Talk:The Iron Heel

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I think it's much too strong to say that any of his stories actually take place in "the dystopic universe of The Iron Heel." There is no continuity of characters or institutions that I'm aware of. (If I'm wrong, please mention some titles). Some of them could be fairly said to take place in dystopic futures. (Of course in Jack London's writing the present is fairly dystopic too!). Dpbsmith 17:30, 8 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I have read at least two of his short stories which take place in the ruthless capitalist dominated world of the "Iron Heel" or its aftermath. The most interesting one takes place in a future where all of the planet has relapsed into barbarism as a result of a world wide plague. And the plague took place in a world which seems to be identical to that described in the "Iron Heel". But you are right, there is no continuity of characters and institutions are not named. Also, in "Iron heel" we are told that eventually the workers will revolt and triumph against their opressors. This would be impossible in a universe were workers and capitalists all disappear and only savages remain. There is also a very short short story which takes place mostly as a dialogue between temporarily shipwrecked capitalist opressors of the people and explores the links between truth, beauty, poetry and political activism. I have the titles for none of the two and no easy way (for at least a few months)to get to them so I leave to other better endowed individuals the duty to check this and make corrections as needed, or not. AlainV. January 10th 2004

The first one would be The Scarlet Plague. To my great chagrin, I find that this story is not included in my three-volume set of "The Complete Short Stories of Jack London" and I have long since given away the anthology that did include it, but have adjusted the wording in the article. I can't identify the second story. Certainly does sound like typical Jack London, though! "A Curious Fragment" does take place in 2734 and refers to the "industrial oligarchs." You couldn't say that Jack London constructed a future history a la Heinlein, or a closely interrelated set of stories like Asimov's robot stories.

I wonder if you have any quotations from any sources to support your statement "Serious fans of Science Fiction also consider this novel to be a masterpiece?" I didn't think Jack London was very well known in the SF world. Dpbsmith 12:26, 11 Jan 2004 (UTC)

This should probably use literary present.

I assume from the context that the use of "immanent" was meant to be "imminent" (e.g. impending, soon), rather than "immanent" (e.g. subjective, existing within the mind, etc.). SchrödingersRoot 20:52, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cover

If the book is from 1908, how can the cover say "Viva Allende"? 1ne 16:58, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

That cover is from a much newer (re)printing of the novel. 4.159.113.151 04:44, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

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BetacommandBot (talk) 06:19, 24 January 2008 (UTC)