Jack London is better known as the successful and popular author of adventure stories such as White Fang, and The Call of the Wild than as an alcoholic pessimist who finally took a fatal overdose of morphine in 1916. John Barleycorn, published in 1913, subtitled "Alcoholic Memoirs," eventually shattered the image of the ruggedly good-looking, energetic and intrepid hero who had been everywhere and seen everything. With his style at its most personal as he explores his own mental states, London achieves a painful kind of autobiography that cuts through the thin skin of his self-esteem.