The Jungle
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair one of the most famous American novels ever written. Most people associate The Jungle with the federal legislation it provoked. Americans were horrified to learn about the terrible sanitation under which their meat products were packed. They were even more horrified to learn that the labels listing the ingredients in tinned meat products were full of lies. The revelation that rotten and diseased meat was sold without a single consideration for public health infuriated American citizens. They consumed meat containing the ground remains of poisoned rats and unfortunate workers who fell into the machinery. Within months of The Jungle's publication, the sale of meat products dropped dramatically. The public outcry of fury led to the passage of the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act, less than a year after the novel's publication. However, contrary to what many people believe, Sinclair did not write The Jungle to incite the American government into regulating the sanitation of the meat packing industry. Sinclair wrote his novel to provoke outrage over the miserable working conditions of industrial w
He returns to the remnants of his family only to discover that Marija has become a prostitute. Sinclair does make use of one literary movement in the service of promoting his political philosophy. Therefore, The Jungle does make use of literary conventions in order to promote Socialism as a viable political goal. Another member of the family, Stanislovas, is dead, having been eaten alive by a swarm of rats in an oil factory. In the novel, Sinclair writes about Jurgis's Lithuanian immigrant family who moves into the disgusting tenements and meat packing factories of Chicago. Jurgis himself suffers misfortune after misfortune. It is through the devotion to Socialism that the disenfranchised working poor can regain control of the political, economic, and social machines that currently drive them to their ruin and their deaths. This final disaster beats Jurgis down further. Sinclair's novel is definitely not an artistic masterpiece. It is necessary, then, to avoid reading it on the same terms as one reads most novels. Sinclair's characters inevitably slide towards their destinies, regardless of their inner character or their efforts to do otherwise. It contains a valuable insight to the life of the immigrant working poor at the turn of the century. At this point, Jurgis truly is a beaten man.
Common topics in this essay:
Jurgis's Lithuanian,
Upton Sinclair,
Drug Act,
Sister Carrie,
Jungle Jurgis,
meat products,
meat packing,
public health,
horrified learn,
sanitation meat,
political economic,
sinclair's novel,
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Acceptance Essays
