In Chapter 1, when Humphrey is sailing across the San Francisco Bay on his way to visit his friend Charley Furuseth, he makes an allusion to the 19th century German philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Arthur Schopenhauer:
I scarcely know where to begin, though I sometimes facetiously place the cause of it all to Charley Furuseth's credit. He kept a summer cottage in Mill Valley, under the shadow of Mount Tamalpais, and never occupied it except when he loafed through the winter months and read Nietzsche and Schopenhauer to rest the brain.
The allusion to these two philosophers so early in the book reveals the significance of their ideas in the novel. The character of Wolf Larsen is generally read as a critique of Nietzsche’s concept of the übermensch, or superman. For Nietzsche, the übermensch was the ideal man, what he believed a more evolved version of humanity would look like in the future. The übermensch, according to him, would not be led by the objectivist morality of organized religions, but would rather follow his own inner guidance. Societal rules and moral codes, in his view, would be antithetical to the übermensch, because they get in the way of him seeing his own inner truth and reaching his full potential. For Nietzsche, the übermensch was humanity’s highest stage of development.
Wolf Larsen can be read as an example of an übermensch because of his disregard for morality and rules; he goes after what he desires regardless of who he harms in the process. He forms his own ideas about what he has read and does not care to follow common wisdom. Also like Nietzsche’s übermensch, he is presented as humanity at its peak, at least in physical and intellectual power—he is physically strong and fit, and Humphrey describes him as being the ideal man physically, “the man-type, the masculine, and almost a god in his perfectness.”
However, Wolf Larsen is generally read as a critique of Nietzsche’s übermensch, not an endorsement. London argues for a balance between following one’s inner guidance and respecting the codes of society. Larsen is not loved for his übermensch-like qualities, but hated, feared, and friendless; he spends his life lonely and miserable, and at the end of the novel, dies a horrific death.
Schopenhauer’s ideas also permeate The Sea-Wolf. He developed the idea of the “will to live” in his philosophy: his term for the instinctual drive in all people to preserve and continue life at all costs. Wolf gives voice to a similar idea throughout the novel, describing life as a “yeast” which has no meaning and purpose other than to sustain itself: “a circle; you get nowhere.” He believes that what Maud and Humphrey think of as a soul is in fact nothing more than this mindless will to live, drawing the bleak conclusion that humanity overvalues its own life because of it.
In Chapter 1, Humphrey catches his first glimpse of the Ghost, moments before it collides with the Martinez and sinks it. He makes an allusion to Leviathan, a sea monster from ancient mythology and the Bible:
The fog seemed to break away as though split by a wedge, and the bow of a steamboat emerged, trailing fog-wreaths on either side like seaweed on the snout of Leviathan.
In Christianity and Judaism, the Leviathan represents chaos and dwells in a vast primordial ocean that existed before the creation of the earth. By alluding to it here, London suggests that there is something ancient, primordial, and chaotic about the Ghost and, by extension, about its captain Wolf Larsen. This contrasts with Humphrey’s modern, orderly, and civilized nature. At this point in the novel, Humphrey lives in the world of language and the intellect, neatly describing and categorizing the world around him in words, which are his comfort zone. The Ghost, on the other hand, represents an ancient and dangerous force that resists such intellectual understandings and threatens to undo Humphrey’s perspective on the world. This reference to the Leviathan monster creates a sense of foreboding danger and a looming threat—that Humphrey’s worldview is at risk of being attacked and submerged in the primordial sea.
When tidying up Wolf’s room in Chapter 5, Humphrey stumbles on his surprisingly large book collection. He owns several books on science, including Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species:
Against the wall, near the head of the bunk, was a rack filled with books […] There were scientific works, too, among which were represented men such as Tyndall, Proctor, and Darwin.
Darwin’s theories of evolution and natural selection permeate The Sea-Wolf. Wolf Larsen’s views about humanity seem to align with Social Darwinism, a movement that reached its peak in the late 19th and early 20th centuries (when The Sea-Wolf was written). Social Darwinism appropriated Darwin’s ideas about evolution in the natural world, applying his concept of natural selection—often referred to as “survival of the fittest”—to human society. Social Darwinism was often used to justify and maintain societal inequities, using this idea of “survival of the fittest” to argue that people who gained power did so because they were inherently fitter than others, not because of inherited wealth and other unfair advantages. Today, Social Darwinism is generally discredited as racist, classist, and scientifically inaccurate.
London doesn’t support Social Darwinism in the novel, either. Despite ostensibly being “fitter” than Humphrey (he is physically stronger, and described as being more masculine), Wolf dies by the novel’s end while Humphrey survives, suggesting that Humphrey, with his balance of physical strength and empathy, is in fact the “fitter” of the two. Further, although both Wolf and Humphrey are interested in Maud, Maud ends up falling in love with Humphrey and rejecting Wolf. This also supports the idea that Humphrey is the “fitter” man, because he is the one who finds a mate and can pass down his genes to future generations. Overall, the novel suggests that human nature is not inherently cruel and selfish, because cruelty and selfishness (represented by Wolf Larsen) don’t win out in the end.
