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3.0étoiles sur 5
The Struggle for Book Learning, Oct. 6 2003
Read this shortly after reading "White Jacket" by Herman Melville. Certainly came away from reading this with the impression that Melville is the superior writer. I guess that's not really in question.As an Oaklander, I take issue with the Amazon comment above that says this book takes place in San Francisco. Maybe one or two scenes take place in San Francisco, but the rest takes place in Oakland. It is fun to read the action taking place on Telegraph Avenue or at Broadway and fourteenth street, locations that in some places still resemble the way they looked in London's day. Plot of novel is best referred to as "semi-autobiographical", from what I can gather. Martin Eden struggles to teach himself to write, only to find that success leads to emptiness. Story mirrored a short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne called "Ethan Brand". In that story, the main character becomes obsessed with finding "an unpardonable sin". After travelling around the world, he realizes that the only unpardonable sin is the uncontrolled thirst for knowledge. Martin Eden is kind of like that... He thirsts to know everything, but when his knowledge is recognized by society, he is disappointed and left feeling empty inside. Eden, the character, has a penchant for Herbert Spencer and Nietzche. I found the philosophizing involving these two hard to take, but I guess that's just par for the course with London.
Makes for a quick read, despite it's four hundred page plus length.
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de Ray Bradbury
