The Jungle

Upton Sinclair's novelThe Jungle, which inspired passage in 1906 of the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act, stands as a classic of twentieth-century American literature and social protest. In this accessible and thorough edition by Christopher Phelps, a critical introduction addresses the wide range of issues raised by the text, including early twentieth-century working conditions, immigrant community, race and gender, political reform, and the continuing relevance of Sinclair's investigation. This edition uses the most widely recognized text ofThe Jungle the Doubleday, Page edition published in 1906 and provides an illuminating supporting document: President Theodore Roosevelt's delivery to Congress of the official report that confirmedThe Jungle's shocking allegations about the Chicago meatpacking industry. Questions for consideration, a chronology, and a selected bibliography help contextualize Sinclair's novel and provide students with resources for further study.

CHRISTOPHER PHELPS is associate professor of History at The Ohio State University at Mansfield. A specialist in twentieth-century American intellectual and political history, he is the author of Young Sidney Hook: Marxist and Pragmatist (1997), in addition to numerous journal articles and reviews. Most recently, he edited and introduced Max Shachtman's Race and Revolution for Verso (2003). He has twice received the Fulbright Award: in 2000 to teach American philosophy and intellectual history in Hungary, and in 2004-2005 to serve as Distinguished Chair in American Studies for Poland. 

Contents

    Foreword
    Preface
    A Note about the Text
    
PART ONE

Introduction: Upton Sinclair and the Social Novel

Into The Jungle

Muckraking and Reform in the Progressive Era

The Politics of Socialism and Labor

The Novel as Social History: Immigration, Ethnicity, Gender,

and Race in The Jungle

The Jungle as Literature

Upton Sinclair and the Legacy of The Jungle

Is It Still True?
    
PART TWO

The Jungle
    
PART THREE

Related Document
Charles P. Neill and James Bronson Reynolds, Conditions

in Chicago Stock Yards, June 4, 1906
    
Appendixes
       An Upton Sinclair Chronology (1878–1968)
       Questions for Consideration
       Selected Bibliography
 Index