“Fifty degrees below zero meant eighty odd degrees of frost. Such fact impressed him as being cold and uncomfortable, and that was all.”(London 519) He is over confident. He has no understanding that weather this cold could be very dangerous to a man. It could cost him his life. He is alert to his surroundings.
The man is obviously not an experienced on how to survive in cold . He ignores all the facts that indicate danger; travel alone but with a dog, underestimates the cold, and leaving the main Yukon trail. He seem does not make any mental notes, taking facts and using everything and anything to take advantage of. Using the man judgment, can’t understand how to prevent disaster from occurring such as snow mount fall from tree, successfully suffocated the fire, extremely crucial for survive. Nor how to avoid crossing frozen river.
"To Build a Fire" By Jack London Part 1: A summary of the novel, including the main characters, setting, plot, and major conflicts. "To Build A Fire" by Jack London is a third-person account of a man's struggle to trek across the Yukon Territory on foot in sub-zero temperatures. The temperatures drop far below what the hiker had anticipated, but he continues on his dangerous journey unaware of how cold it really is. In the beginning of the story, the man makes consistent progress in his journey and has high hopes that he will make it to camp only a little after dark. As he ventures further into his journey, the temperatures drop and the man becomes concerned with his wellbeing.
London also presented Darwin’s idea of survival of the fittest in his story. Darwin’s idea implies that those best adapted to particular conditions will succeed in the long run. In relation to “To Build A Fire,” London explains how the man wanders through Alaska, where it is 75 degrees below zero, and eventually fails to make it to his destination. The man back at home had warned him of the dangers of Alaska’s winter, but he had simply laughed it off and casually taken on the challenge. Soon after, though, he was aware of the fact that it was extremely cold and life threatening to travel on the trail at that time.
The cooler temperature of America damaged Kunta's physical condition slowing him down and negatively impacting his health. "Kunta was nearly numb with cold when the rolling box turned suddenly off the main road… legs crashing through frosted stalks of cotton." Kunta had never experienced this type of weather considering he was accustomed to Africa’s bearing sun and warm temperatures. The plants and geographic layout of America were foreign to Kunta providing as another disadvantage when he tried to escape. "The thorny brambles and vines of the brush at the edge of the forest seemed to reach out and tear at Kunta's legs."
He painted McCandless as a young man on a quest that could only be completed by having minimal things, including necessary knowledge about his voyage ahead. The fact of the matter is that it doesn’t matter how you spin it, Chris McCandless walked off into the dangerous Alaskan terrain with next to nothing and expected to survive. Craig Medred is correct in claiming that McCandless was “killed by stupidity, not starvation” because of his poor judgement starting from when he left home, to the moment he died. There’s no debating that the equipment that Chris McCandless, or as he was going by at the time Alex Supertramp, brought along with him was minimal. Krakauer himself even describes his gear as such, “His rifle was only .22 caliber, a bore too small to rely on if he expected to kill large animals like moose and caribou, which he would have to eat if he hoped to remain very long in the country.
Disdainful of the materialistic, cash driven world, he detaches himself physically and mentally to build a new life as Alexander Supertramp. In Jon Krakauer’s book Into the Wild, McCandless abandoned his life and identity, as he went on this journey. Feeling enslaved by society’s focus, he felt the need to prove that acquiring self worth didn’t require material possessions and broke free from society’s dependencies. McCandless enjoyed being self-reliant and refused to accept anyone’s help. His extreme independence and confidence made him underestimate the difficulty of survival in the wilderness.
David Durr Professor Donald Carey ENGL 1302 1 October 2012 In the short story “To Build a Fire” Jack London writes of a man who attempts to journey on the Yukon trail at a time of year when the Yukon is at a temperature of, at most, fifty degrees below zero. The man is hubristic and does not listen to the old-timer on Sulphur creek who warns him to always travel with a partner when the temperature is more than fifty degrees below zero. Though the man has no human companion, he is not alone. His fury comrade is a wolf dog. The canine considers his master nothing more than a provider of fire and one that has the “sound of whip-lashes in his voice” (London 131).
And, in the end, he is unable to will himself to movement, realizing that his mental powers are no match for what conflicts with him externally. The man in the story also has to fight internal conflicts. So as the Newcomer is constantly fighting his own foolishness for taking so many risks in such extreme cold and not following the advice of people with more experience. So he basically was just too self confident. The man just had to accept death after going through different stages before he can come to terms with it.
The narrator communicates to the reader how he thinks he is sane by justifying his actions. But don’t all insane or crazy people try to justify their reactions to a particular situation. Even though he wants too and eventually does kill the old man because of his crazy eye, he wants the reader to