controlled by the powers of heredity and environment. As George Becker once defined naturalism as ôpessimistic materialistic determinism,ö (Naturalism 2003).
Such literature often views individuals as no more than one more class of beasts in nature. The characters in such works are often from the lower-classes, their actions dictated by heredity, instinct, and passion. As one critic maintains, ôTheir attempts at exercising free will or choice are hamstrung by forces beyond their control,ö (Naturalism 2003). Philosophical and scientific movements influenced writers like Jack London and Stephen Crane, particularly social Darwinism. If we look at CraneÆs The Open Boat, we see that such a helplessness against the forces of an indifferent nature are clearly expressed with respect to the relationship between human beings and nature, ôWhen it occurs to a man that nature does not regard him as important, and that she feels she would not maim the universe by disposing of him, he at first wishes to throw bricks at the temple, and he hates deeply the fact that there are no bricks and no temples,ö (Crane 2004).
Naturalism was a product of the rapid shift in American society from a primarily rural, agrarian civilization to an urban, industrial one. So, too, it was a product of the shift from traditional religious faith and morality toward skepticism and uncertainty. Writers like Jack London attempted to discover some meaning in light of human beingsÆ existence within such an existential universe. We see this plainly in the themes of naturalist literature that include survival, determinism, violence and nature as an often hostile and indifferent force. In LondonÆs (1990) The Call of the Wild, we see such themes repeated over and over again. At one point Hal is literally and figuratively swallowed by the earth, ôDog and man watched it crawling over the ice. S
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