The Jungle, written by Upton Sinclair, is a story about an immigrant that is trying to live the American Dream. The story follows Jurgis, a man from Lithuania who moves to Chicago to pursue a better life and to reach the “American Dream”. Unfortunately, Jurgis encounters multiple problems throughout his pursue such as jail time and death in the family to name a few. In the end, he doesn’t really get to live his “American Dream”, so he tries to improve it for others by joining a social reform to protest the problems with capitalism. The time that this story is taken place in is the early 20th century, where some working environments were harsh and the employees were taken advantage of. I believe Sinclair’s thesis for the novel was that the working …show more content…
This is shown throughout the novel and is shown in the eyes of Jurgis, an immigrant from Lithuania. When Jurgis and his family found a house to live in, everyone is forced to find a job in Chicago. The problem with this is that, the jobs in the town require tons of labor and some of the jobs were unsafe for people. Jurgis finds a job at a slaughterhouse, but he comes to see that he is working in a dangerous time of the year and that the working conditions are terrible. This is the starting base where reform is needed but Jurgis was oblivious to what he was encountering at first. He would risk his life every time he would go to work. Sinclair starts to point out that immigrants have to struggle and they cannot really live comfortably in that time period. He exclaimed that from the moment that the family bought the house that had a whole bunch of loop holes and it slowly progressed into Jurgis’ …show more content…
After leaving prison, Jurgis found out that his family has been evicted from the house they bought. Jurgis’ family relied on him for a decent income and once that was gone everything was taken away. Sinclair shows that one setback can ruin everything for an entire family. He also shows that most immigrants have to live on a check to check basis to keep what they own. Jurgis then has to find a new job and he does over time; his occupation is to dig up space for freight tunnels. He hurts himself again at work and loses his job again. This part of the novel shows that, these kind of jobs are a high risk/ low reward, and Sinclair makes it clear after Jurgis gets hurt in both of his jobs. After losing both jobs, Jurgis resorts to begging people for money because of his situation. He left his family, he didn’t have a home and he was jobless. If there were better rules applied for immigrants and workers in general, then maybe Jurgis wouldn’t have gone through all the trauma through his stay in Chicago. Towards the end, Jurgis was sent to jail again for fighting Phil Connor again and once he is released he finally sees the true image of the “American Dream” through a socialist party. Jurgis sees that the only way to change the Capitalistic view, is for the workers to also own some factories to compete with wealthy business owners. He sees that capitalism is biased
The period of time running from the 1890’s through the early 1930’s is often referred to as the “Progressive Era.” It was a time where names such as J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, Jay Gould and John D. Rockefeller stood for the progress of America and their great contributions to American industry and innovation. This chapter however, has a much darker side. Deplorable working conditions, rampant political corruption and power hungry monopolies and trusts threatened the working class of America and the steady influx of European immigrants hoping to make a better life for themselves and their families. What started as a grass-roots movement pushing for political reform at the local and municipal levels soon began to encompass
The “new” immigrants came over hungry for work and were willing to work for a fraction of what the “old” immigrants would. The “new” immigrants came in unskilled and unaccustomed to American society, took the “old” immigrants jobs and shook up their neighborhoods; this created much tension between the two groups. Riis like others, hated some ethnic groups more than others, and in How the Other Half Lives establishes a general hierarchy placing the “old” immigrants on the top, groups such as Germans, Irish and the English. In the middle Riis ranks the Italians, Jews, and blacks. On the bottom of the ladder Riis places the Chinese.
Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle,” gave the most in-depth description of the horrid truths about the way America’s food companies, “the only source of food for people living in the city,” are preparing the food they sell. “The Jungle” describes the terrible
However, in "The Gospel of Wealth a person like Jurgis is scoffed at. He implies that anyone can climb out of poverty. He makes it seem like there are no faults with the capitalist system and everything is wrong with the socialist system. With both authors exaggerating their claims, the truth lies somewhere in between. Thus, a society that accentuates both systems strengths and minimizes its failures will be a prosperous
Foreigners, who were uneducated about America’s customs, were unable to find jobs or prevent swindlers from causing their already insufficient wealth to subside. Because of this, Jurgis and his family’s economic and social lives have changed drastically. For instance, in Lithuania, Jurgis and his family had many friends and, therefore, were well-respected in their community.... ... middle of paper ...
