Journal #16

Crane’s “The Blue Hotel” and London’s “To Build A Fire”

Read the following quote and discuss how it applies to the main characters in both stories. In the course of this discussion, address how each of the characters is both similar and different:

“Determinisim governs everything … The writer must study the inherited traits of individual character and the social condition of the time. Together, these elements determine the course of any action, the outcome of any life. Free will or self-determination is mostly an illusion, although chance is granted a role in human affairs. Still, even the effects of chance are obliterated in the inevitable course determined by the interaction of inherited character traits and the social environment.“

Determinism is the philosophical idea that every event or state of affairs, including every human decision and action, is the inevitable and necessary consequence of antecedent states of affairs. It is not so much based off of your own choices but your traits and environment. In “The Blue Hotel” the swede died because of outside forces more than because of his own choices. First of all they all ended up at the same hotel because of the blizzard that was going on. They were all together which lead to interaction, such as card playing. The swede had read so many books about the wild west that his brain thought the real world was like it. He did not have control over what his brain was telling him and his mind was saying that he would die in that hotel. He kept repeating it over and over causing the men to get angry and a fight to break out. Once the swede won he was cocky and once the other gentleman showed up, once again because of the blizzard, the swede annoyed him to the point where the stranger killed him. The swedes character traits and social environment lead to his death.

In “To Build a Fire” the man is walking in the freezing wilderness trying to get to a campsite. An older man had warned him not to go in at this temperature but he did anyway. The environment was cold and caused the water to freeze. While trying to walk he fell through the ice casuing his foot to start freezing so he had to make a fire in order to keep going. But the environment was against him because when he started the fire a pile of snow fell on it and took it out. One last fire was his only hope but his fingers had frozen as well and he could barely move anymore. He knew he would die because of the temperature and conditions in the wilderness and he eventually accepted it, knowing he sould have listened to the old man.