Darwin’s ideas are also apparent in The Sea-Wolf’s focus on humanity’s “primal” or “primitive” origins. Throughout the novel, London poses questions about what humanity might look like in its most natural state. Humphrey believes that Wolf is the archetypal primitive man: strong, cruel, and selfish. However, the novel’s ending suggests that human nature is more nuanced than this.
At the beginning of the novel, Humphrey is represented as being overly civilized and intellectual, disconnected from his “primal” self (like his physicality and sexuality). After spending time doing physical labor and literally immersing himself in nature (represented by the sea), however, he achieves a balance between being civilized and connecting to his primitive roots. From an evolutionary perspective, it also makes sense that Humphrey would need to return to the sea to connect with these primitive roots. Life itself originated from the ocean, and so by immersing himself in the sea, he is not only metaphorically but also literally returning to the source of all life.
In Chapter 8, after noticing an open volume of Robert Browning’s poetry on Wolf Larsen’s bed, Humphrey makes an allusion to Browning’s 1864 poem “Caliban Upon Setebos:”
"You are a sort of monster," I added audaciously, "a Caliban who has pondered Setebos, and who acts as you act, in idle moments, by whim and fancy."
[...]
Not to be tiresome, I shall say that I fetched the book from his state-room and read "Caliban" aloud. He was delighted. It was a primitive mode of reasoning and looking at things that he understood thoroughly.
“Caliban Upon Setebos” is written from the perspective of Caliban, a character in William Shakespeare’s The Tempest. The novel’s allusion to this poem highlights the similarities between Caliban and Wolf Larsen. Both characters represent humanity in its natural state before the influence of culture. Wolf, for example, is entirely self-educated, and much of his worldview comes from directly observing the world around him. Humphrey frequently refers to Wolf as “primal” and “the perfect type of the primitive man,” suggesting that he represents humanity in its natural state.
Humphrey’s relationship to this idea of the “primitive man” is complex. On the one hand, he seems to see Wolf as superior to other men because he is self-educated and hasn’t been corrupted by the outside influence of culture, giving him a direct, or somehow more natural, perspective on the world that people who have received a formal education (like Humphrey) don’t have access to. On the other, Wolf’s self-education has contributed to his immoral, materialistic, and cruel nature. Wolf believes that it’s right for him to overpower others with his superior physical strength simply because he can, and sees nothing wrong with assaulting or even killing others.
Caliban, like Wolf, is a product of nature; he has grown up on an island away from the influence of civilization until the arrival of the wizard Prospero and his daughter Miranda. In The Tempest, similarly to The Sea-Wolf, Shakespeare investigates the complex relationship between nature and civilization. Like Wolf Larsen, Caliban is meant to represent humanity in its “primal” state, without the civilizing influence of culture. At one point before the action of The Tempest, Caliban attempted to rape Miranda, and he shows no remorse. This is reminiscent of Wolf Larsen, who sexually assaults Maud in The Sea-Wolf. Both characters act this way simply because they can, and because they don’t believe in right and wrong, they feel no remorse for their violence.
In “Caliban Upon Setebos,” Robert Browning imagines Caliban musing upon the nature of his god, Setebos, wondering why he created life. He postulates that Setebos might have been feeling lonely, cold, and unhappy, and that he created life to ease these feelings. In Caliban’s vision, Setebos envies his creations because they are able to feel joy and surprise when experiencing beauty, but Setebos, as the creator of that beauty, feels nothing. Despite Setebos’s occasional violence, Caliban does not see him as a cruel god; he muses that were he as strong as his god, he would likely behave violently against his own creations too, simply because he could.
Wolf Larsen bears similarities to both Caliban and Setebos. Like Setebos, he surpasses others in his strength and uses it to overpower others, but this sets him apart, making him feel unhappy and lonely; he longs for an equal to challenge him. And like Caliban, his perspective on the divine and the universe comes from a direct observation of the world around him rather than a formal education.
Throughout the novel, Humphrey makes allusions to the character of Lucifer, or Satan, from John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost. Both Humphrey and Maud frequently compare Wolf Larsen to Lucifer, and Wolf himself is fascinated by what he sees as the character’s independent spirit and fearlessness.
In Chapter 26, during one of his frequent conversations about literature with Maud and Humphrey, Wolf says:
“[Lucifer] led a lost cause, and he was not afraid of God’s thunderbolts,” Wolf Larsen was saying. “Hurled into hell, he was unbeaten […] To serve was to suffocate. He preferred suffering in freedom to all the happiness of a comfortable servility. He did not care to serve God. He cared to serve nothing. He was no figurehead. He stood on his own legs. He was an individual.”
Here, Wolf is expressing his admiration for Lucifer, who at the beginning of Paradise Lost is God’s favorite angel, but is thrown out of heaven for challenging God’s authority. Lucifer is not content to serve under God; he wants to take God's place and rule over the universe instead. Wolf quotes Lucifer’s famous line from the poem, “Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven,” which mirrors Wolf’s own ideas about freedom and self-reliance. It also reflects his disbelief in being good and altruistic toward others in hopes of being rewarded with an afterlife in heaven.
