The Jungle
Upton Sinclair (1906)
“The novel that aimed at America's heart and hit its stomach — a muckraking masterpiece that changed federal law and exposed the human cost of industrial capitalism.”
Character Analysis
A Lithuanian immigrant of extraordinary physical strength and naive optimism. His refrain — 'I will work harder' — is the American Dream's creed, and the novel exists to demonstrate why that creed is a lie when the system is rigged. Jurgis's arc moves from faith through destruction to political consciousness. He is less a psychologically complex character than a representative figure: the immigrant worker as capitalism's raw material, processed and discarded.
Simple, direct, physical. His speech is translated from Lithuanian and rendered as plain English. His language contracts as his hope diminishes — fewer words, shorter sentences.