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The Power of Imagination
Themes and Colors
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in To Build a Fire, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Throughout the story, the natural world is presented as unemotional and unaware of the fate of the man. This literary depiction of nature reflects Naturalism’s understanding of a harsh, yet realistic natural world. Contrary to other literary movements, Naturalism views nature without sentiment and without projecting human characteristics of love, care, and agency onto the natural world. This understanding of nature is clearly embodied in the character of the dog that is indifferent to the man and his fate. To the dog, the man is a source of food and protection only, and not a companion. The dog cannot feel any emotion about the death of the man, and the dog quickly seeks out other humans who will provide the food and shelter it needs. One human is indistinguishable from another in the dog’s mind. Many people who emphasize a unique connection between a specific human and a specific animal view dogs and other pets sentimentally. Therefore, the relationship, or lack thereof, between the man and the dog in this story effectively communicates London’s theme of the indifference of nature. Naturalism rejects the literary movement Transcendentalism, an influential philosophy in American thought, which emphasized unique connections between nature and humanity and focused on the souls of humans as open to the influence of nature as a spiritual force.
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Indifferent Nature ThemeTracker
The ThemeTracker below shows where, and to what degree, the theme of Indifferent Nature appears in each chapter of To Build a Fire. Click or tap on any chapter to read its Summary & Analysis.
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Chapter
To Build A Fire
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Indifferent Nature Quotes in To Build a Fire
Below you will find the important quotes in To Build a Fire related to the theme of Indifferent Nature.
To Build A Fire Quotes
High up in the tree one bough capsized its load of snow. This fell on the boughs beneath, capsizing them. This process continued, spreading out and involving the whole tree. It grew like an avalanche, and it descended without warning upon the man and the fire, and the fire was blotted out! Where it had burned was a mantle of fresh and disordered snow.
The man was shocked. It was as though he had just heard his own sentence of death.
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The man has succeeded in building a fire, but the rising heat causes the snow in the above branches to shift and coming tumbling down. This quote describes the acceleration and accumulation of the snow that starts with one small shift and ends with a load of snow that smothers the man’s life-saving fire. This is a critical turning point in the story, in which the man’s emotions crash from a place of self-confidence to near certainty of death. The statement that he felt as if he “just heard his own sentence of death” is the first time that death Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molestiae earum eum. Libero sit beatae. At a deserunt. Sint aperiam consequatur. Minima porro perferendis. Sit neque odit. Tenetur qui dignissimos. Q
Later, the dog whined loudly. And still later it crept close to the man and caught the scent of death. This made the animal bristle and back away. A little longer it delayed, howling under the stars that leaped and danced and shone brightly in the cold sky. Then it turned and trotted up the trail in the direction of the camp it knew, where were the other food-providers and fire-providers.
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The story ends with the dog realizing that the man is dead and continuing on the trail to find the camp. This shift in focus from the man to the dog happens once the man has died and the silence from the man demonstrates his absence from the world and from the story. The dog’s understanding of death is different than a human’s would be. It catches the “scent of death” from the man and it “bristles” and “backs away.” This reaction seems to be an instinctual one to something the dog senses is negative and dangerous without understanding it. Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molestiae earum eum. Libero sit beatae. At a deserunt. Sint aperiam consequatur. Minima porro perferendis. Sit neque od
