God's Dog: Why the wolf matters.

"Wabam wabisca ip pit tah." ("Look! The white fangs!")

Jack London, White Fang

Jack London was one of the greatest wildlife fiction writers to explore the secret world of the wolf. His masterpiece, White Fang, is a meditation on both savagery and beauty, cruelty and love, extermination and survival. London abstains from anthropomorphisms as far as possible, attempting to portray the wolf not as human, but as a unique and individual species with motivations, struggles, triumphs and heartaches all its own. I have heard many times and from various sources that the wolf is "God's dog." I think that that is a fitting title considering that, aside from God Himself, the wolf is one of the most controversial figures in human history. Like London, I hope to promote an image of the wolf that is closer to reality than we are used to in legend, fairy tale, and modern misconception. The question remains, however, why wolves? Why do wolves matter when there is economic crisis, terrorism, racism, child abuse, natural disasters and world hunger? If all these calamities were to end, if peace and prosperity were to be achieved, what kind of world will we have left if ecosystems have collapsed, and global warming and trophy hunting has resulted in extinction of entire species? More than any other animal, the wolf represents the destructive force man has unleashed upon those creatures that he does not understand. The American West, Canada, and Alaska are the last strongholds left for the embattled wolf, the symbol of wildness. Henry David Thoreau said it most eloquently, "The West of which I speak is but another name for the Wild, and what I have been preparing to say is, that IN WILDNESS IS THE PRESERVATION OF THE WORLD. Every tree sends its fibers forth in search of the Wild. The cities import it at any price. Men plow and sail for it. From the forest and wilderness come the tonics and barks which brace mankind. . . . "