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| The Star Rover (Modern Library Classics) | 
| Author: Jack London
Creator: Lorenzo Carcaterra
Publisher: Modern Library
Category: Book
List Price: $11.95
Buy New: $6.73
You Save: $5.22 (44%)
New (25) from $6.73
Avg. Customer Rating:  23 reviews
Sales Rank: 999220
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 288
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5 x 0.3
ISBN: 0812970047
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.52
EAN: 9780812970043
ASIN: 0812970047
Publication Date: November 11, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Unread Book In Excellent Condition. No Creases On Covers Or Spine. Same Day Shipping !!! P
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Product Description
The Star Rover is the story of San Quentin death-row inmate Darrell Standing, who escapes the horror of prison life—and long stretches in a straitjacket—by withdrawing into vivid dreams of past lives, including incarnations as a French nobleman and an Englishman in medieval Korea. Based on the life and imprisonment of Jack London’s friend Ed Morrell, this is one of the author’s most complex and original works. As Lorenzo Carcaterra argues in his Introduction, The Star Rover is “written with energy and force, brilliantly marching between the netherworlds of brutality and beauty.”
This Modern Library Paperback Classic is set from the text of the first American edition, published in 1915.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 18 more reviews...
 Steers you into a whole other direction August 1, 2008
This one will launch you into a whole other direction of perception of reality. You may find yourself digging to learn more on the phenomena of Remote viewing, astral projection. Check out Robert Monroe's books if you like this one.
DARRELL STANDLING & CONAN May 6, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
First time I read Jack London and thoroughly enjoyed Star Rover. Found the 1914 book in a used book store for only $10 and in good condition being nearly 100 years old. The Star-Rover was mentioned in a Robert E. Howard book The Barbaric Triumph by Don Herron-pg 144-145 via a letter from REH to Preece he mentions a book by Jack London-The Star Rover ultimately became the single most influence on him as a writer. In the 1930 letter to Preece REH says that 'London's The Star Rover is a book that I've read and re-read for years, and that generally goes to my head like wine.' 'In The Star Rover, London builds his dark hero Darrell Standling's list of grievances and enemies into a powerful and mountainess indictment of man's propensity for cruel and hate. At a time when most authors were trapped in the rut of boilerplate Ameri-Christian morality, London reveled in the power gained by embracing his irrational, barbaric nature and the hates that accomplished it. To London, and later to REH, hate was a pure, clean emotion, man's most natural impulse, unfettered by civilized morality.' 'To REH, London's prose was perhaps most notable for its ability to pile outrage upon outrage until hate became exaggerated into a towering, unstoppable force. Twenty years later, REH would perfect such writing until it could be argued that he improved upon the master. The Dark Barbarian and The Barbaric Triumpth by Don Herron and Two-Gun Bob are must reads for ALL new to REH and fans alike. Must reads The Last of the Trunk and Selected Letters of REH by Paul Herman, Blood & Thunder, The Life & Art of REH by Mark Finn, Solomon Kane, Kull, By This Axe I Rule, Beyond The Black River in Best of REH Vol I, Bran Mac Morn, Lord of Samarcand, Cormac Mac Art, Dark Horse comics Conan and Pigeons from Hell, and Savage Sword of Conan a B&W Magazine in the 1970's by Roy Thomas and artist John Buscema, and more. Thank you to Paul Herman, Glen Lord, Mark Finn, Don Herron, Dark Horse comics, and everyone else who has kept REH's legacy alive. I'll definitely be reading more of Jack London.
excellent March 13, 2008
this is the best book illustrating how reincarnation works in our everyday life. i've been recommending this book to people ever since it was re-printed years ago. and the kicker is that it was wrtitten by the great jack london - just before his death. i believe, as i've read that he did also, that it is a true story.
 "The Spirit Is the Reality That Endures": Jack London's Most Ambitious Work February 16, 2008
In 1915, just one year before his untimely death, Jack London's most ambitious work was published. It is "The Star Rover" (aka "The Jacket"), story about Darrell Standing, former university professor who is now a Death Row inmate of San Quentin. Opinions about this unique novel still divide among readers, but his intense descriptions about the people in extreme situations are as riveting as his more famous works like "To Build a Fire."
The story of "The Star Rover" is told in the first person by Darrell Standing. In prison he is subjected to severest tortures including straightjacket by the brutal guards and sadistic officers. In this story set in San Quentin (the prison part based on the accounts of London's friend Ed Morrell), Darrell finds a way to escape from the pains by separating his spirit from his body and living the past lives of other people - a little boy in the westward emigration in America; a shipwrecked English sailor in medieval Korea, and so on.
In a way "The Star Rover" is a collection of short stories put together by the framing story of Darrell Standing. The tense and passionate sentences of Jack London are gripping in most of the story, but it must be said that some parts are redundant and a little boring, London not knowing where to go next. Still, once actions start, the book becomes a page turner. Like many stories by Jack London, the protagonists must experience and endure severe conditions of life and their willpowers are tested in the process.
"The Star Rover" is a book about a man who lives many lives. After all the fact that it is written Jack London is nothing surprising because Jack London really lived many lives. The book is certainly flawed and less famous than his Klondike stories, but its style is definitely that of Jack London.
Any place but here November 6, 2007
I read this wonderful book in high school, more than 40 years ago. Some parts of it are still fresh in my mind... clinging to the rock in the middle of the sea... (illustrated on the cover of the edition I read). The Mountain Meadows massacre, which I had never heard of, and did not believe until I went to the encyclopedia to look it up. The determination of the protagonist not to yield to the abuse of the warden. The transcendence of the soul!
Many of London's stories are testaments to the will to survive or to overcome some desperate situation. I kept hoping that Standing would escape the prison or be pardoned. He did escape, but in a very different way than I was expecting.
I agree with others that this is one of London's greatest works, and it is surprising it is so little known.
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