The National tribune., 1906-06-07
THE JUNGLE. I"
Crude Coarse Brutal Novel. which Pecipitated All this
COmmOtOn.

"The Jungle" Why the name? M
Upton Sinclair seems to have gone ju:
about as far out of his way to find
name for his appeal to Passion" as
has for subject around which to weav
a, story whose thread of love is so slen
der that it snaps before the story is hal
told.
One could scarcely call Packingtow
"A Jungle" The Slough" 1.-THE Mo
raSs." The Abbatoir Slums''-any o
these would have better fitted this stor
for title than the one selected. Blu
the story. the storys the thing after all
And such a story II has not in i
one single ray of sunlight from the frs
page to the last one. 1t begins with
wedding, where the participants an,
principals have entered the marriag
state by incurring debt of $500 o
more for the purpose of keeping up tn
customs of the old world in the new
a thing that can't be done, and thes
principals having been here two year
should have known it. The scene of TIL,
story is laid in the Polish section O
Chicago, although the characters wht
do or do not do things in the story ar,
'lnternamed" "Lithuanians." The wed
ding merges into a dance and a drunk
and % pages-the Introductory page.
are devoted to this sort of thing, anG
it is the highest society you meet dur.
hlS thc flo pages VI the DOCK. IneSe
400 and odd pages drag you through
stfnks and mud, slime, blood. fogs OF
1atty steam, fertilizers, offal, in which
ignorance, illiteraey beStiality are the
characteristics of the people who play
the parts in the unwholesome story Not
one whit above these does a single char
acter in the book rise at any moment.
There is not suggestion of wit, of
humor, of ordinary common-sense in
the book. 1t deals with degradation
from cover to cover, but it is degrada-
ton out of which but one or two char
acters in the book as depicted by Mr..
Sinclair would have ever arisen under
the most favorable circumstances. In
this lies the unfairnesS, the unjustness
of the attacks which he makes by
stringing together incidents of long
years in packing-house existence and
presenting them as everyday occur
rences, while the characters in the play
are people alien to American customs
and conditions, so stolid, so stupid that
they do not learn enough of the English
language in the four years of the sup
posed story or our supposed aequaint-
ance with them we will say, to make
them understood in ordinary conversa-
tion-not, enough for the brightest one
among them. Ona, the bride, to be able
TO make conductor understand that
she wants a Street-car transfer
1t is true that one of them, the BRIDE
groom, Jurgis. finally gets into politics:
but that is not difficult; he still could
not read and write, and when the last
page is turned in the book he has be-
come Socialist, an Anarchist. He
could not stand the trials which came
to him-and they were awful, it must
be admitted-so he took to drink and
used up the little money he had that
way, leaving his poor little wife to bear
the children. and the burden of caring
for them, and she was pretty, and the
foreman was brute-and then
The Instalment Plan.
Jurgis went very mad when his wife
confessed that 10 save him his place,
and to get food for her starving child.
she had gone wrong, and he tried to
Kill the foreman. Then his wife died
in childbirth, and he wept over her,
heartbroken, but he did not become a
man. He had never been one in reality.
He had been creature of blood and
Drawn. mere brute strength, gentle, it
is true, but with mere brute instincts,
lacking in brain power, and none ever
developed.
The story is tinged with blue on the
'instailment" plan. Jurgis buys a house
on the installment plan and is bitterly |
duped His prototype in this may bel
found in all the walks of life, from low
est to highest. They bought furniture
on the installment plan. Here again
they have aristocratic company. In and |
out in the Shiny story is woven the warp
of this installment plan of living and
being set out OF doors after a bitter I
struggle curdles the little life left in |
these Poles-or Lithuanians. OF course. |
this part OF the story is so common that |
we do not stop to comment on it; it |
only goes to show that human nature /
is the same everywhere, the disposition |
to put on good front, and make believe
that we have more than we really have. /
The sting of loss is 80 less bitter to the I
higher class than 1t is to the lower, only. 1
possibly, the higher class should have
had better sense than to be thus duped. |
But the story! All this is but the
filling.
Jurgis gets work in the packing house
just as soon as he comes to Chicago;
has been there but two days, in fact /
And the breaking hearts of women. life
crushed out of little children, strength of
strong men broken are but incidentals
in the story of "The Jungle" The whole
slam in the story. which was evidently
written for the purpose of Scanning"
is at the packing-house industry
Ycu read it, and YOU wonder just how
much is true and how much can be laid
to keen imagination and desire for "ef-
feet Common sense and a moderate
with conditions in pack
lighthouses gained from knowledge of
them from San Francisco to Boston
and that line will nearly take In every
great packing-house in the world-leads
the writer to believe that Mr.. Sinclair
has laid on his high lights with a view
TO immediate effect. and that they will
not stand full inspection
Jurgis went to the packing house TO
inspect II before he asked for work
there. and he sees the whole thing from
the great yards of the "Durham's"
Jurgis pronounced Yoorghis) got a
place In the killing beds" at the pack
fnghouse. 1.-The work which .iurgis
was to do here was very simple" the
book says. "and 1t took him only short
time to do 1t. He was provided with a
stin besom, such as is used by street
sweepers. and 1t was his place to follow
down the line the man who drew out
the smoking entrails from the carcass
of the steer This mass was to be
swept into a trap, which was then
closed. so that no one might slip into
1t. 1t was a sweltering July day,
and the place ran with steaming hot
blood-one waded in 1t on the floor The
stencil was almost overpowering. but to
Jurgis IL was nothing. His whole soul
was dancing with joy-he was at work.
He was paid the fabulous sum of
TN cents an hour" The conditions.
1t will be seen. did not revolt the man in
the least. and the story goes on to say
that he went home on the run to carry
the joyful tidings that he had earned
s1.50 the first day OF work in America
He would have worked a week for that
In his own country.