Review of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle - Essay Example

Review of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle (Bantam Books. New York, October 1981). Randall Salmon History 102 Scott Emery The Jungle by Upton Sinclair was published in 1906 and continues to impact it's readers views about capitalism and it's victims. Sinclair expresses his fury toward turn of the century America by clearly demonstrating the inequality between the "haves" and "have nots". Sinclair explores, in detail, the disgust and corrupt conditions of urban immigrant families of the early 1900s.

The plot centers on an immigrant family that has come from Lithuania to make a better life in America. Jurgis Rudkus, the head of the family, realizes pretty quickly that America is not the land of opportunity. Multiple jobs, and long hours "And, for this, at the end of the week, he will carry home three dollars to his family, being his pay at the rate of five cents per hour-just about his proper share of the million and three quarters of children who are now engaged in earning their livings in the United States." (85). His wife and children are forced to find jobs of their own.

They continue to barely survive. These initial American experiences take their toll on the Rudkus family, and they lose the hope they brought with them from Lithuania. Jurgis and his family learn that hard way that justice dos not exist in a capitalist society where only corruption is rewarded. The trials of the Rudkus family continue. Jurgis is injured at his work and is forced to spend two months healing. When he returns to work he has been replaced and finds work at a glue factory. Bills continues to pile up, his wife is expecting another child, and he to drinks.

The family continues to spiral into poverty as Jurgis learns that his wife was forced to sleep with her boss. This symbolizes and demonstrates Sinclair sole message with in the novel - corrupt and merciless capitalists are screwing over immigrant families. Jurgis seeks his revenge an confronts the man who raped his wife. He thinks "this man's whole presence reeked of the crime he had committed; the touch of his body was madness to him-it set every nerve of him a-tremble, it aroused all the demon in his soul" (181).

Jurgis is arrested for assault against his wife's boss. When is released from jail he comes home to find his family unemployed and homeless. Sinclair continues his vivid description of the degradation of a family. Jurgis' wife and baby die during childbirth, his son drowns, and he decides to become a drifter leaving the rest of his children behind. He is again arrested for assault and but skips out on the bail. While wandering the streets as a beggar he happens upon a socialistic meeting that he mistakes for a shelter.

It is only after socialism enters Jurgis' life that his luck changes. He is united with his oldest daughter who works a prostitute to support the rest of the children. Jurgis finds work in socialist hotel and becomes an avid socialist. For Sinclair redemption comes in the form of socialism. Sinclair approach, in The Jungle, is descriptive and social in nature. He manipulates the reader with images of horror and desperation to show how evil capitalism is. In doing so he condemns capitalism while elevating socialism to religion status.

Sinclair is obviously bias and makes no attempt to balance his beliefs with anyone else's. He offers no voice which sides with capitalism. While the text of the novel is purely fiction it does describe in accurate detail the living and working conditions during the 1900s not just of immigrant families but the whole working class. The novel evokes the initial response of disgust however through Sinclair systematic repetitions of meat factory conditions and the unbelievable experiences of the Jurgis family, boredom does set in.

Beyond that the reader, about mid way through the novel, realizes that Sinclair is attempting to manipulate emotions through the depiction of intense personal loss. The reader expects the novel to end badly certainly only death could save Jurgis from anymore heart break. The novel would have novel's point and impact would have been the same without the preachy socialist ending. Sinclair believed that a socialist society was better then a capitalist society and he does a good job of proving his point with fictional characters.

Excluding the the socialist daydream of the last four chapters, The Jungle, offers a detailed commentary on how workers were treated in the 1900s. During this time the meat packing was a mass production operation. The staff was composed completely of unskilled immigrants who were worked to the bone. "Here is a population, low-class and mostly foreign, hanging always on the verge of starvation and dependent for its opportunities of life upon the whim of men every bit as brutal and unscrupulous as the old-time slave drivers; under such circumstances, immorality is exactly as inevitable, and as prevalent, as it is under the system of chattel slavery" (126).

Sinclair offer vivid examples of men losing their fingers, arms and even their lives. These companies employed children as slave labor. They bleached rotten meat for resale and "the meat will be shoveled into carts and the man who did the shoveling will not trouble to lift out a rat even when he saw one"(162) . This novel complimented th study of unions and worker compensation of the 1900s in this course. The novel's socialist stance no doubt contributed to the rise and widespread acceptance of unions - the depiction of what can only be considered an 'American Nightmare' provided many with a clear understanding of what would continue to occur if organized resistance and collective bargaining would not be allowed to push for shorter workdays, safer workplaces, and a minimum wage.

I would recommend this book to others. Too often in history we learn dates, names, and facts without the true emotional background to make what we learn meaningful. I think Sinclair, even in his misguided attempts to encourage the spread of socialism, offers a unique emotional history of the life and times immigrants in 1900s America.