'Socialism In Upton Sinclair's The Jungle'

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“I aimed at the public’s heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach.” Upton Sinclair declared this quote after writing his novel The Jungle. Sinclair wrote the novel with the intent of forwarding his personal agenda. He attempted to display the problems of capitalism by describing the awful working conditions of the average worker and convince the reader to embrace socialism. However, Sinclair did not achieve his goal; he succeeded in a different aspect. By describing the horrendous conditions of the packaged food industry, Sinclair outraged the public. Thus, the public demanded for reform of the quality of processed food and improved working conditions for poor laborers. Sinclair, while attempting to stay historically accurate, still stretches the truth …show more content…
He used ragged descriptions of the brutality of the work done workers like Jurgis. “Neither squeals of hogs nor tears of visitors made any difference to them; one by one they hooked up the hos, 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 leach each started again, and vanished with a splash into a huge vat of boiling water” (Sinclair 36). Sinclair uses quotes like these in an attempt to show the audience that the workers are forced to do inhumane work by ruthlessly killing animals and working among these horrible deaths. Sinclair argues that capitalism has normalized processes that should seem cruel and unjust to the normal reader. This is similar to the situation with the workers of Andrew Carnegie's Steel company. The working environment was so bad for workers that in 1892, 218 workers felt it necessary to go on strike (Gale Global Issues). The harsh jobs shown in the novel reflect the realities of the time. By criticizing the inhuman work done by poor laborer, Sinclair condemns the processes created by
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