The Jungle

The story begins with the traditional Lithuanian wedding of Jurgis and his sixteen year old bride, Ona. The wedding is one that they can barely afford, and sets the backdrop for the changes that they are just beginning to encounter in their new country. Immigrants with peasant backgrounds had begun to arrive in the United States during the late 1890's from places such as Ireland, Poland, Italy, and Lithuania . These people were ill equipped to deal with the harsh realities of urban living in America at the time. In his book Sinclair shows how capitalism creates pressures that undermine the traditional family life, cultural ties, and moral values that these immigrants had brought with them. With "literally not a month's wages between them and starvation" workingmen are under pressure to abandon their families, woman must sometimes choose between starvation and prostitution. Children are forced to work rather then attend school, just to keep starvation away for one more day. The Socialist Party of America was founded in 1901, and for over a decade after that saw enormous growth, by 1912 they had over 1,200 elected public officials in the country, and during the election of that year had very good election results by their candidate Eugene Debs for President (Dickstein). The growth of the Socialist movement primarily took place in the vast heartland of the United States, as it was undergoing the strains of industrialization. The roots of this movement were based on reforms to the social and economic systems that were keeping the immigrants enslaved by the current systems that were in place. The 19th century saw rapid industrial expansion in America. Between 1800 and 1900 the per capita income rose from $200 to more then $1200 (numbersusa.com). However, the distribution of wealth was uneven, 1% of the population owned 54% of the wealth. It is in the background that socialism flourished. Socialism was a message of hope, when the workers could see no hope for their lives. During the early 20th century, working conditions were basically unregulated. The workers were at the mercy of the industrialists and how they felt they should treat their workers. The growing immigrant population assured them that they would always have a large labor pool willing to work for low wages. If a worker complained or was injured, there were many others waiting in line to take the job. In 1886 workers united in Chicago, during the famous Haymarket Riots. Workers went on strike for an 8-hour work day and better working conditions.
Workers at the time were required to work twelve to fourteen hour days, six days a week, often in dangerous conditions. There was no government oversight, so employers were free to make up the rules as they went along. The riots started after two strikers were killed by police, supposedly at the request of factory owners, causing outrage among the working class in the city. A rally was called for at Haymarket Square to protest the killings, the rally turned violent when the police were called in to disperse the crowds. During the Haymarket riots eleven people were killed and dozens wounded when police, at the request of factory owners, opened fire on the crowd. In retaliation, the demonstrators tossed a bomb near the police line, killing several officers. This was the foundation for the socialist movement among the workers in the American Heartland (Conlin). This was a rallying cry to those that felt powerless, and disenfranchised. Over the next several years as workers tried to make gains in the workplace, their attempts fell mostly on deaf ears, as there were more people willing to take the jobs at the low wages and dangerous conditions then were workers willing to sacrifice for the good of all. It is in these conditions that The Jungle is set. As Sinclair reveals the poverty and hopelessness, of urban life, he sets his argument for socialism. How under a classless society, with the factories regulated, and workers compensated fairly for their toil, life for the immigrants would be better. The fear of injury and starvation would be eliminated, workers would be united in their common goal to produce for the factory because they benefited directly from their labor as a cooperative. The immigrants came to America in search of a better life, a life they thought capitalism would bring them. As it turned out for many of them, life was harder here, then in their home country. There at least they had family support, they knew they values and morals they were to live by and they knew the language and culture, capitalism was not the utopia they that it would be. The stories of the immigrant who made good, were too few compared to the numbers of people came looking for that dream. Capitalism, enslaved them, by low wages, dangerous working conditions, the fear of injury, the constant threat of job loose, the "use them up and toss them away" (Conlin) attitude, and the reality of never being able to get ahead. Upton Sinclair really wrote The Jungle for the promotion of socialism, himself