Does one hypothesis below match your thinking about how Jack London portrays Buck in The Call of the Wild? If so, copy it into your notebook. If not, develop your own hypothesis. Use a chart like the one at the bottom to compile evidence from the text to support your ideas.
 

1. Buck’s thought processes are more human than dog-like, but that only makes his adventures
more exciting because readers can relate to what he’s going through.

2. London was “a nature faker.” The book crosses the line between fact and fiction, deceiving the reader for the author’s purposes. The lack of truth makes the book less believable and less suspenseful. Buck’s human reasoning ability gives him an unfair — and unrealistic — advantage .

3. Though London’s dog-heroes “are simply human beings disguised as animals (who) think, feel, plan, suffer as we do . . . in other respects they follow closely the facts of natural history and the reader is not deceived.”

4 . London’s dog stories were “a protest against the ‘humanizing’ of animals, of which . . . several “animal writers” had been profoundly guilty.” London’s “dog - heroes . . . were not directed by abstract reasoning, but by instinct, sensation, and emotion, and by simple reasoning.”

5 . Buck was a “super dog,” but one that could exist. He is like those few special humans who can surmount difficult odds and thrive because of their super-human qualities .
 

If you did not choose a hypothesis above, write your own.
 

Use a chart like this to gather evidence for your theory.
By the end of the book you will need five examples with which to write an essay.

Quote/Example from the text:	Page #

(Credit to edsite.gov for this one.)