Fall Winter 2013 Vol. 24, No. 2-Spring Summer 2014, Vol. 25
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123 The Magazine of the THE CALL Jack London Fall/Winter 2013 Vol. 24, No. 2-Spring/Summer 2014, Vol. 25, No. 1 Society IN Memory of Greg Hayes In my pitifully tattooed brain this announcement was conducive to THE WORLD OF JACK LONDON HAS LOST A FRIEND nothing “going forward” (that unnerving cliché). Instead I was propelled into By Louis Leal keenly focused backward-looking— Satchel Paige (“Don’t look back, something might be gaining on you”) Greg Hayes, retired He was president of the board would not have approved of me when JLSHP was in danger of peering into deep space ranger of Jack London State closing. With his leadership the to see how fast the steamroller was Historic Park (JLSHP), died, slow and difficult process of the rolling. Suddenly expectation surrounded by loved ones, on association taking over the opera- needed to mesh with outcome July 9, 2014 at 62 after a long tion of the park was successful perfectly. Which, face it, happens how often? struggle with cancer. He is and JLSHP was not only saved, but also became the first Califor- Anyway, long story survived by his wife Robin hopefully not short, nia State Park run by a non-profit angels immediately lined up Fautley and daughter Ni- organization. colette. Both will remember on the telephone lines His received a B.A. from outside my streaky windows him as an incredible husband UCLA and an M.A. in American replacing each crow and father. Literature from Sonoma State like reverse notes Hayes joined Jack London State University. His thesis was “Jack in some fabulous paean Historic Park as a ranger in 1978. London’s Agrarian Super He- of all-out love and support. While there, he helped create and roes.” Through his years as rang- And here—what can I say? —words fail me and plain gratitude administer horseback patrols, pi- er at JLSHP he carried on an in- tense study of Jack London’s life. and Sly Stone unabashedly take over: ano playing on Charmian Lon- I want to thank you It was there in the park one day don’s Steinway, golf cart rides, for lettin’ me guided walks, and interpretive that he met his future wife, Robin be myself museum staff, the Jack London Fautley. They were together for again. Cottage, and the Wolf House ru- thirty happy years, sharing world ins. He continued this professional travel, the love of nature, and the * * * connection to Jack London until passion for preserving our envi- he retired as Head Supervising ronment. On that final day, Robin Fautley Ranger in 2003 and became a vol- Greg Hayes was also a poet. wrote: unteer docent at the park, and con- His recent book, Earthsweats, is tributed greatly to the success of an excellent example of his work. The world has lost a good man this morn- the park by training new docents, Here is what he wrote upon ing learning about his cancer: A poet leading tours, and working on in- A lover of his family terpretive projects where he used The year began with an A protector of forests and State Parks his writing talents. He was chosen A beautiful man whose humor, intelli- to be on the executive board of the annoying cancer diagnosis. 2013, the Year of the Snake— gence, and gentle calming nature touched Valley of the Moon Natural Histo- that’s Taurus, to you Occidentals the hearts of those who knew him ry Association, the cooperative as- and yes, my Sign. Deeply loved, deeply respected sociation that supported the park. Go with peace and love, dearest one. 12 THE CALL 22 The Jack London Society President Gendering and American Male Identity Noël Mauberret Lycée Paul Cezanne, Institute for in White Fang American Universities in Aix-en-Provence, France Vice President Paul Crumbley Christian Pagnard Utah State University Lycée Alain Colas, Nevers, France Executive Coordinator Jeanne C. Reesman AT first glance, Kiche, the land, White Fang’s ultimate destina- tion. University of Texas at San Antonio she-wolf who gives birth to Advisory Board Central to London’s presentation Sam S. Baskett White Fang in Jack London’s of healthy masculinity is his insistence Michigan State University novel White Fang, seems the that readers shift back and forth be- Lawrence I. Berkove tween masculine and feminine points She en- University of Michigan-Dearborn very face of wild nature. of view. One of London’s achieve- Kenneth K. Brandt tices desperately needed sled dogs away ments as a writer is his skill at manag- Savannah College of Art and Design from two men toiling across the frozen ing perspective so that readers find Donna Campbell Arctic landscape, embodying the most themselves inhabiting shifting subject Washington State University threatening facet of the seductress/mother positions and thereby experiencing a Daniel Dyer Louis Montrose associates with the femi- range of variously gendered roles de- Western