With my death I am just as much obliterated as the last mosquito you or I smashed.
About This Quote
The line comes from a private letter Jack London wrote on June 25, 1914 to Ralph Kasper. In the letter he explains his materialist view of mind and rejects the idea of an afterlife, using the image of a crushed mosquito to convey total annihilation at death. The passage was later published posthumously by his wife, Charmian London, in a collection of his writings and letters.
Interpretation
London is asserting that personal identity does not survive bodily death. For him, consciousness is an activity of the living organism; when the organism stops, the person ends completely—no soul continuing on—just as a mosquito ceases to exist after being smashed.
Extended Quotation
I believe that when I am dead, I am dead. I believe that with my death I am just as much obliterated as the last mosquito you or I smashed.
Variations
I believe that when I am dead, I am dead. I believe that with my death I am just as much obliterated as the last mosquito you and I smashed.
Misattributions
- Charmian London
Source
Charmian London, The Book of Jack London, Vol. 2 (The Century Company, 1921), ch. 40, letter to Ralph Kasper dated June 25, 1914, p. 363.
