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To Build A Fire Compare And Contrast

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Compare and Contrast

The stories, "To Build a Fire," and "Powder" aren't written by the same author, yet they are more alike than you'd think. "To Build a Fire" is about a man and his dog trotting through the harsh winter weather and a few struggles they had on their way. On the other hand, "Powder" is about a boy and his father trying to make it back in time for dinner so the father could be trusted to have the boy's company.

In both "Powder" and "To Build a Fire," the snowy weather is an obstacle. In "Powder" the boy and his father attempt to head back home from their skiing trip, but the road gets blocked due to a large amount of snow covering the roadway. As if it weren't bad enough, the father already had to beg the mother to let them go. He even promised to get the boy home before Christmas Eve, but the trooper told them, "It might get cleared, it might not." This caused the father to panic and ignore the trooper's notice by driving off when he had driven away. This is similar to the problem in "To Build a Fire" where a man and his canine companion are trudging through the snow to reach a campsite with his male friends. This was especially difficult since it was 75 below zero which told us that there were 107 degrees of frost. (Jack London) …show more content…

For example, there would be a difference in temperature since I doubt the father would take the boy out in weather anywhere near -75 degrees Fahrenheit. Plus in "Powder" the boy and his father are in the protection of their car whereas in "To Build a Fire," they are physically walking through the snow nearly frozen to death. Their situation in "To Build a Fire" is quite serious due to the fact that it is life or death. Unlike Jack London's excerpt, Tobias Wolff's is not as drastic since the story is regarding the trust between two

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Throughout Zac Unger’s memoir Working Fire the Making of a Fireman he struggles to find a place within the fire station and among coworkers. Unlike many of the fellow recruits who spent years preparing to become a firefighter, Unger an Ivy League grad simply responded to a bus stop ad. After realizing that most recruits were either former military, tradesmen or other firefighter’s kids Unger “Mostly I just stayed quite, tried to down play my existence. I figured if I could just make it through the academy without being called out as a fraud, I’d end up a firefighter like the rest of them”(Unger, 22-23). This distinction between Unger and the rest of the recruits was seen as something to be ashamed of, something to hide away.

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494 Words | 2 Pages

The words “powdery” and “white blanket” are words that are not very common to find in sentences like this. These words are the words that create the mood. When me as the reader reads this sentence I can imagine the snow as a soft white blanket, but still being cold unlike what a blanket is supposed to be.

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1142 Words | 5 Pages

For example, both of these texts share the setting of a cold climate. Plus, the men in both stories have an amazing sense of direction and know where they are going without being able to see tracks from those who have come before them. Also, the boy and dog aid the men on their quests. In Powder the father treats the boy as something to protect, but in To Build a Fire the man uses the dog as an "experiment" just to make sure that he himself didn't get cold feet. Furthermore, in Powder the man and boy aid each other and their relationship grows, whereas in To Build a Fire the relationship starts out fine then as the story progresses the man uses the dog instead of caring for him.

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686 Words | 3 Pages

For one, "Powder," written by Tobias Wolff, is a story about a son and his father, while "To Build a Fire," written by Jack London, is about a dog and his owner. Another difference is where the characters are in each story. Although both stories are about escaping a winter storm, they both do it in different ways. The father and son in "Powder" avoid the snow in a car, while in "To Build a Fire," the dog and his owner escape the snow by hiking outside. "The road was closed.

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412 Words | 2 Pages

At the end of the story though the main characters instincts are not strong enough and that is what ends up killing him. In reality he is unaware of the many things waiting ahead for him in that freezing forest. An elder man tried to tell him that it is dangerous to go alone

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427 Words | 2 Pages

Compare and Contrast "Powder" v.s. "To Build a Fire" "Powder" and "To Build a Fire" are stories that both put another being at risk because of selfishness. Each story involves extreme cold, snow, and danger. Each story also has a person in charge who puts another in an unsafe situation. The son in "Powder" and the wolf dog in "To Build a Fire" both know the men with them are not making good decisions.

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837 Words | 4 Pages

Both of the texts begin in a cold and snow covered environment. In "To Build a Fire", the characters' main goal is to survive the harsh climate on foot and meet up with others at six o'clock. Similar to London's passage, the main character in "Powder" needs to be home in time for dinner on Christmas Eve. The characters in both stories were trying to meet a time deadline, despite their troublesome obstacles along the way. Both authors portrayed their story through a setting that consisted of severe weather and cold temperatures.

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441 Words | 2 Pages

In “The Veldt”, the children believe they can do and have anything. This has caused them to act stubborn and foolish when it came to making decisions. In “Barn Burning”, the family is in poverty and the children are not being treated fairly. Both of these stories seem to unveil in a similar way despite their different backgrounds. The children in “The Veldt” are spoiled and rarely disciplined.

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894 Words | 4 Pages

Although both of these stories have many literary elements in the story, the three that are the most important are setting, irony, characterization.

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674 Words | 3 Pages

Argumentative Essay In “To Build a Fire,” the story of an unnamed man traveling along the Yukon Trail with a dog is told. Throughout the story, the man’s death is foreshadowed. The husky that he is traveling with has a natural instinct and understands, seemingly more than the man, that traveling the Yukon Trail in the freezing cold temperatures is extremely dangerous. The man soon learns how cold it is when he spits.

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438 Words | 2 Pages

Foster explains that almost all readers know that warmer months, most of the time, symbolize rebirth and happiness, while colder represent decay and sadness. This is true of the time frame of The Road, they are in an eternal winter because the disaster released so much ash that no sunlight could reach the earth’s surface. This makes their journey even harder because not they not only have to overcome fear and starvation, but also the cold. Towards the end of their journey, the monotony of their days and the coldness is emphasized to show that the man was getting sicker and closer towards death. McCarthy might have chosen a cold earth to make their trials seem more worse because the man and boy had to look for both food and supplies to keep them safe and warm.

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85 Words | 1 Pages

The formation and ideals of conservatives and liberals are extremely different, yet these two ideologies make up the basic foundation of the political thought in America. Both of these ideologies are working toward a similar goal; to run America the best way possible; but have opposite ways of achieving this goal. Conservatives and liberals differ their views in aspects of how they think government should be run. Both ideologies and their concepts are essential to in provoking the political thought of citizens in the nation.

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434 Words | 2 Pages

There is a debate about using prescribed fires. Prescribed fires are fires that help reduce the catastrophic damage that wildfire creates. prescribed fires work most of the time, but they can be faulty at some points. That's why some people don't agree with using prescribed fires. Even though they sometimes don't work, they can be really helpful when they do work.

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1138 Words | 5 Pages

Powder by Tobias Wolff Tobias Wolff’s, “Powder,” is about a father that attempts to win back his family by taking his son Tobias on a ski trip. The audience can relate to this if they have ever had any family issues, which many would likely have. In the story, the father risks driving his family through the snow and ice to go skiing with them. This is symbolic to represent the dedication he feels towards his family and how he desperately wants to keep them in-tact.

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884 Words | 4 Pages

To Build A Fire is a short tragic tale by Jack London that narrates about a man’s last days on the earth. The story’s protagonist is passing through the sub-freezing land of the Yukon when he becomes the victims of an unforgiving and harsh force of nature. Before embarking on the journey, the man is warned against walking alone on such severe weather conditions and even if his instincts also warn him, he decides to ignore all the signs and his conscience and to follow his ego. He makes several attempts to light a fire but does not make it. It is after several attempts that the man finally gives in to the forces of nature and awaits his now evident death.

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