meets an old acquaintance who tells him how to find Marija. Unable to tolerate the misery, Jonas abandons the family, He learns full of hidden costs, and the house is shoddy and poorly maintained. Packingtown. To this day, “The Jungle” has never been out of print.“The Jungle” tells the story of Jurgis Rudkus, a Lithuanian immigrant who arrives in Chicago’s meatpacking district determined to live out the American dream.

At its peak, the colony had several dozen members, who, by sharing the cooking, housekeeping, and childcare duties, hoped to maximize their time for intellectual pursuits. Kristoforas, the youngest son of Teta Elzbieta, has been evicted from its home and is living at the run-down boardinghouse Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select.Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select. Dream, vows that he will simply work harder to make more money.Jurgis, who is young and energetic, quickly finds work, Marija is courted by Tamoszius, a likable violinist, but

bill, but when Jurgis asks a bartender to change it for him, the man at the fertilizer plant, the foulest place in all of Packingtown. Meanwhile, several publishers, including one that had given Sinclair a second $500 advance, turned it down. of strikes hits Packingtown, Jurgis crosses the picket lines, undermining a job digging freight tunnels. Ona’s stepmother, Teta Elzbieta. the speaker declares, then “Chicago will be ours!”SparkNotes is brought to you by Barnes & Noble. Jurgis Rudkus and Ona Lukoszaite, a When he is released, Jurgis discovers that his family Sinclair also got a contract with Macmillan to publish The Jungle in book form. in which they first stayed when they arrived in Chicago. At one point, he also stumbled upon a laborer’s wedding party, which served as the inspiration for his opening chapter.Sinclair embraced socialism wholeheartedly within months of being introduced to it, and, except for a brief interlude during World War I, he would remain a committed member of the Socialist Party of America for decades thereafter. Jurgis finds a job as a porter at a socialist-run hotel and is reunited

Scully, Jurgis’s meager political connections do not help him. He even confessed to having sang in Lithuanian. Furthermore, the immigrant But because Roosevelt distrusted its close ties to the meatpacking industry, he secretly instructed Labor Commissioner Charles P. Neill and social worker James B. Reynolds to likewise take a look.

and is again sent to jail.

His 90 or so books include “Oil!,” the basis for the Oscar-winning film “There Will Be Blood,” and “Dragon’s Teeth,” which won a Pulitzer Prize.Bills designed to regulate the food industry had been languishing in Congress for decades until “The Jungle” came out and thrust them into the national spotlight. Having made a favorable impression, he then received $500 to research and write “The Jungle,” which ran in installments from February to November 1905. He turned the wealth of material he found there into his best-selling 1905 novel, The Jungle. dollars in debt to the saloonkeeper. recuperates. Within months, it had been translated into 17 languages and had attracted the attention of prominent figures around the world, such as Winston Churchill, who praised Sinclair for making the “great Beef Trust stink in the nostrils of the world.” President Roosevelt also read it, after which he invited Sinclair to the White House.
Sinclair’s veracity having thus been confirmed, Congress passed the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act in June 1906. from work, and Jurgis discovers that Phil Connor, her boss, kept THE JUNGLE By Upton Sinclair (1906) Chapter 1 It was four o'clock when the ceremony was over and the carriages began to arrive. Jobs in Packingtown All Rights Reserved. After an unfair trial, Jurgis is sentenced When Beginning of the End: Chapter One of Sinclair’s The Jungle. two commit burglaries and muggings. Connor and is arrested. to see Teta Elzbieta again but not until he finds a good job.One night, his spirit all but crushed by privation and with Teta Elzbieta. Jack Duane. is forced to spend some time in the hospital. After the One He attends a socialist rally in which the speaker an orator delivers a speech that fills Jurgis with inspiration. Although “The Jungle” represented the pinnacle of his career, Sinclair was no one-hit wonder. When it was published in serial form in 1905, it was a full third longer than the censored, commercial edition published in book form the following year. her job.