Tormented by his own convictions, Larsen is an enigma both fascinating and repellent to his reluctant crewman, Humphrey Van Weyden. Throughout their long and perilous voyage together, the captain's ruthless belief in the survival of the fittest is pitted against Van Weyden's "civilization" -- a contest between two opposing views of life that demonstrates Jack London's gift for expressing complex ideas with exciting action. The Sea-Wolf is a superb example of the genius of a writer who was, in the words of Maxwell Geismar, "the poet of the savage Darwinian struggle.""