Stephanie Smogoleski
CP English IV 4 B
4/8/2014
Poop
The world consists of economic competition which throws people for a whirlwind. Many however do thrive, yet there are still some with scratched knee’s left to dig through the dumpster. Throughout the modern history of society, it has been a constant struggle for practically everyone. A world popular example of this struggle is Upton Sinclair’s 1906 novel, The Jungle. The groundbreaking book takes readers along on a journey into a new world for a family of recent Lithuanian immigrants. The family trekked to America, which in the early twentieth century was said to be the land where any man willing to work hard during the day would make a fair amount of living and could support his family. It happens to be an ideal that every American should be familiar with at least one of the foundations that got the American society to where it is at today. Yet, while telling his story, Upton Sinclair put the reader in a metaphorical war against Capitalism. Sinclair’s disdain against capitalist society is present from cover to cover, shown through the enthusiasm of Jurgis to work, the struggle for workers of Packingtown, and the corruption that was put on “the man” at all levels of society.
Both Capitalism and Socialism are highly relevant to The Jungle. Laissaz-faire Capitalism is the prime economic system in America. All around, it means that consumers and producers have the right to make their money and spend it through whatever legal means that they choose. Capitalism is the system that is most fitting to what people know as the “American Dream”. Some may believe that Capitalism is the cause for a large amount of the poverty that Americans face, but any capitalist would explain that inher...
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...cial Darwinism. Darwin created the idea of natural selection, proposing that those best suited to live well in their environments and those who die off. A relation to this idea is the corruption of Packingtown. This starts off from when the family is scammed by the real estate company and when Jurgis is conned into an election scam, eventually leading to him joining it himself. These instances show that the only way to survive in Packingtown is to cheat those around you. Instead of the popular “kill or be killed” term, The Jungle transformed it into something along the terms of “making a living off of others or screw yourself”. Sinclair brings these ideals into his novel to connect yet another evil of capitalism. It suggests that if everyone was equal, there wouldn’t be a need to scam others to make money, but because of the hardships it is the only way to thrive.
Upon his 1906 publishing of The Jungle, Sinclair was coined as an avid “muckraker” when President Roosevelt addressed an audience in April of that year. When asked whether or not the novel provided a realistic account of workers conditions within the Chicago meat packing industry, Roosevelt accused Sinclair of being a liar in an attempt to discredit him. A large part of this was credited to Roosevelt’s personal distaste for Sinclair’s apparent link to the Socialist party but, Roosevelt was also unaware that Sinclair had worked undercover at the plant to gather first hand and accurate accounts. The Jungle shined light on the poor working conditions of workers in a meat packing facility. Throughout the novel, Sinclair gave gruesome examples of what workers went through each and every day. Each department of the facility was faced with its own risks and challenges, “There were the wool pluckers, whose hands went to pieces even sooner than the hands of the pickle men; for the pelts of the sheep had to be painted with acid to loosen the wool, and then the pluckers had to pull out this wool with
Upton Sinclair, the author of The Jungle, wrote this novel to unveil the atrocious working conditions and the contaminated meat in meat-packing workhouses. It was pathos that enabled his book to horrify hundreds of people and to encourage them to take a stand against these meat-packing companies. To obtain the awareness of people, he incorporated a descriptive style to his writing. Ample amounts of imagery, including active verbs, abstract and tangible nouns, and precise adjectives compelled readers to be appalled. Durham, the leading Chicago meat packer, was illustrated, “having piles of meat... handfuls of dried dung of rats...rivers of hot blood, and carloads of moist flesh, and soap caldrons, craters of hell.” ( Sinclair 139). His description
In Upton Sinclair's 1906 novel, “The Jungle,” he exposes corruption in business and government and its disastrous effects on a family from Lithuania. The novel follows immigrant Jurgis Rudkus as he struggles against the slow ANNIHILATION of his family and is REBORN after discovering that socialism as a cure away to all capitalism’s problems. The Jungle is an example of protest literature because it exposes in a muckraking style the DANGEROUS, INHUMAINE conditions that workers lived and worked in, corruption in business and politics and the unsanitary meat that was sold.
To understand the ways in which political systems are important to this novel, it is necessary to define both capitalism and socialism as they are relevant to The Jungle. Capitalism, and more specifically, laissez-faire capitalism, is the economic system in America. It basically means that producers and consumers have the right to accumulate and spend their money through any legal means they choose. It is the economic system most fitting with the idea of the American Dream. The American Dream portr...
Discuss how Upton Sinclair portrays the economic tensions and historical processes at hand in the late 19th and early 20th centuries
“In twentieth-century America the history of poverty begins with most working people living on the edge of destitution, periodically short of food, fuel, clothing, and shelter” (Poverty in 20th Century America). Poverty possesses the ability to completely degrade a person, as well as a family, but it can also make that person and family stronger. In The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair, a family of immigrants has to live in severe poverty in Packingtown, a suburb of Chicago. The poverty degrades the family numerous times, and even brings them close to death. Originally the family has each other to fall back on, but eventually members of the family must face numerous struggles on their own, including “hoboing it” and becoming a prostitute. The Jungle, a naturalistic novel by Upton Sinclair, reveals the detrimental effects that a life of poverty exerts on the familial relationships of immigrants in Chicago during the early 1900’s.
