The Jungle
"I aimed at America's heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach." This statement, attributed to writer Upton Sinclair, is in reference to Sinclair's novel, The Jungle. The Jungle, written in the early twentieth century, depicts the horrors and corruption of the cities and its industries. Specifically, the novel is aimed at putting down the meat packaging industry. The novel's title symbolizes the competitive nature of the city; the world of Packingtown, the place where the protagonist, Jurgis, abodes, is like a Darwinian jungle, in which the strong prey on the weak and all living things are engaged in a brutal fight for survival. This can be summed up as, Social Darwinism, a nineteenth century philosophy which essentially held that society was designed to reward the strongest, best people, while inferior people were kept down at a suitable level. By relating the story of a group of honest, hardworking immigrants who are destroyed by corruption and evil, Sinclair tries to rebuke the idea of Social Darwinism, implying that those who succeed in this corrupt system are not the best of humankind, but rather the worst and most crooked of all. The meat packaging industry is the strong, while Jurgis and the rest of the immigra
The Jungle is full of scenes that depict the Lithuanian immigrants suffering. From the start of the novel, the reader is rooting for the success of Jurgis and his depleted family. They are forced to take on grueling hours and work through hunger and illness; they must go to work even when they are exceptionally sick. The only joy that the family has in their lives is watching the young and jubilant Antanas, the son of Jurgis and his wife Ona. However, Antanas succumbs to "all the diseases that babies are heir to," and is left without a smile: Page 135 contains, without a doubt, the most repulsive details in the entire novel. These details make any reader utterly disgusted, if not terribly sick. I, personally, thought that this description was the passage that took the story over the edge; it made people realize exactly what was wrong in the industry. It's horrifying entails let the citizens know that something had to be done with the way that business had been conducted. Perhaps, an incident that hits both the heart and the stomach is when Jurgis learns of the death of Ona's stepbrother Stanislovas: At night he was tied down, lest he should kick the covers off him, while the family lay in their stupor of exhaustion. He would lie and scream for Without a job opportunity, Jurgis is left with nothing. I can't help but feel terribly sorry for Jurgis and his family. This is a horrible letdown and Jurgis now realizes that his life will forever be ruined. These three incidents found in The Jungle hit my heart the most; they were disappointments not only to Jurgis, but they affected the whole suffering family. One by one they hooked up the hogs, and one by one with a swift stroke they slit their throats. There was a long line of hogs, with squeals and lifeblood ebbing away together; until at last each started again, and vanished with a splash into a huge vat of boiling water. (35) This particular passage hit me in the heart because Antanas is the character that brightens up the book, and to see him suffering is hard to bear. When Jurgis is put in jail for defending the rape of Ona, he is left with thoughts from the past. He realizes that it is Christmas Eve and all that he can think of is the times spent d
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1515
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)
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