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The Role Of Socialism In The Jungle By Upton Sinclair

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“The Jungle” is a novel written by Upton Sinclair on a Lithuanian family that comes to America to achieve the American Dream. The family goes through many trials as poor immigrants, struggling to get wealth, happiness, and opportunities to succeed in America. Sinclair talks about socialism and its benefits. He also exposes the corruption of capitalism and the political system in America. An initial reading of “The Jungle” by Upton Sinclair might appear to be literary fiction, further analysis suggest that it is primarily a work of propaganda. Sinclair uses the protagonist of the story, Jurgis Rudkus to show the difficulties the family went through. In “The Jungle” immigrants were not treated right and Sinclair exposes the human flaws of people to show how the lower class society was mistreated. The family experiences this when “Ona was sexually harassed” (chapter 15) by an upper class, puppet to the capitalist society, Conner. This disgusting man took advantage of a poor immigrant girl. This is an example of …show more content…

Ostrinsky asks, “You wanna know better about socialism?”... Let us go out and take a stroll.” Sinclair makes Ostrinsky sound very kind and polite to show socialism as a welcoming home. “Perhaps we can do better tomorrow… we try not to let a comrade starve…” (chapter 29) Sinclair gives Ostrinsky kind characteristics as he supports socialism. On the contrary, Sinclair gives evil characteristic to the upper class capitalists such as Conner. To conclude, “The Jungle” is propaganda over literary fiction because Sinclair over exaggerates the problems Jurgis and his family go through to make his point. Jurgis and his family go through almost every wrong possible, making it unrealistic. Although “The jungle” appears as literary fiction early on, after finishing the story, it is clear the novel is a work of

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