The jungle
(Book)

The Jungle is a 1906 novel written by muckraking journalist Upton Sinclair. Sinclair wrote the novel to portray the life of the immigrant in America, but readers were more concerned with the large portion pertaining to the corruption of the American meatpacking industry during the early-20th century, and the book is now often interpreted and taught as only an exposure of the industry of meatpacking. This was not Sinclair's intention for the book though and not what he would have liked it to be famous for. The novel depicts in harsh tones poverty, absence of social programs, unpleasant living and working conditions, and hopelessness prevalent among the working class, which is contrasted with the deeply-rooted corruption on the part of those in power. Sinclair's observations of the state of turn-of-the-century labor were placed front and center for the American public to see, suggesting that something needed to be changed to get rid of American wage slavery. (Amazon)