buck from the beginning because Buck and Splitz wanted the same position, the head of the team. Splitz kept on attacking Buck and injuring Buck severely. One day they got into a fight and Splitz came close to killing Buck. Then Buck bit Splitz in the throat and killed him. From then on he was the head of the team. " The general tone of the team picked up immediately. It recovered its old-time solidarity" (pg. 54). After Buck became the head of the team he experienced many other times where he had to use his survival skills.

Jack London is a wonderful author in the way he writes and the way he describes things in detail. Here is a description of Buck:"There were fierce fighters among them, but three battles with the fiercest brought Buck to mastery, so that when he bristled and showed his teeth they got out of his way" (pg.56). Sometimes in the book you feel like you're right there traveling along with Buck and going through the trials to become a sled dog.



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