The Jungle

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THE JUNGLE - Rated
I had never heard of Upton Sinclair until I stumbled on this book in a charity shop. I found it rivettingly horrible with it's graphic descriptions of a slaughterhouse and the conditions of the meat packing industry in Chicago around 1910. The book goes off the boil later but it's still a great read and like all great books it ushered in change when Theodore Roosevelt read it. I immediately bought another book called OIL! but I didn't find this in the same class as The Jungle. Sinclair seems to carefully research the industry he is writing about and this is what makes the Jungle a great book.

Laissez-faire exposed. - Rated
There are without a doubt better novels than "The Jungle". A great novel was not Sinclair's aim however. His aim was to point out the vile conditions that existed among working Americans in the early twentieth century. Conditions that were so awful that a visit to some workers in New York a few years before this book came out began to change young Theodore Roosevelt from a conservative to a progressive. Along the way Sinclair shocked the American public with the filth they were buying as quality meat.

Sinclair heaps horror after horror on Jurgis and his family. Almost to the point of overkill but again this was ment to be a work that shocked America and like "Uncle Tom's Cabin" before it "The Jungle" painted a worse case picture. Unregulated capitalism was exposed as the beast it was and still to an extent is with words like, "there was no place in it where a man counted for anything against a dollar." Sinclair was not out to improve the quality of food but that is what this book is most credited with. His real intent was to promote Socialism and in that to some extent he failed. However fear of the radical change Sinclair was after prompted many progressive reforms. Better a little change than a revolution.

In short, if you are looking for a great novel look elsewhere. Still, one needs to read this book for a look at where unregulated laissez-faire capitalism leads. As the calls increase to do away with government involvement in the regulation of business this book becomes more and more something that every American should read. Greed is a powerful thing and this book shows just how far some people will go in the quest for money. Powerful at times and sometimes a little off course this work by Upton Sinclair should always serve as a reminder of what was and what might be again.

grim grim grim grim grim - Rated
This has got to be the most depressing book I've EVER read. Mind you, it is quite good.

Passionate and heart breaking - Rated
After writing this book Sinclair himself remarked he had aimed for the public's hearts but instead hit their stomacks. This statement is still very relevent today. This book is a condemnation of the cruel and oppressive nature of the capitalist system. At a time when the U.S. was said to be a place full of prosperity, on its way to becoming the leading capitalist nation in the world, the domestic casualties of this are witnessed. The corruption that keeps the wealth in the hands of the rich is also vividly exposed. America "a beacon of democracy", is shown to be instead a ruthless, heartless land where those who are unfortunate are left no alternative but live a life of extreme poverty serving their oppressive masters. Sinclaire allows us to see the hell experienced by the hard working immigrants and then offers an alternative in socialism. I would argue this is not a radical conclusion but the realisation that capitalism has many contradictions which leave most of the world in hellish poverty whilst those with power, using oppressive methods defend ther privilidged position.

Relentless exploitation...unfortunately polemic conclusion - Rated
I was staggered that such conditions existed in any industry even at the time in which the book was set. It strikes me nonetheless, that it was very much a template for the foundation of the wealth of many industrialised and economically powerful nations. Loses a star as the last section has little of the crushing narrative that raises the rest of the book to such eye watering levels.