The Iron Heel | Themes

The Iron Heel Themes

The Struggle between Socialism and Capitalism

This is the book's most apparent theme, the anchor of both its narrative and philosophical explorations; in other words, characters and events in the book's plot are driven and defined by this struggle in the same way as its consideration of socially relevant ideas and ideals. The most important thing to note about this central theme is that its relevance to the book is built upon its relevance to the world at the time the book was written.

In the early 1900s (the book was first published in 1908), the intellectual, economic and philosophical analysis of socialist thinkers like Karl Marx was beginning to make its influence felt, particularly in Eastern Europe but also in America. There, the large-scale embrace of the principles and practices of the late nineteenth century industrial revolution had entwined with the so-called "American Dream" to create an unstable, uneasy relationship between rapacious capitalism...
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