When The Call of the Wild was published in 1903, it was a resounding critical and popular success. Reviewers applauded this exciting adventure tale and viewed it as a welcome alternative to the popular fiction of the day. J. Stewart Doubleday, reviewing the novel in The Reader, praised London's "suggestion of the eternal principles that underlie [life]," admitting that "it is cruel reading - often relentless reading; ... But we forgive the writer at last because his is true! He is not sentimental, tricky; he is at harmony with himself and nature."

The Atlantic Monthly found "something magnificent in the spectacle of [Buck's] gradual detachment from the tame, beaten-in virtues of uncounted forefathers, ... and his final triumph over the most dreaded powers of the wilderness." Overall, the reviewer praised it as "not a pretty story at all, but a very powerful one."

London's reputation also extended overseas, where...