Important Quotations Explained
1. Here
was a population, low-class and mostly foreign, hanging always on
the verge of starvation, and dependent for its opportunities of
life upon the whim of men every bit as brutal and unscrupulous as
the old-time slave drivers; under such circumstances immorality
was exactly as inevitable, and as prevalent, as it was under the
system of chattel slavery. Things that were quite unspeakable went
on there in the packing houses all the time, and were taken for granted
by everybody; only they did not show, as in the old slavery times,
because there was no difference in color between master and slave.
This quote from Chapter 10 comes
from Sinclair’s explanation of Ona’s working conditions; she is
forced to work under Miss Henderson, who runs a prostitution ring,
and most of her coworkers are prostitutes. Sinclair presents these
conditions as a horrible situation for the modest, moral Ona but
also offers an explanation in which the system of prostitution is
examined in rough economic terms. As with every other failing among
the working class in the novel, prostitution is shown not as an
innate fault of the women involved but rather as the fault of the
capitalists and the economic oppression that they force upon the
impoverished immigrants. This passage also hints at the sexual oppression
that young working girls are forced to endure from their bosses
and foreshadows Ona’s rape at the hands of Phil Connor.
Additionally, the last sentence raises a Marxist argument
about the appearance of calm surrounding social relations under
capitalism. The argument runs that social relations under capitalism
are no less exploitative than those that existed under slavery and
in feudal societies but that capitalism conceals the true turbulent
nature of these relationships under a veneer of naturalness and
inevitability. The difference between wage labor and these antiquated
forms of subjugation is only a matter of transparency; though the
“difference in color between master and slave” is no longer applicable
to the owner-laborer relationship, the oppression remains the same.
2. [T]he
meat would be shoveled into carts, and the man who did the shoveling
would not trouble to lift out a rat even when he saw one—there were
things that went into the sausage in comparison with which a poisoned
rat was a tidbit. There was no place for the men to wash their hands before
they ate their dinner, and so they made a practice of washing them
in the water that was to be ladled into the sausage. There were
the butt-ends of smoked meat, and the scraps of corned beef, and
all the odds and ends of the waste of the plants, that would be
dumped into old barrels in the cellar and left there. Under the
system of rigid economy which the packers enforced, there were some
jobs that it only paid to do once in a long time, and among these
was the cleaning out of the waste barrels. Every spring they did
it; and in the barrels would be dirt and rust and old nails and stale
water—and cartload after cartload of it would be taken up and dumped
into the hoppers with fresh meat, and sent out to the public’s breakfast.
This long description from Chapter 14 is
among the most famous and influential passages in the novel and
helps to explain why the book caused so much public furor upon its
publication. Sinclair intended the book to raise public consciousness
about the plight of the working poor, but he relied on a pseudo-naturalistic
technique that emphasized the physically revolting filth and gore
of the stockyards. As a result, the novel caused outrage about the
unsanitary quality of the meat that was sold in stores rather than
the oppression of the poor. The public pressed less for the socialist
reforms that Sinclair backed than the public reform to food laws.
The image of all kinds of waste being dumped in with the consumer’s
product is surely revolting; that it is dumped in without any regard
for the consumer by greedy capitalists is infuriating. Sinclair
himself stated: “I aimed at the public’s heart, and by accident
I hit it in the stomach.”
3. They
put him in a place where the snow could not beat in, where the cold
could not eat through his bones; they brought him food and drink—why,
in the name of heaven, if they must punish him, did they not put
his family in jail and leave him outside—why could they find no
better way to punish him than to leave three weak women and six
helpless children to starve and freeze?
This quote from Chapter 16 explains
Jurgis’s mindset when he is sent to prison after attacking Phil
Connor. Ironically, to Jurgis, the prison is actually an environment
far preferable to the cruel, filthy world of Packingtown. Here he
receives shelter from the elements and food without having to do
anything; he believes that his family members are the real prisoners,
as, without his support, they now face starvation and eviction.
It is a measure of Jurgis’s sympathy and of the horrible conditions
that the family is forced to endure that Jurgis actually wishes
that his family were sent to prison in his place. Additionally,
Jurgis’s rhetorical question at the end of the quote speaks to the
cold and unsympathetic nature of capitalism: if the women and children
cannot earn the means to survive, it is because they aren’t productive
enough as laborers.
4. All
day long the blazing midsummer sun beat down upon that square mile
of abominations: upon tens of thousands of cattle crowded into pens
whose wooden floors stank and steamed contagion; upon bare, blistering,
cinder-strewn railroad tracks, and huge blocks of dingy meat factories, whose
labyrinthine passages defied a breath of fresh air to penetrate
them; and there were not merely rivers of hot blood, and carloads
of moist flesh, and rendering vats and soap caldrons, glue factories
and fertilizer tanks, that smelt like the craters of hell—there
were also tons of garbage festering in the sun, and the greasy laundry
of the workers hung out to dry, and dining rooms littered with food
and black with flies, and toilet rooms that were open sewers.
This descriptive passage from Chapter 26 portrays
the rank and festering physical environment in which the Packingtown
laborers are forced to live, helping to explain why Jurgis found
prison so preferable. The passage also shows off the lurid, pseudo-naturalistic
style that Sinclair adopted for the novel, which matches his flair
for physical description with his desire to shock and disgust his
readers. He captures the disgusting filth and general unbearableness
of Packingtown in the images of “floors [that] stank and steamed
contagion” and “blistering . . . railroad tracks.” Furthermore,
he breaks down the meat-packing plant into the raw, nauseating elements
of “rivers of hot blood” and “carloads of moist flesh.” This repulsiveness plagues
not only the factories but also the laborers and their living quarters;
they have “greasy laundry” and sordid bathrooms. Sinclair deliberately
makes his readers feel uncomfortable in the hopes of stirring up
their sympathy, and The Jungle is full of vivid
and stomach-churning passages such as this one.
5. To
Jurgis the packers had been equivalent to fate; Ostrinski showed
him that they were the Beef Trust. They were a gigantic combination
of capital, which had crushed all opposition, and overthrown the
laws of the land, and was preying upon the people.
This quote from Chapter 29 illustrates
the effect of Jurgis’s adoption of socialism upon his mind. He previously
considers the capitalists “equivalent to fate,” believing them to
be all-powerful, impersonal, inhuman forces that have total control
over his life. But Ostrinski convinces him that the capitalists
are merely corrupt human beings who immorally oppress other human
beings. Jurgis realizes here that the only difference between the
capitalists and the workers lies in money, for while the capitalists
have “a gigantic combination of capital,” the workers have nothing.
But, as the speech at the end of the novel emphasizes, there are
many more workers than capitalists, which could enable the socialist
party to overthrow the hegemony of capitalism in a democratic system.
This quote demonstrates the opening of Jurgis’s mind to politics
and economics, as he takes up the socialist cause with a fervor
at least as strong as that with which he initially embraces capitalism
and the American Dream.
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