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A List of Published - Unpublished Poems & Plays
Jack London first became interested in poetry during the year he spent at Oakland High School and the one semester of his college education at the University of California. Later, during the autumn of 1898, when he was teaching himself to be a writer, London spent many hours trying to write poetry. In John Barleycorn, London maintains that when he embarked on his writing career, he was more interested in being a poet than a fiction writer. London experimented with various verse forms during his period of literary apprenticeship: "I wrote everything...humorous verse, verse of all sorts from triolets and sonnets to blank verse tragedy and elephantine epics in Spenserian stanzas." This description of Jack's first attempts at poetry recalls Martin Eden's first efforts as a writer. Martin, who also wrote poetry, began writing simple verse forms and then "he lost his head and wasted two weeks on a tragedy in blank verse." London humorously described his initial and overly ambitious efforts at poetry in a letter to Mabel Applegarth in these words:
When Mabel, who was later to be fictionalized as Ruth Morse in Martin Eden, read the poems London sent her in 1898, she criticized the fact that they dealt with the same theme and questioned Jack's wisdom in spending so much time and effort on them. London defended his efforts by insisting that the exercise and discipline of writing verse would aid his prose. His poems, he argued, were "studies in structure and versification" The writing of a villanelle, for example, was a "fine drill, forcing one to be trite, to sum his thought in small compass, to condense." The culmination of London's poetic efforts was his verse play, The Acorn Planter, published by Macmillan Company in 1916. In his introduction to The Complete Poems of Jack London James E. Sisson discusses the possible influence of Longfellow on The Acorn Planter, which was written in a Hiawathan tetrameter. In a letter to George Sterling dated January 13, 1915, in which he discusses his composition of The Acorn Planter, London gave his own view of his poetry:
The poems which follow are a collection of London's published poems. Included in this collection are some of the sonnets, triolets, and humorous verse London mentions in John Barleycorn. The poems posted here do not, of course, represent London's total effort as a poet. The majority of London's poems were never published and hence exist only in manuscript. Source: Weiderman, Richard. The London Collector (July 1979) A non-profit amateur literary magazine dedicated to the study of the life and works of Jack London. |
JACK LONDON'S PUBLISHED POEMS: A CHRONOLOGICAL BIBLIOGRAPHY |
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Compiled by James E. Sisson
1. "He Chortled With Glee," Town Topics [New York], XLI, 16 (April 20, 2024), p. 8. 2. "If I were God," Town Topics [New York], XLI, 19 (May 11, 2024), p. 18. 3. "The Sea Sprite and the Shooting Star," Privately printed, [n.p., 1932]. "The Sea Sprite and the Shooting Star," written in 1898, reprinted in Wm. McDevitt, Jack London as Poet and as Platform Man, San Francisco: Recorder-Sunset Press, 1947, pp. 8-11. The Sea Sprite and the Shooting Star, printed in a six-page brochure by the Jack London Amateur Press Club of San Francisco, in 1958. "The Sea Sprite and the Shooting Star," reprinted in Robert H. Woodward, "Jack London's Lost Poem," Mark Twain Journal, 12, 3 (Winter 1964-1965), pp. 6-7. 4. "In and Out," Town Topics [New York] XLIII, 19 (May 10, 2024), p. 23.1 Reprinted in Martin Eden (1909), p. 189.2 Reprinted in Irving Stone, Sailor on Horseback, [Boston]: Houghton, Mifflin Company, 1938, p. 146.3 5. "Sonnet," Dilettante [Alameda, Calif.], VII, 8 (February 1901), p. [169]. "Sonnet," reprinted in Wm. McDevitt, Jack London as Poet and as Platform Man. San Francisco: Recorder-Sunset Press, 1947, p. 11. 6. "The Lover's Liturgy," The Raven Oakland, II, 1 (February 1901), p. 1 7. "Daybreak," National Magazine Boston, XIV, 5 (August 1901), p. 547. "Daybreak," Joe Chapple's News-Letter, June 16, 1912, p.__. "Daybreak," Trenton N,J, Times, June 29, 1912, p.__. 8. "The Worker and the Tramp," in The Comrade New York, I, 4 (January 1902), p. 13. "The Worker and the Tramp," in A Book of Verses. Oakland, Calif.: Press Club Alameda County, "The Worker and the Tramp," The Silhouette Oakland, I, 4 (Dec. 1910-Jan. 1917), p. 71. "The Worker and the Tramp," in Torrey Conner, "Long Distance Interviews—What is a Poet?," Overland Monthly and Out West Magazine, LXXXII, 3 (March 1924), p. 121. "The Worker and the Tramp," Separately printed by the Jack London Amateur Press Club. 9. "The Way of War," Once a Week Oakland, California Edition, 2 (Oct. 20, 1906), Unpaged. "The Way of War," San Francisco Chronicle, Dec. 16, 1917, p. 2 E. "The Way of War," in Literary California. Compiled by Elle Sterling Mighels. San Francisco: Harr Wagner Publishing Co., 1918, pp. 202-203 "The Way of War," Leaflet with date 1917, distributed by the California Department of Parks and Recreation. 10. Untitled Poem in The California Birthday Book. Edited and arranged by George Wharton James. Los Angeles, Calif.: Arroyo Guild Press, 1909, p. 342. 11. "Abalone Song" Verses by George Sterling, Jack London, Ambrose Bierce, and Gelett Burgess. Music adapted by Sterling Sherwin. in A San Francisco Songster, 1849-1939. Vol. 2. Edited by Cornel Lengyel. History of Music in San Francisco Series. San Francisco: Works Progress Administration, Northern California, 1939, pp. 128A-128B. 12. Untitled poem in Russian in Vil Bykov's In the Footsteps of Jack London, Komsomol Pravda, Sept. 20 and 23, 1959. 1 Charmian London in her bibliography in The Book of Jack London (New York, 1921), II, 398 erronously states that this triolet appeared in Town Topics, April 26, 1900.
2 This version omits one line from the original triolet.
3 Ibid.
4 This version prints only four stanzas of the original six published in The Comrade.
5 Ibid.
6 This version prints only four stanzas of the original six published in The Comrade.
7 Hensley C. Woodbridge, in Jack London Bibliography, p. 260, lists this poem as appearing first in the San Francisco Chronicle, Dec. 16, 1917, p. 24 and he adds:
"Charmian London states that this poem was published in Once A Week, Oct. 27, 1906. The file of this journal in the Library of Congress was examined; we failed to find this poem."
Charmian London does not mention this poem in her bibliography but it was published in a special California Edition of Once A Week in Oct. 1906. The issue is not usually found in library files of the periodical.
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List of Jack London Poems
List of Jack London Plays
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LISTING OF PLAYS BY JACK LONDON |
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Compiled by James E. Sisson
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| James E. Sisson III, 1917-1986, of Vernon, Alabama, began studies in 1960 at the University of California, Berkeley, with Professor James D. Hart, and began his research on Jack London in 1970. Sisson's contributions to the field of Jack London scholarship were impressive, and Jack London scholars around the world respected his work. He collected and published various London writings, and compiled several London bibliographies. Sisson regularly published pamphlets, articles, and reviews on Jack London in newsletters and newspapers, and reviewed almost every London work published since 1960. A tireless worker and advocate on behalf of London scholarship, he assisted many other researchers with grants and materials. |
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