“The Jungle” novel was written by an American journalist/ novelist name Upton Sinclair in 1906. “The Jungle” made a big hit and became his best-selling novel because it revealed so well about the economical and social reality during that time. The book mainly described about how unsanitary the meat packing industry was operated in Chicago and the miserable life of the immigrants going along with the industry. Through the story around the life and family of Jurgis Rudjus, a Lithuanian immigrant who comes to America with the belief to change their life and live in a better condition, Sinclair expresses that “The Jungle” is a symbol of capitalism. Sinclair’s contempt for capitalist society is present throughout the novel, demonstrated in the eagerness of Jurgis to work, the constant struggle for survival of the workers in Packing town and the corruption of the man at all levels of the society. Also, the author promotes socialism as a standard political society to replace capitalism.
Jurgis once hope to embrace as he lived the “American dream” is nothing more than
People thought the market would work things out on its own. The government set no safety regulations and let the corruption skyrocket. Jugis and Ona learn the hard way about the stresses of being immigrants. “ Jurgis had come there, and thought he was going to make himself useful, and rise and become a skilled man; but he would soon find out his error, for nobody rose in the Packingtown by doing good work. If you met a man who was raised in Packingtown, you met a knave.”
When most people think about immigration to the United States, they think of the U.S. as being the “land of opportunity,” where they will be able to make all of their dreams come true. For some people, immigration made their lives richer and more fulfilled. This however, was not always the case. A place that is supposed to be a “Golden Land” (Marcus 116) did not always welcome people with open arms. Even after people became legal citizens of the United States, often times the natural born Americans did not treat the immigrants as equals but rather as outsiders who were beneath them in some way. In some situations, people’s lives were made worse by coming to the “land of opportunity.” Often times people were living no better than they were in their own countries not able to make ends meet, just to live in the United States. Virtually all immigrants during the 1900’s had the same dream, to become successful and provide for their families as citizens of the United States, but they soon found out that the life in their new country was not going to be easy.
In the book, The Jungle, Upton Sinclair portrays a Lithuanian immigrant family traveling to America in hopes to pursue the American dream. The American Dream is the ideology that every person in America should have an equal opportunity to achieve success and prosperity through hard work, determination, and taking initiative. Jurgis and his family were very optimistic on their quest to seek the fortunes that America claims to be able to provide. However, Jurgis Rudkus goes through many obstacles that take a toll in his life only to find out that the American dream is nothing but an overrated fantasy that is virtually impossible.
It did not matter if a laborer lost a finger, the only thing that mattered to the businessmen was making more money. This was how life was working in the factory and it shows that the industries are taking advantage of the immigrants and forcing the less fortunate to work in deplorable circumstances.
In Upton Sinclair's 1906 novel, The Jungle, he exposes corruption in both business and politics, as well as its disastrous effects on a family from Lithuania. In a protest novel, the ills of society are dramatized for its effect on its characters in the story. The Jungle is an example of protest literature because it exposes in a muckraking style the lethal and penurious conditions that laborers lived and worked in, corruption in business and politics, and the unsanitary meat that was sold.
Author Upton Sinclair published the novel The Jungle in 1906. In his novel, Sinclair wrote of a Lithuanian immigrant family who moved to Chicago in the early twentieth century, who was struggling to make ends meet. The author explained how immigrants in this time era experienced difficulties adapting to the new society of America, and its conditions. Sinclair’s novel described how immigrants’ lives, experiences, and choices were effected by social class, racism, and sexism. He produced very strong examples, some more significant than others, which illustrated how immigrants were effected.
When trying to attain work, lodging or even food it becomes a grave handicap and an almost impenetrable barrier. Many capitalistic members of American society utilized this handicap to their advantage as a means to swindle and outright steal from the newly arrived immigrants. Making enough money to survive while protecting what they already had became the second challenge for the freshly arrived immigrant. Smooth talking sales people, corrupt politicians, and a legal system that favored the capitalistic establishment all seemed to work together to disenfranchise the immigrant population at every opportunity. Throughout Sinclair's novel we see illustrations of corruption at every level.
"The Jungle" portrays the lower ranks of the industrial world as the scene of a naked struggle for survival. Where workers not only are forced to compete with each other but, if they falter, are hard pressed to keep starvation from their door and a roof over their heads. With unions weak and cheap labor plentiful, a social Darwinist state of "the survival of the fittest" exists. The real story revolves around the integration and eventual disintegration of Jurgis Rudkis and his family, Lithuanian immigrants who move to the Chicago stockyards in hopes of a better life. Unfortunately, their hopes quickly disintegrate; like thousands of other unskilled immigrants at the turn of the century, financial necessity forces them into virtual slave labor in order to survive. For Jurgis and his family, the slave master is the ruthless and greedy meat packing industry, whose leaders value their workers no more than the animals they slaughter.