being a long-time socialist, but what really caught the attention of the public was the few pages of descriptions about the horrors of the meat-packing industry. He couldn't have been very happy that the book gained fame for a different reason, but nonetheless it did gain a significant amount of fame and get that message of socialism is better than communism out to the public widely. There are a lot of different characters in The Jungle, and they all have some significance in their roles. These characters vary widely in many aspects, including: professions, social status, and economic status. The main character in the novel is Jurgis Rudkus, a Lithuanian immigrant. His wife is Ona Lukoszaite, also from Lithuania. Their son is named Antanas, but he dies after not too long, which is really a turning point for Jurgis. Phil Jack Duane is an experienced and educated criminal who is also "politically connected". Connor is a foreman in Packingtown, politically connected through Scully, and a man who causes much trouble for Jurgis. Mike Scully is a powerful political leader in Packingtown. There are also the members of Ona's family, each of whom play smaller parts in the story. The story opens with the party at Jurgis and Ona's wedding in America, but soon goes back to the time before they left Lithuania. Jurgis met Ona at a horse fair, and fell in love with her. Unfortunately, they were too poor to have a wedding, since Ona's father just died. In the hopes of finding freedom and fortune, they left for America, bringing many members of Ona's family with them. After arriving in America, they are taken to Packingtown to find work. Packingtown is a section of Chicago where the meat packing industry is centralized. They take a tour of the plant, and see the unbelievable efficiency and speed at which hogs and cattle are butchered, cooked, packed, and shipped. In Packingtown, no part of the animal is wasted. Jurgis's tough build quickly gets him a job on the cattle killing beds. The other members of the family soon find jobs, except for the children. They are put into school. At first, Jurgis is happy with his job and America, but he soon learns that America is plagued by corruption, dishonesty, and bribery. He is forced to work at high speeds for long hours with low pay, and so is the rest of the family. He is cheated out of his money several times. The children must leave school and go to work to help the family survive. This means they will never receive the education they need to rise above this, and get a better job, part of the vicious cycle. Ona is not permitted to take a holiday, even for her own wedding, and the birth of her child. After the birth of her first son, Antanas, Ona soon becomes pregnant again. She becomes very upset, but she doesn't tell Jurgis why. After she fails to come home one night, Jurgis confronts her. She breaks into tears and tells Jurgis that a foreman named Connor has forced a sexual relationship on her. Jurgis curses her and runs off to find Connor. After beating Connor to a pulp, Jurgis is sentenced to jail for thirty days. The judge refuses to listen to Jurgis's story seriously. When Jurgis is released, he finds that his family has moved to an even poorer neighborhood, and Ona is in labor at that very moment. Neither the baby, nor Ona, who went into labor two months early, survive. Jurgis pulls himself together for the sake of Antanas and gets a job. When Antanas drowns in the mud-filled street, Jurgis gives up on Packingtown and his family. He gets aboard a passing train, and leaves Chicago. Jurgis enjoys a "hobo" life, wandering across the country. When winter comes, he is forced to return to Chicago. He gets into a fight in a bar and is sent to jail. In jail, he meets Jack Duane, an experienced criminal. After being freed from jail, Jurgis and Duane team up in a luxurious, but risky life of crime. Jurgis learns about the connections between criminals, police, politics, and big business. He becomes a member of this complex network and moves into politics. He runs into Connor again, and beats him to a pulp a second time. Connor's political connections cause Jurgis to lose all his acquired profit. Jurgis is back to wandering the streets. To keep warm, Jurgis walks into a Socialist meeting. After the meeting, he is introduced to a man named Ostrinski, who teaches him about Socialism. Jurgis agrees completely with the political party's ideals, and becomes an active member. As the story ends, the results of an election are being received. The novel ends on a positive note, showing that the Socialist party made significant progress all across the country. The Jungle is a novel that casts an evil light on America, business, and politics. It promotes the concept of Socialism, emphasizes corruption in our America as it is, and makes people working at the bottom look like slaves. The book mentions nothing about the benefits of Capitalism versus those of socialism, a one-sided argument.. Toward the end of the book, Upton Sinclair shows the reader how to solve