THE
KEMPTON-WACE
LETTERS

Jack London and Anna Strunsky were regular participants in the activities of the Bay Area socialists. They were very good friends, and at first did not think of each other romantically. Theirs was an affair of two highly intellectual minds with similar ideas and dreams. Anna Strunsky was a powerful influence in the life of Jack London. Except for a short period in 1902 when Jack fell in love with her, they were only close friends. Anna was never in love with Jack, but always had the deepest respect for him.

By late 1900 their letters about the nature of love evolved into their collaboration on The Kempton-Wace Letters. Jack, as Herbert Wace, would discuss love from the biological point of view; and Anna, as Dane Kempton, would take the idealistic emotional viewpoint. The Kempton-Wace Letters were published in 1903, and they constitute one of the most interesting and curious books in the whole literature of love. The book was brilliant, superbly youthful and audacious for its time, and it still reads well today.