Jack London's books were burned & banned? I hadn't heard that before.

[Lex]

*sigh* I think I'm going to re-read some of his work now.

The University of Pennsylvania's Online Books Page states that "Jack London's writing was censored in several European dictatorships in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1929, Italy banned all cheap editions of his Call of the Wild, and Yugoslavia banned all his works as being 'too radical.' Some of London's works were also burned by the Nazis."<1> They were banned because Jack London had a reputation as an outspoken socialist.

In 1960, critic Maxwell Geismar called The Call of the Wild "a beautiful prose poem." Editor Franklin Walker said that it "belongs on a shelf with Walden and Huckleberry Finn". E. L. Doctorow called it "a mordant parable... his masterpiece."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Call_of_the_Wild

[Djinn]

1. surprise surprise

wouldn't mind betting 3/4 of US politicians would like to see this piece banished forever (including half of the Dems)

The Scab

After God had finished the rattlesnake, the toad, and the vampire, he had some awful substance left with which he made a scab.

A scab is a two-legged animal with a corkscrew soul, a water brain, a combination backbone of jelly and glue.

Where others have hearts, he carries a tumor of rotten principles.

When a scab comes down the street, men turn their backs and angels weep in heaven, and the devil shuts the gates of hell to keep him out.

No man (or woman) has a right to scab so long as there is a pool of water to drown his carcass in, or a rope long enough to hang his body with.

Judas was a gentleman compared with a scab. For betraying his master, he had character enough to hang himself. A scab has not.

Esau sold his birthright for a mess of pottage.

Judas sold his Savior for thirty pieces of silver.

Benedict Arnold sold his country for a promise of a commision in the british army.

The scab sells his birthright, country, his wife, his children and his fellowmen for an unfulfilled promise from his employer.

Esau was a traitor to himself; Judas was a traitor to his God; Benedict Arnold was a traitor to his country.

A scab is a traitor to his God, his country, his family and his class.

[Union Thug]

2. Great quote! n/t

[bleever]

3. "The Iron Heel" and "The Star Rover" are jewels

that are largely forgotten, but are precursors to many great works.

London believed that everyone, even a poor kid without a father, had an equal share of divinity, and an equal right to personhood, and he claimed his own and did his best to encourage others to do so in his writing.

:patriot:

[bulldogge]

4. He was also

A racist, check out some of his commentary on the boxing matches taking place while he was alive

[qwertyMike]

5. Don't forget

People of the Abyss - about totalitarianism.

The Call of the Wild and his other Northern nature adventures suffered as part of a blanket ban on all his books.