The Road

The Road is Jack London’s collection of stories from his life as a hobo. In this entertaining collection of tales and autobiographical essays, London relates every aspect of the hobo’s life — from catching a train to cadging a meal. The wealth of experiences and the necessity of having to lie for a living brought depth London’s subsequent stories. In “The Road,” Jack London relates the tricks that hobos used to evade train crews, and reminisces about his travels with Kelly’s Army. Jack London later credited his story-telling skill to the hobo’s necessity of concocting tales to coax meals from sympathetic strangers.