reading report the law of life

Name: 陈仲权Student Number: 11320034College: College of ChemistryA Reading Report of The Law of LifeThesis: The Law of Life portrays human’s brutal struggle for survival and confirms Darwinism--- selecting the superior and eliminating the inferior, which demonstrate human’s intrinsic character to compete to the best.We are really impressed by the naturalism and convinced of it, because of the fact that the writing techniques of personification and psychological description are extensively utilized and reinforce the depth of the novel, making it profound and transcending its own time.Psychological description: the mental activities of Koskoosh are so thought-provoking that they push forward how the story is organized. The handful of faggots was the measure of his life. Once he placed a stick carefully upon the fire and resumed is meditation, his mental activities emerged. It was not surprising because he was totally aware that he was going to died, and he had to cherish his remaining hours.Personification : Koskoosh knew that the amount of the sticks is the length of his life. And he was dying. “One by one they would go to feed the fire, and just so, step by step, death would creep upon him. When the last stick had surrendered up its heat, the frost would begin to gather strength. First his feet would yield, then his hands; and the numbness would travel, slowly, from the extremities to the body.” The use of the verbs “creep upon, surrendered, gather strength, travel,” etc. shows how the nature is destroying vulnerable individuals.In The Law of Life, the nature is acting like a real human. “Nature was not kindly to the flesh. She had no concern for that concrete thing called the individual. Her interest lay in the species, the race.”It seems that we are being dominated by someone with superpower. Without doubt, we can understand why London’s defined naturalism has been applied later by many scholars to some of his fiction.On the other side of the story, all objects and events that appear in Koskoosh’s mental activities reveal the idea---survival for the fittest.The most convictive example is a maiden. At first a maiden was good to look upon and strong. But she had task to take. She had to cook and toil for the hunter and become the mother of children. And with the coming of her offspring her looks left her. Her limbs dragged and shuffled, her eyes dimmed and bleared, and only the little children found joy against the withered cheek of the old aquaw by the fire. Her task was done. On the first pinch of famine of the long trail, she would be left.Another example is the sick child, little Koo-tee. He is fretful, and not overstrung. He can’t follow the trail, so he will die soon. “Well, it did not matter. A few years at best, and as many an empty belly as a full one. And in the end, death waited, ever-hungry and hungriest of them all.” This is the law of life. The rise of the sap, thebursting greenness of the willow bud, the fall of the yellow leaf--- in this alone was told the whole history.They reflect that the life is a circulation, but different creatures are on the loop. Every individual is just an episode, and they will past away like clouds from a summer sky. The nature doesn’t care. To life she set one task, gave one law. To perpetuate is the task of life, its law is death.Now I am going to go deep into the Koskoosh’s mental activities.It was Koskoosh’s being abandoned and awareness of the approaching of death that stimulate a list of mental activities. As modernists, from our point of view, survival pressure can spur individuals to think more and do more, arousing one’s potential to be the best. It is corresponding with the saying that “pressure would become motility.”Firstly, Koskoosh’s being abandoned impulses him to think of his abandoned father, which is an immoral behavior. In this phenomenon, we know that survival pressure can impulse us to perceive our mistake, giving us self-understanding.Secondly, Koskoosh remembered a great famine that lasted for seven years, when the salmon run had been failing, the caribou were not coming, the rabbits didn’t replenish, and he lost his mother. The severe consequence is that not one in ten of the tribe lived to meet the sun when came back in the spring. Human is just vulnerable under the overwhelming domination of nature.Koskoosh also recollected the times of plenty. Though with meat spoiled on their hands and the dogs fat with overeating, he saw experienced the revived ancient quarrels, and crossed the divides to the south to kill the Pellys, and to the west that they might sit by the dead fires of the Tananas. Both in the time of famine and in the time of the time of plenty, death was the law of the life. To Koskoosh, it was very clear now.Finally, Koskoosh recalled the scene of the old moose’s being killed by the wolves. This picture was so strong to him that when he was a leader of men and head of the councilors, he had done great deeds and killed the white man, knife to knife, in open fight. Death was on the verge, with the wolves closer and closer. Koskoosh again thought of the picture. He now understood that the law of life was playing on him. He himself thought that he should not cling to life, so he dropped the blazing stick into the snow and dropped his head wearily upon his knees.Comment of the story: there are examples of “the law of life” in our real life. For instance, During the Wen Chuang earthquake, thousands of victims were buried under the relics. On the verge of death, if someone were clever or strong enough, they would have a way out to survive, and be rescued.In the Olympic Games, in my perspective, “the law of life”plays an essential role in the competition system, in which every team, every individual competes with each other. Obviously, the strongest win the glory, and the weak are forgotten.The law of life is a revelation of one’s life—death, which goes against our will of being eternal. It stimulates everyone to endeavor to have a valuable life.。