The Call of the Wild 717places him in conflict—he’s caught in the middle
between his two identities. Buck well understands
that “there [is] no middle course. He must master
or be mastered; . . . to show mercy was a weakness.
Mercy did not exist in the primordial life. It was
misunderstood for fear, and such misunderstandings
made for death. Kill or be killed, eat or be eaten, was
the law.” His is an either/or existence and love its
complicator.
Confronted with these realizations, Buck tries
to find some kind of compromise by going out on a
series of reconnaissance missions to find himself. He
travels back and forth between the domesticated and
wild worlds for days at a time, transforming back
to a more docile version when he returns to camp,
and undergoing an “instant and terrible transforma-
tion . . . as soon as he [is] within the secrecy of the
forest. . . . a thing of the wild, stealing along softly,
cat-footed, a passing shadow,” patient and stealthy
in his pursuit of prey. He straddles spirit worlds as
well, London referring to him as “the Evil Spirit”
and “The Fiend incarnate”; a Native American tribe
later mythologizes him as “Ghost Dog.”
But the precariousness of his dual identity
haunts him. When he hears the call of the wild—a
wolf howling—for the first time clearly, the sound
is irresistible. It “impels him to do things, and
ultimately masters him, but only after Thornton
is murdered.” No longer fettered with a tie to his
beloved friend, Buck capitulates to the call. He
becomes a super-sized wild version, “a gigantic
wolf ” with a “long wolf muzzle . . . larger than the
muzzle of any wolf,” his head “the wolf head on a
massive scale.” Having inherited the best traits of
his St. Bernard father and shepherd mother, his
amalgamation improves on them and makes him
a superior version of wild animal, more than a
perfect compromise between his past and present
identities.
Lori Vermaas
nature in The Call of the Wild
London describes and discusses two versions of
nature, domesticated and primordial. The former
exists on Judge Miller’s estate in Santa Clara Valley,
California, a manicured and expansive landscape
that induces laziness and sleepiness. Buck’s home
for his first four years, the estate is relaxed and lei-
surely, a spread whimsically “half hidden among the
trees” whose “gravelled [sic] driveways . . . wound
about through wide-spreading lawns and under the
interlacing boughs of tall poplars.” It is a picturesque
place where man lives comfortably and in harmony
with nature, with architecture well integrated into
the natural surroundings. The servant’s cottages are
“vine-clad,” part of a larger complex of “an endless
and orderly array of outhouses, long grape arbors,
green pastures, orchards, and berry patches”—
descriptive of a pastoral scene of fecundity and
growth. In these brief, opening scenes nature is a
playground for Buck—he swims when he wants
and goes on “rambles” with the judge’s children and
grandchildren. He is nature’s master.
His upbringing in the warm and inviting South-
land, however, strongly contrasts with the cold,
harsh Northland on which London focuses for the
novel’s remainder. The wild is nature’s raw and thus
truer form, a cruel environment that dominates its
subjects. The difference is evident during Buck’s
first encounter. Stepping onto the Narwhal’s deck
after sensing the “change,” he steps into snow, a
mushy, muddy substance he has never experienced
before. While sampling it with his tongue, it “bit
like fire.”
Buck discovers that nature is a brutal, immoral
place that privileges the strong and runs on suspi-
cion and ruthless competition. In the wild, morality
is irrelevant, even pointless, because “flung into the
heart of things primordial . . . , all was confusion
and action, and every moment life and limb were
in peril. There was imperative need to be constantly
alert . . . dogs and men . . . were savages . . . who
knew no law but the law of club and fang.” The law
is thus one of survival, kill or be killed, eat when you
can, take care of yourself only, trust no one—and it
is all marked by speed. Fights occur suddenly, once
weakness is sensed. The docile Curly goes down in
a heap of mauling dogs, whose vicious lesson Buck
learns early on. After Curly’s death, Buck realizes
that out here “the way” is “no fair play. Once down,
that was the end of you. Well, he would see to it that
he never went down.”
Given that nature is a harsh taskmaster, only
the fittest survive, which creates incredibly efficient