Capitalism's problems: replace it with Socialism. The Socialist party is promoted as an international political party that will solve all of the world's problems. Every member of the party was told about the "Socialist revolution", when the entire planet would become Socialist. Not once does the book mention the possibility of failure. It even claimed Socialists would control the country by 1912. The Jungle is, however, more than an advertisement for Socialism and this what gained the book the most fame. It describes the horrors of the meat packing industry in great detail. People were forced to work from before sunrise to after sunset. In the meat preserving plants, the floors were never dry. The workers would catch horrible foot diseases, causing them to loose toes and even entire legs. The butchers would be forced to move at a blinding pace, often cutting themselves and others. They would still have to work though, or loose their job. Often, the wounds would become infected, and butchers would die of blood poisoning. These are all examples of how the conditions were just flat-out horrible, and really got to the readers with the vivid descriptions. Another thing that shocked me while reading the novel was the cruelty to animals. The animals were packed in freight cars, and shipped across the country. Many of them died on the trip. Once reaching Packingtown, each hog had a chain fastened around its leg, was hoisted into the air, and carried into a room where its throat was slit. When the cattle reached Packingtown, they were stunned by electric shock, and dropped onto a conveyor belt, where a man with a sledgehammer pierced their skulls. These animals existed in very poor conditions, especially the "steerly" cattle that developed boils. Now that I have read The Jungle, I am amazed that our country survived to be the world superpower it is today. I am even more amazed that we did not all die from eating food made in such poor conditions. The life in Packingtown resembles the jungle life because the weak and the old are rejected, while the strong and the young are wanted for awhile, which is the main idea in Social Darwinism. "Here was Durhams's, for instance, owned by a man who was trying to make as much money out of it as he could, and did not care in the least how he did it; and ranged in ranks and grades like an army...each one driving the man next below him and trying to squeeze out of him..." (63). In the jungle, it is evident that the animals care little of other species when they kill. heir main motive is to capture food. As is the case, for the politicians and businessmen, who gain immense power through Capitalism. These men manipulated the immigrants to become successful, which was their main objective. "Jurgis talked lightly about work, because he was young...He was the sort of man the bosses like to get hold of...If he were working in a line of men, the line always moved to slowly for him..."(26) "why, they would "speed him up" till they had worn him out and then throw him into the gutter"(64). This illustrates how the "predators" in this case, find a strong, young workman. They will use this "prey" for all he is worth, for as little pay and then when he has given all he has, the "predator" will spit him out. This theory continues to show how corrupt and needy people can be to gain success, by comparing it to the need that an animal has for food.

The theme of Social Darwinism continues by exemplifying that survivors learned to adapt to their new surroundings,"... for nobody rose in Packingtown by doing good work. You could lay that down for a rule- if you met a man who was rising in Packingtown, you met a knave..." This exemplifies that in order to survive in Packingtown someone usually had to adapt by becoming merciless. This concept can be linked with the ideas of animals in the jungle because they must be brutal when they are pursuing their next meal in order to survive. Elzbieta's daughter, Kotrina, is forced "like most children of the poor , prematurely made old; she had to take care of the baby; she had to cook the meals and wash the dishes and clean house..."(133). However, Kotrina learned to adapt to the life situations presented before her. Perhaps, by taking on all this responsibility at thirteen she was able to gain a better understanding about Packingtown life. Some adaptations the characters went through concluded corruptly, such as Marija and Jurgis' and other characters continued to handle life as it occurred a day at a time, such as Teta.

The Jungle's title may be one of the most important parts of the book. It is a hint to the theme that Capitalism is bad and leads to corruption. Without the title a person is liable to get so engaged in Sinclair's hideous descriptions of the meat industry that his point on Socialism might be missed. It allows characters to be depicted as "predators" and "prey." It also permits the reader to see how society can be so greedy that we would need to use other human beings to build us up, like food builds up nutrients for an animal.