Title: Oil!
Description: Sinclair's 1927 novel did for California's oil industry what The Jungle did for Chicago's meat-packing factories. In Oil! Upton Sinclair fashioned a novel out of the oil scandals of the Harding administration, providing in the process a detailed picture of the development of the oil industry in Southern California. Bribery of public officials, class warfare, and international rivalry over oil production are the context for Sinclair's story of a genial independent oil developer and his son, whose sympathy with the oilfield workers and socialist organizers fuels a running debate with his father. Senators, small investors, oil magnates, a Hollywood film star, and a crusading evangelist people the pages of this lively novel.
Subjects: Fiction, Petroleum industry and trade, Petroleum industry and trade in fiction, Southern california in fiction, Motion picture industry, Motion picture industry in fiction, Drama, California in fiction, Classic Literature, Historical Fiction, Literature, Government policy, American fiction (fictional works by one author), California, fiction, Fiction, political, Political fiction, Fiction, general, Fiction, historical, general, Motion picture industry, fiction, Political plays, Corrupt practices
Places: Southern California, California
LC classification: PS