The book mentions and involves the meat packing industry many times. A big part of the story is meant to talk about the horrible conditions about the meatpacking industry but it’s not the whole story. The main character does start to work in the meatpacking industry but it’s not the whole story. The book is about the hardships of a poor immigrant family in Chicago and about every other poor person having hard times in the country. Upton Sinclair is showing the horrendous ways that people had to live in his days, the way people manipulated each other, stole, tricked, ripped off. They were being deceived by the very society that needed their cheap labor. The book is really gets you to pity what this family and thousands of families that actually
Sinclair worked undercover in a meatpacking plant to gather information firsthand, before he began writing the book. Its influence on the labor practices and regulations governing the food industry cannot be understated. It tackles subjects as varied as the poor living conditions of the immigrants, exploitation of cheap labor by industrialists, and the unsanitary conditions of the meatpacking plants and stockyards of Chicago. The descriptions of the disgusting processes that were conducted in the meatpacking plants made for shocking reading and turned the book into a bestseller. The President Teddy Roosevelt ordered an investigation into the lack of sanitation in meatpacking plants and caused the creation of legislation governing the food industry in the form of the Food and Drugs Act of 1906.
Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle was a novel popularized and published during the Progressive Era with the purpose of exposing the horrific working conditions of the Chicago meat industry. Sinclair exposed the unsanitary practices of the meat industry and the dehumanization of the workers. The harsh realities written in Sinclair’s novel reached the hearts of many Americans furthering the push of many progressive activist’s demands. In the end this created an everlasting lawful change with the help of President Theodore Roosevelt.
Upton Sinclair did not exaggerate the details of labor in the novel because he described the awful working conditions, the regular amount of pay and the meat products made in factories. In his essay, Lewis Carroll Wade talked about the disgusting meat that was being allowed to be sold in Chicago. Wade says, “As Chicago chilled beef invaded
Sinclair went to Chicago to research the strike and the conditions suffered by the workers in the meat-packing industry. He interviewed the workers and their families as well as their relatives, doctors, and others. He personally observed the appalling conditions inside the meat-packing plants. His research during this process ended up be the basis for the book.
You want to help the citizens of Packingtown (Chicago) and stop the atrocities that are going on in the meat packing plants. However, when this book was written, Sinclair’s point was often skewed or just ignored. His purpose of writing the book wasn’t necessarily to draw attention to the meatpacking industry; it was instead to draw attention to Socialism, and how much better it is than capitalism. The books main themes are poverty, power, social classes, and suffering until the end when Jurgis finds socialism. However, socialism couldn’t remedy everything that capitalism broke.
The Wretched Lives of Workers America during the early 20th Century was a time full of selfish capitalists and the poverty-stricken workers who paid for their success. The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair, captures this perfectly with the portrayal of Jurgis Rudkus. Jurgis is a newly immigrated person to the United States with his family when they realize they need jobs and a place to live. Throughout the book, Jurgis finds new jobs such as in meat factories and fertilizer plants but loses them as well.
As stated before, Upton Sinclair, was ahead of his time with his ability to dig for the truth and show Americans the truth regarding the Chicago meat packing industry. Another large passion of his was politics and the belief in socialism. He advocated against capitalism and ridiculed it within his novel by portraying it as the cause of much downfall for the main character. Sinclair did more for this country with the novel he wrote then many politicians are able to do in a lifetime. He showed through his power of writing the importance of every citizen within America to be woke and involved in every aspect of their lives.
In the novel The Jungle, Upton Sinclair illustrates that “Neither the squeals of hogs nor tears of visitors made any difference to [the workers]; one by one they hooked up the hogs, and one by one with a swift stroke they slit their throats” exemplifying the desensitization of workers in the meat-packing industry (Sinclair, 35). This desensitization was the result of years of tedious work that removed all hope from the workers and left them isolated. However, it is not only the nature of the work that affected them, but those who had more power than them. The advance of the industrial revolution resulted in businessmen and bosses gaining power simultaneously while workers were becoming circumscribed by their work.
In early 1900, specifically, 1906, The Jungle by Upton Sinclair was written. This novel told the story of a Lithuanian immigrant who worked in a filthy Chicago meatpacking plant. It exposed the meatpacking industry by stating their vile practices not only towards their meat but their workers as well. This was a result of the combination of many immigrants in the United States to pursue a better life, and the fact that many big industries were looking for ways to maximize their profit.
Throughout a man’s life, he is usually told that determination and passion inevitably lead to success, that he will get rewarded for what he puts into his work. But under some circumstances man is not able to flourish no matter the amount he sacrifices to his demanding society. Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle recognizes this conflict and addresses the outcome of it. Through this novel, the author applies numerous techniques to analyze man’s capability of prosperity when the odds seem to be against him.
c. Horrible working conditions were one of the largest issues that Upton Sinclair wrote about in The Jungle. Upton Sinclair spoke of people losing limbs and other tragic accidents that occurred in the meat packing industry. The most tragic accidents that Upton Sinclair described involved not only the workers but also the customers that would be receiving the tainted goods due to workers falling into rendering tanks and the goods being processed for shipment. During this time of rapid growth, work hygiene wasn’t of significant importance.
Upton Sinclair’s, The Jungle is a novel, which affected the food industry in 1900’s but also in America today. People have learned over the years the truths about the food industry, revealed through Sinclair’s detailed evidence. Sinclair meant to aim at the public’s heart but instead he shot straight at their stomachs. One would easily be convinced to never again buy or eat meat again. Fortunately, people have seen changes from 1906 and have been currently trying to repair the Food Industry.
he early twentieth century was a wild, wild time – though we can 't immediately think of a time in American history that has been calm. Still, even by rowdy American standards, the first few years of the last century were crazy. Upton Sinclair was lucky enough to ride this wave of national dissatisfaction with the status quo straight to literary success. His novel The Jungle, an exposé of the meatpacking industry, became an enormous bestseller translated into seventeen languages within weeks of its publication in 1906. But while The Jungle has long been associated with food production (and its disgustingness), the book is actually a much broader critique of early twentieth-century business and labor practices in the rapidly growing cities of the United States.
Author Upton Sinclair uses the slaughterhouse hogs to symbolize European immigrants, and how they are seen as helpless creatures, when in reality they all have their own sense of individuality despite the pain they endure. By using the hogs
During the time period of the 1900’s, the meat packaging industry in Chicago, as Sinclair mentions in his novel, The Jungle, was a very unsanitary and extremely dangerous workplace that lacked much more than just a few safety precautions. Simple things, such as enforcing hand washing or workers’ rights were unheard of in the working environment. It is clear that Upton Sinclair was trying to expose the worker’s horrendous labor conditions in order to improve their situation, along with the introduction of socialism. Upton Sinclair, in his novel, talks about how a Lithuanian immigrant by the name of Jurgis Rudkus, and his family, travel to Chicago trying to make ends meet. However, they soon realize Chicago was not the place for that.