Personal Review

My personal take on this novel was that it was very engaging and was generally easy to understand. The beginning was rather dull, but once the story began to focus more on Jurgis and his trials as a new immigrant in Chicago it became much more interesting, however at the same time, much more gruesome. One of my problems with the story was the excessive death that took place. I do understand that Sinclair was trying to make a statement about the horrors of capitalism for the working class, his killing off of nearly all of those close to Jurgis was simply sad to read through. You may argue that Marija was not killed, but she was forced to become a one armed prostitute addicted to morphine, which isn’t much better.

While Sinclair definitely succeeded in showing some of the negative sides of capitalism, the unsatisfactory feeling I received when the book was over was somewhat upsetting. When I read stories I enjoy ending them on a positive note, and when a book ends with the main character at a communist rally and nothing happening to conclude the book besides the communists shouting that Chicago will be theirs its hard to feel satisfied. If this book had had a little more closure I would have enjoyed it much more.

Although I did not feel this book was very enjoyable to read, its historical significance did help me to feel better about the tragic life that Sinclair put these characters through. If I had a friend who was looking for an enjoyable read I would make the easy decision to keep them away from this novel, however, if I had a friend who wanted a book that had achieved something in its life, The Jungle would be one of my top choices. Even though was not my favorite book, it is important to acknowledge that Upton Sinclair achieved a lot with this book.

Text Connections

The Jungle is a book of extremes and emphasizes everything negative about capitalism in the horrible part of Chicago known as Packingtown. It seems almost like Sinclair was receiving direct orders from Lenin because the book is so one sided in its argument and really shows none of the better sides of capitalism or the negative sides of communism. Because of this it seems like the book is somewhat less well regarded today because it does not address all sides of the argument. Although this was Sinclair’s main reason for writing the novel it had major effects on scaring America into creating new restrictions and regulations on the meatpacking industry, which were important for our industrializing nation. Although The Jungle did not have quite as strong effects as say, The Communist Manifesto, it could be compared to it as a form of making the goals of the manifesto more available for the majority of less educated Americans. Even if the jungle did not achieve its goal of communizing America it did save thousands of lives from death by meat poisoning.

Syntax

• “…after waiting for a little and beating with his foot to get the time, casts up his eyes to the ceiling and begins to saw—‘Broom! broom! broom!’” (11)
• “What! she would cry. To be married on the roadside like a parcel of beggars! No! No!” (70)
• “Here he stayed, breakfastless, for two hours, until the throng was driven away by the clubs of the police. There was no work for him that day.” (215)
• “The other took it, and began to examine it; he smoothed it between his fingers, and he held it up to the light; he turned it over, and upside down, and edgeways.” (271)

Throughout nearly all of The Jungle Upton Sinclair uses a fairly standard sentence structure with few exceptions. His main style does not use syntax as one of its standard methods showing his tone or purpose of the novel. Although it does not happen much, one of the interesting and unorthodox structures he uses is repeating an exclamatory word that’s not part of dialogue. This takes place in the second example where Sinclair seems like he is trying to either show you what the characters are thinking in those situations or he is trying to show the reader how they should be reacting to the situation. Sinclair also uses syntax to create fragmented or jumpy sounding sentences as found in the latter two quotes. In the third excerpt Sinclair cuts up the sentence with commas to try and emphasize the slow sadness that Jurgis must live through even on a normal day. In the fourth quotation Sinclair once again uses commas to break up the sentence and show how feverish and frantic the man was while looking at the dollar bill. While these are rather rare occurrences they do have strong and important effects on the sentences on a whole.

Diction

• “And this is their utterance; merry and boisterous, or mournful and wailing, or passionate and rebellious, this music is their music, music of home.” (8)
• “…and so a whole family would drift into drinking, as the current of a river drifts down-stream.” (89)
• “It is not my fault if der baby comes mit one arm first, so dot I can’t save it. I haf tried all night…” (208)
• “‘Whuzzamatter wizze dinin’-room doors?’

‘Nothing is the matter sir.’

‘Then why dontcha openum?’” (262)

The diction in The Jungle, like most books, played a large role in the tone Sinclair was using as well as the mood he was attempting to create. One of the points in the novel where this was evident was while describing the music that was being played at the wedding. Sinclair describes the music as merry, boisterous, mournful, wailing, passionate, and rebellious followed by repeating the word music three times. The addition of these words to this section seem to make this sentence almost poetic and much more descriptive than it would normally have been with more bland words. Another form of important diction used by Sinclair in this novel was during dialogue to create a more authentic feel. When he uses distinct dialect that the immigrants in Chicago might really use like haf for have or openum for open them it adds significantly to the realism of the person he is trying to create. Most of the diction in the novel comes from the negative view of capitalism that Sinclair has and his strategy to embody it in Packingtown.

Rhetorical Strategies

• Metaphor- “The second violin is a Slovak, a tall, gaunt man with black-rimmed spectacles and the mute and patient nature of an overdriven mule.” (8)
• Hyperbole- “Now Antanus Rudkus was the meekest man that God ever put on the universe.” (67)
• Rhetorical Question- “…and it was so very weak of them that they cried out for a little peace.” (80)
• Simile- “…it had fallen upon him like a lightning stroke.” (199)
• Volta- “…he would cling there until he was driven off, for every mile he got away from Packingtown meant another load from his mind.

Whenever the cars stopped a warm breeze blew upon him…” (235)

The various forms of rhetorical strategies that are found in this book succeed in amplifying the horrible vision that Sinclair was attempting to create. The metaphors found in the first ten pages were important parts of the initial description of the wedding that proved to be so momentous for the lives of Jurgis and Ona. Sinclair was able to create very distinct images of the mediocre musicians he was describing and this very effective style created an effect that may otherwise have gone unnoticed. More towards the middle of the novel while Jurgis is in the dirty and dangerous Packingtown he boards the train and as he rides away the tone immediately shifts to a much more positive Sinclair. Possibly what he would imagine the U.S. to look like if it became a communist state. Upton Sinclair’s novel while being extremely successfully crafted was buttressed immensely by the rhetorical strategies he combined into the story.