The Sea Wolf Annotated
- ISBN-10
- ISBN-13
- 9798651633739
- Pages
- 384
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2020-06-06
- Publisher
- Independently Published
- Author
- Jack London
Description
The Sea-Wolf is a 1904 psychological adventure novel by American writer Jack London. The book's protagonist, Humphrey van Weyden, is a literary critic who is a survivor of an ocean collision and who comes under the dominance of Wolf Larsen, the powerful and amoral sea captain who rescues him.The Sea Wolf tells the story of a soft, domesticated protagonist - an intellectual man named Humphrey van Weyden - forced to become tough and self-reliant by exposure to cruelty and brutality. The story starts with him aboard a San Francisco ferry, called Martinez, which collides with another ship within the fog and sinks. he's set adrift within the Bay, eventually being picked up by Wolf Larsen. Larsen is that the captain of a seal-hunting schooner, the Ghost. Brutal and cynical, yet also extremely smart and intellectual (though highly biased in his opinions, as he was self-taught), he rules over his ship and terrorizes the crew with the help of his exceptionally great physical strength. Van Weyden adequately describes him as an individualist, hedonist, and materialist. Larsen doesn't believe the immortality of the soul, he finds no meaning in his life but survival and pleasure and has come to despise all human life and deny its value. Being curious about someone capable of intellectual disputes, he somewhat takes care of Van Weyden, whom he calls 'Hump', while forcing him to become a servant, do menial work, and learn to fight to guard himself from a brutal crew.A key event within the story is an attempted mutiny against Wolf Larsen by several members of the crew. The organizers of the mutiny are Leach and Johnson. Johnson had previously been beaten severely by Larsen, and Leach had been punched earlier while being forced to become a boat-puller, motivating the 2 . the primary attempt is by sending Larsen overboard; however, he manages to climb back onto the ship. checking out his assailant, he ventures into the sleeping quarters, located beneath the most deck, the sole exit being a ladder. Several, a minimum of seven men, participate within the mutiny and attack Larsen. Larsen however, demonstrating his inhuman endurance, strength, and conviction, manages to fight his way through the crew, climb the ladder with several men hanging off him, and escape relatively unharmed. Van Weyden is promoted as mate, for the first mate had been murdered. Larsen later gets his vengeance by torturing his crew, and constantly claiming that he's getting to murder Leach and Johnson at his earliest convenience, being the season is completed, as he can't afford to lose any crew. He later allows them to be lost to the ocean once they plan to flee on a hunting boat.
