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Similarities Between To Build A Fire And The Outcast Of Poker Flat

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Is nature here to help or harm humans? The short stories “To Build a Fire” and “The Outcast of Poker Flat”, written by Jack London and Bret Harte respectively, explore this idea. Both authors portray nature as apathetic and indifferent towards human beings and use literary devices such as imagery to accomplish this goal. In the short story “To Build a Fire,” Jack London shows the reader how cold and unforgiving nature can be to humans. London is able to accomplish this through his use of imagery. This can be seen in the sentence, “As he turned to go on, he spat speculatively. There was a sharp, explosive crackle that startled him.” In this sentence, London is able to show that the weather was so frigid that the man’s spit froze midair after leaving the man’s mouth. Another example of London’s use of imagery to describe the dangers of cold is the quote, “He struck the fingers repeatedly and returned them to the mitten, baring the other hand for the purpose of eating. He tried to take a mouthful, but the ice-muzzle prevented.” This quote …show more content…

One example of this can be seen in the quote, “A wooded amphitheatre, surrounded on three sides by precipitous cliffs of naked granite, sloped gently toward the crest of another precipice that overlooked the valley.” This quote shows that nature had set a trap for the group of outcasts. This terrain would then be used as the focal setting for the rest of the story and where the outcasts would die. In the quote, “The wind lulled as if it feared to waken them. Feathery drifts of snow, shaken from the long pine-boughs, flew like white-winged birds, and settled about them as they slept.” Nature is depicted as beautiful, but in reality, it buried the bodies of the outcasts and left no trace of humans inhabiting that area. Bret Harte’s use of imagery allowed him to show that nature is not merciful to

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