Sinclair, has shown in a dramatic style the hardships and obstacles which Jurgis and fellow workers had to endure. He made the workers sound so helpless and the conditions so gruesome, that the reader almost wants a way out for Jurgis. Sinclair's The Jungle is a "subliminal" form of propaganda for
Capitalism and socialism both have advantages and pitfalls; when capitalism is adopted using certain socialist ideals, a truly prosperous society exists. A major theme of The Jungle is socialism as a remedy for the evils of capitalism. Every
The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair, emphasizes the importance in changing to become a thriving society through socialism. Sinclair writes his novel to show the corruption that occurs as a result of capitalism. Jurgis’ family is in search for a better life in America where he believes he will make enough pay to support his family. The novel shows that poverty is in control over the working class, but the working class still has a desperation for money. In The Jungle, Upton Sinclair pushes for Socialism by showing Jurgis’ struggle to find work, the hardships of the packingtown workers, and the inequality of all men in this capitalistic society.
Employment is hard to find and hard to keep and a job isn’t always what one hoped for. Sometimes jobs do not sufficiently support our lifestyles, and all too frequently we’re convinced that our boss’s real job is to make us miserable. However, every now and then there are reprieves such as company holiday parties or bonuses, raises, promotions and even a half hour or hour to eat lunch that allows escape from monotonous workloads. Aside from our complaints, employment today for majority of American’s isn’t totally dreadful, and there always lies opportunity for promotion. American’s did not always experience this reality in their work places though, and not long past are days of abysmal and disgusting work conditions. In 1906 Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” was published. His novel drastically transformed the way Americans felt about the unmitigated power corporations wielded in the ‘free’ market economy that was heavily propagandized at the turn of the century. Corporations do not have the same unscrupulous practices today because of actions taken by former President Theodore Roosevelt who felt deeply impacted by Sinclair’s famous novel. Back in early 1900’s in the meatpacking plants of Chicago the incarnation of greed ruled over the working man and dictated his role as a simple cog within an enormous insatiable industrial machine. Executives of the 1900’s meatpacking industry in Chicago, IL, conspired to work men to death, obliterate worker’s unions and lie to American citizens about what they were actually consuming in order to simply acquire more money.
The life of an immigrant in the United States during the Gilded Age was a rough one. During this time period, the U.S. went through a dramatic change in dealing with changing infrastructure and masses of people coming over from different countries for a chance at a better life. This time period was characterized by small wage jobs, poor working conditions and the struggle to survive. The Jungle embodies the themes of the Gilded Age with first hand experiences of an immigrant's hardships of life. The main characters of Sinclairs The Jungle, Jurgis and Ona, come over from Lithuania for a chance at a prosperous life in Chicago.
Sinclair stated that “the animals’ faith emphasized [his] views of how industry treats humankind” (Sinclair 8). Machinery was more important and valuable than the human life, especially the life of an immigrant worker with no rights and freedoms. The author concluded that society was the jungle where people had to work hard in order to survive and escape the challenges of their living. Continuous struggle was needed to maintain the challenges and problems of people’s everyday life enabling them to maintain control over their life and to get the current opportunities. Exploitation of immigrants was another important problem covered in the book promoting specific changes in society. In conclusion, Sinclair made a very convincing argument and his writing was so influential it prompted government action.
In the early 1900's life for America's new Chicago immigrant workers in the meat packing industry was explored by Upton Sinclair's novel The Jungle. Originally published in 1904 as a serial piece in the socialist newspaper Appeal to Reason, Sinclair's novel was initially found too graphic and shocking by publishing firms and therefore was not published in its complete form until 1906. In this paper, I will focus on the challenges faced by a newly immigrated worker and on what I feel Sinclair's purpose was for this novel.
Capitalism dominates the world today. Known as a system to create wealth, capitalism’s main purpose is to increase profits through land, labor and free market. It is a replacement of feudalism and slavery. It promises to provide equality and increases living standards through equal exchanges, technological innovations and mass productions. However, taking a look at the global economy today, one can clearly see the disparity between developed and developing countries, and the persistence of poverty throughout the world despite the existence of abundant wealth. This modern issue was predicted and explained a hundred and fifty years ago in Karl Marx’s Capital.
If one looks at liberty and individual freedom, it is evident that command economies tend to oppress their citizens. Therefore, socialism, which allows for basic needs to be met and personal freedoms to be upheld, is the best economic system for all of a country’s citizens. Market economies, as a whole, inherently and inevitably lead to poverty and a large class disparity. In a capitalist society, the ones who supply labor, the ones who work the hardest, are the ones who are paid the least. The owners, who are already rich, receive most of the profit and accumulate large masses of wealth.