Jack London Biography

One of the most successful novelists and essayists of his time, John Griffith London was born in San Francisco on 12 January 1876.

Having left school at the age of 14, London travelled to Japan and the Arctic on board a sealing ship, before returning to the United States, where he also travelled extensively. In later years, his extensive travelling experience provided much of his source material.

In April 1894, London was arrested for vagrancy in Buffalo, New York, and imprisoned for a month, in violation of his statutory rights. It was this experience that was to inspire his life-long advocacy of the socialist cause. In the same year, London campaigned against poverty and social injustice, as a member of Kelly’s Industrial Army, before resolving to complete his education.

London attended Oakland High School, and completed one semester at the University of California. However, he became disillusioned with academia, and left for the Klondike in March 1897. London failed as a gold prospector but gathered much from his experience, to write 'The Son of the Wolf' (1900) and his famous canine narratives 'The Call of the Wild' (1903) and 'White Fang' (1906).

His determination to fight for working people was undiminished, and he used his new-found literary celebrity to this end, publishing 'People of the Abyss' (1903), a portrait of slum life in Britain, gathered from first-hand experience, and 'The Iron Heel' (1908), a dystopian and eerily prescient work on the dangers of the police state.

Between 1900 and 1916, London published over fifty books, as well as being a proficient letter-writer and public speaker. Notable works include 'The Sea Wolf' (1904), informed by his own experiences in the main, 'Smoke Bellew' (1912), and what was to become a classic of the prohibition cause, 'John Barleycorn: Alcoholic Memoirs', ironically, a semi-autobiographical account of London’s lifelong battle with alcoholism.

Although a committed socialist, London displayed a worrying tendency towards espousing a crude and individualistic Social Darwinism, such as in his eulogising of the ‘Aryan race’ in works such as 'The Valley of the Moon'. London's phenomenal output, as well as his revelry in his role as public intellectual and socialist agitator, cemented his reputation during his lifetime.

London married twice, first to Bessie Madden in April 1900 - the same day his first book was published - whom he divorced in 1905, and then to Charmain Kitteridge, who survived him.

He had known his first wife for several years as they had the same group of friends and it was common knowledge that they didn't marry for love but because of friendship and a belief they would have strong children.

Their first child Joan was born on 15 January 1901 and their second, Bessy, was born on 20 October 1902. They were both born in California. By 1903, their marriage was under strain as they realised they were not compatible, divorcing in 1904.

He then married Charmain in 1905 after being introduced to her by his Macmillan publisher George Platt Brett SR. The couple seemed better matched than London and his previous wife and they enjoyed several trips together, including a ten month stint in Hawaii beginning in December 1915.

The pair tried to have children but one child died at birth and one pregnancy ended in a miscarriage. Charmain survived London and her ashes were mixed with his when she died in 1955.

Jack London died on 22 November 1916 of kidney failure. Two works were published posthumously, 'Jerry of the Islands' (1917) and a socialist treatise, 'The Human Drift' (1917).