The Jungle Social Sensitivity

The Jungle Social Sensitivity

Upton Sinclair's overwhelming concern was the betterment of society; art served as a tool for improving conditions among the working classes. First conceived of as an analogy between the wage slavery imposed on workers and the slavery earlier imposed on blacks, The Jungle graphically exposed the brutality that capitalism allows the privileged to inflict on the poor. Sinclair spent two months in and around Chicago's packing houses disguised as a worker, observing the squalor, filth, and despair spawned by an economic system designed to promote personal gain. Returning to his home in New Jersey, Sinclair wrote his novel in less than six months. At first rejected by major publishing houses for fear of libel, The Jungle was published by Doubleday in 1906 after the publishing company investigated and verified Sinclair's claims.

Sinclair's gruesome descriptions of rats, children's fingers, and tubercular steers being ground up into canned meats, and...
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