Meaning of "Dying" and "Death" in "To Build a Fire" The meaning of the words "dying and death" in Jack London's 1910 novel, "To Build a Fire” continually expresses the man’s dwindling heat and misfortune on his journey along the Yukon Trail to meet “the boys” at camp. London associates death with man's diminished ability to stay warm in Alaska's freezing climate. The main character's predicament slowly worsens one level at a time, eventually resulting in death. The narrator informs the reader that "the man" has no personal experience traveling in Yukon terrain. The veteran warned the man of the harsh realities of the Klondike. The confident main character considers the Sulfur Creek veteran “feminine.” Along the trail, "the man" falls into a hidden spring and attempts to make a fire to dry his socks and keep warm. With wet feet quickly going numb, he realizes he has only one option: successfully build a fire or face the harsh reality of the Yukon at one hundred and nine degrees below zero. Snow falling from a tree extinguishes the fire, and the character realizes that he "has just heard his own death sentence." Jack London introduces death to the reader in this scene. The man realizes that "a second fire must be lit without fail." The man's mind begins to run wild with thoughts of insecurity and death when the second fire fails. He recalls the story of a man who kills a steer to stay warm and imagines killing his dog and crawling into the carcass for warmth so he can make a fire to save himself. London writes: "a certain fear of death, dull and oppressive, came to him." As the man slowly freezes, he realizes that he is in serious trouble and can no longer make excuses for himself. Recognizing that he would "never make it to camp and would soon be dead and stiff", he tries to push this morbid thought from his mind by running down the path in a last ditch effort to pump blood through his extremities. The story's climax describes "the man" imagining "his body completely frozen on the trail." He falls into the snow thinking, "he's bound to freeze anyway and the frostbite wasn't as bad as people thought. There were much worse ways to die." The man fell asleep "in the most comfortable way and...