Reserve University nine landscape personified in New World signed to erode the male/female binary Sara S. "Sue" Hodson discovery narratives. This use of the femi- and reveal a self within which mascu- Huntington Library nine signals London’s incorporation of the line and feminine balances must be Joseph Johnson pervasive land-is-woman metaphor that recalibrated according to the demands Independent Scholar Annette Kolodny, like Montrose, traces to of a changing environment. This pro- Holger Kersten early discovery narratives, but also situates cess defines sexual identity as a bal- University of Magdeburg at the heart of the American pastoral. When ancing of the gender polarities that Earle Labor the novel ends with the female sheepdog, characterize the internal management Centenary College of Louisiana Collie, surrounded by the puppies White of the male self, as well as the way Louis Leal Fang has fathered, we imagine that London that self perceives the external world. Jack London State Historical Park has replaced the threatening seductress As Scott Derrick observes, “in Lon- Susan Nuernberg with the nurturing mother, signaling the don’s narratives feminine strength and University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh taming of wild nature achieved by the masculine strength exist in a state of Gary Riedl proper management of masculine force. tension, at times explicit and obvious Wayzata High School, Wayzata, MN The novel is consistent with the Old World and at other times muted and scarcely Gina M. Rossetti tradition of gendering the New World as perceptible” (117). When this tension Saint Xavier University feminine by framing it in the male gaze. is situated within particular characters Jacqueline Tavernier-Courbin But such an interpretation is too pat, too in addition to being projected onto the University of Ottawa tidy, too entirely disconnected from the external world, it reveals selves buf- Dan Wichlan feminine critique of masculine power that feted by contesting gender imperatives Jack London Foundation is a central concern of the book’s interior that threaten the equilibrium essential Earl Wilcox chapters. London does trade on the land-is- to healthy male development. Winthrop University woman tradition, but he does so as com- London takes his reader into the James Williams plement to an equally significant process of vexed and fluctuating struggle to Critical Inquiry gendering that casts wild nature as mascu- achieve gender equilibrium primarily Honorary Board Members line. London requires us to adopt Collie’s through White Fang, whose growth point of view—a feminine perspective—to can be understood as an exploration of Vil Bykov assess White Fang’s progress from violent the “anxieties over national identity Moscow University male Other to protective father. The reader and manhood” that Katie O’Donnell Rudy Ciuca judges White Fang at the end of the novel Arosteguy considers “an aspect of Jack London Foundation on the basis of his success at winning ap- London’s work that needs further con- Joseph Lawrence proval in Collie’s eyes, not as she appears sideration” (38). Read as an examina- Jack London Foundation in his. This judgment culminates London’s tion of precisely these anxieties, White Editor effort to chart the development of a mascu- Fang’s passage from birth in the Arctic Kenneth K. Brandt line identity appropriate to a settled and wild to fatherhood in civilized Califor- Savannah College of Art and Design largely nonthreatening female landscape— nia performs as an account of the [email protected] the cultivated fields and growth of families American journey from immersion in Assistant Editor London associates with the sunny South- the wilderness first encountered by Dominic Viti 2 43 THE CALL 3 European explorers and colonists, to the refinement of the self the savage, the frozen-hearted Northland Wild,” we know we properly adjusted to the demands exacted by civilized culture. have entered a masculine landscape (9). This language pre- Over the course of White Fang’s maturation readers witness pares us for the description of men who venture into this do- the challenges to American manhood posed by a mutating main of “mockery and silence” as “puny adventurers bent on cultural landscape that ceases to value the ferocity initially colossal adventure, pitting themselves against the might of a required for survival on the frontier or in the wild. White world as remote and alien and pulseless as the abysses of Fang is London’s acknowledgement that the violent male as- space” (10). This is the Arctic as masculine proving ground in sociated with the earliest phase of American history remains a which the “puny adventurers” assume the diminutive, vulner- core element of American male identity that must be curbed able stature of the feminine. for the good of the nation and the happiness of the individual.