The Jungle by Upton Sinclair gave great insight into many issues that were evolving in America during the Progressive era. It is based around telling the story of an immigrant family who comes to America for a better life. They soon realized the American dream wasn’t what it seemed. Sinclair wrote The Jungle to expose the appalling working conditions in the meatpacking industry, and the poverty in America. He aimed at the public's heart and by accident hit it in the stomach.
The conditions in the meat packing industry in 1897 were terrible. The main character Jurgis is used by Upton Sinclair to give an inside perspective of the meat factory and show the conditions they went through. Jurgis ended up getting a job at one of the meat packing
There was a kind of labors in the U.S. food industry stood on the floor with half an inch deep blood, and put up with the stench. But not only that, they worked faster, but earned less. In fact, they were immigrant labors, and this horrible treatment of them truly happened in the beginning of twenty centuries. The Jungle which was written by Upton Sinclair documented this inhuman treatment. However, a hundred years later, immigrants still suffer the harsh treatment in the modern food industry.
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair follows the life of Lithuanian immigrant Jurgis Rudkus and his family living in Chicago. Jurgis finds work at Brown's slaughterhouse and there he endures harsh working conditions as well as his family members. Ultimately he and family suffer many tragedies related to their work environments. While this book is a work of fiction it mirrors real life. The Jungle was published in 1906 during the Gilded Age.
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair The Jungle by Upton Sinclair truly exemplifies the difficulties immigrant’s families run into when pursuing the “American Dream.” The Jungle can be evaluated as a primary source as it uses direct evidence in Chicago in PackingTown district. PackingTown District is known to be Chicago’s biggest meatpacking industry. Written during the Progressive Era it revealed the many dangerous and horrible conditions that are in the meatpacking industry. It uses vivid description of diseased, rotten, and contaminated meat, which ultimately shocked the public.
Jurgis agreed upon arriving Jurgis could not believe such a huge house with a lot of expenses things. The man said that he own a meatpacking company. At the end of the story Jurgis conversion to socialism. The novel has a switch from narrative to
The Jungle, written by Upton Sinclair, is about a Lithuanian family that travels to Chicago in pursuit of the American Dream. When writing this novel, Sinclair sought to build support for the Socialist Party and the working class. In preparation for writing The Jungle, Sinclair spent weeks in Chicago’s meat packing plants to study the lives of its stockyard workers. When the novel was first published, readers were more concerned with the health standards and conditions in which the meat was processed rather than the socialist message that Sinclair intended. The Jungle is also often associated with the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act both in 1906, the year the novel was published (Source A).
Throughout The Jungle, Upton Sinclaire’s social political agenda was very clear. When Jurgis and his family first arrive in America, they had high hopes and believed that they could achieve the American dream. However, we see a transformation in the family’s view of capitalism as they continue to face hardships. Sinclaire portrays big business as antagonistic through corporate leaders exploiting and taking advantage of their workers. As an author, Upton Sinclaire wanted to expose the flaws and horrors of capitalism to the public and used his characters to depict the lives of many immigrant workers struggling under the power and corruptness of American capitalism.
Sinclair, a socialist writer, was a struggling writer. An editor recommended that Sinclair investigate the strike that was happening in Chicago because of the unfit conditions of meat packers. Sinclair followed his suggestion. In 1904, at the age of 26, he went to Chicago to examine the conditions of the workers in the meat packing industry and figure out why the workers were on strike. Sinclair interviewed not only the workers involved in the meat packing industry but families, lawyers, doctors, and social workers.
The main character Jurgis early on in the book when he was still full of hope and believing in the “American dream” shuns his coworkers aligned with the union. However, as he is exposed to how working at the meat plant truly is and how it can drain the life out of someone, he joins the union himself. Jurgis’ hope in the union pulled him further even when he was on the brink of breaking down. As people read The Jungle it inspired those in similar positions to form their own unions. Sinclair’s writing became a powerful tool for everyday working citizens to unite with those in similar situations, creating a platform for workers to have a voice and be heard.
Upton Sinclair was an American novelist who was born in Baltimore in 1878. At the age of eight or nine, Sinclair’s family moved to New York and lived in cheap rooming houses. Sinclair’s father was constantly drinking alcohol, while his mother would force religion and morality into Upton. Surprisingly, Upton did not have any proper education until he was around eleven years old. Yet, he was an intelligent individual who was able to enter New York’s City College at the age of fourteen (Sinclair vi).
Sinclair exposes the corruption and the exploitive nature of the capitalist system, using Jurgis’ experience in the meatpacking industry as a testament to the struggles of immigrants during this time to serve as an important reminder of the importance of protecting the rights of
“The Jungle” was one of the most influential books in American History (Millen). It was a book about a family that had come to America seeking their dream only to find a nightmare (Millen). Sinclair's reason for writing the book was to expose the despairing world of the working class which furthered his drive to make it better (Millen). The message of the book was to show that people working in a capitalist society have no chance or hope (Millen). Also, Sinclair's first five novels were published between 1901 and 1906 (Strecker).
In fact, just as a tiger would, Jurgis “sunk his teeth into the man’s cheek; […] he was dripping with blood, and little ribbons of skin were hanging in his mouth” (187). The use of these comparisons to animals creates a jungle like atmosphere for the reader within the capitalist urban environment which has an extremely unforgiving nature. In the urban jungle of Chicago that Sinclair writes about, the immigrant workers are the weaker animals fighting for survival in which the wealthy capitalist prey upon to build vast fortunes of
Throughout the novel, Upton Sinclair shows the readers the harsh working conditions during the early nineteen hundreds. The owners of big meat companies would take advantage of their authority over the workers and treat them with no respect. The workers had strict rules such as taking off an hours pay if a worker is one minute late to work or having no days off. In the beginning of the novel, Ona requests a day off for her wedding with Jurgis but her boss refuses. Not only that, but they do not know what is in their medicine.
The Jungle Book Review In 1906, Upton Sinclair published The Jungle to expose how rough the life of immigrants coming to the United States was. This book also exposed unsanitary conditions in meatpacking industry. Upton Sinclair’s main focus in this book was to show how tough life was for immigrants coming to America, but instead he disgusted Americans by the conditions of the meat factories. The book begins with the main character, Jurgis Rudkus, and his wife Ona, having their marriage reception in Chicago. This gives the reader background information about the characters, where they are from, and why they have come to American.
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.