THE AIMS OF mi fWa i BY U.SINCLAIR(')€¦ · In chapter31,Sjnclajr shows a vision of Utopia open-handedly through the mouth of a socialist,Dr.Schliemann.There may be different ideas,of

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THE AIMS OF THE JUNGLE:BY U.SINCLAIR 81

THE AIMS OF m i f W a i BY U. SINCLAIR(')

NACHIGAMI, TasukuFukushima University

,I.PREFACB

It Seems reasonable that,before inquiring into the aims of The Jtmgle,(-')we divide it into two parts for convenience of analysis. 0ne part is from the opening chapter to the 27th cha_'oter,and the other is from the 28th to the last.The demarcation is Jurgis's conversion to socialism.

In the first half,Sinclair reveals the filthy and helpless working and living conditions of the packing workers suffering and groaning under capjtaljsm, focusing on the Lithuanian immigrant Jurgis and his family in the Packingtown district of chicago. And in the second half,Sinclair turns''his viewpoint from Jurgis to workingmen as a mass explains socialism,and cries for betterment.

II.ANALYSIS OF THE FIRST HALF

When Ju「giS,Who knows nothing about capitalism,sees “the stockyards,''his first imP「eSSiOn iS “it seemed a dream of wonder,with its tale of human energy,of things being done,of employment for thousands upon thousands of men,of opportunity and freedom,of life and love and joy.”(p.34)

It iS a hiStO「leaf fact that capitalism worked wonders in point of unleashing man's P「eductive POWe「S.And it is a historical fact too that the United States was a backward Count「y as a Capitalist country.As that was the case,the urgent business was to make uP the leeway and Catch up with any forward capitalist country.It was so urgent In Ame「iCa that it was accompanied by many grave evils-wages lower than those necessary fo「 the 「eP「eduction of working power;such collective and coercive intensification of labO「 as “Speeding up the gang.;” (p.61)no pay for any fraction of an hour These are only a few instances of increasing relative and absolute surplus values.0n the other hand,the monopolization in the United States had been making steady progress since the 「iSe Of its Capitalism.It also was attended by evils.0ne of the suitable instances

(1) This PaPe「 WaSorigina通y reported at the Semjnar oa American Literature (June 1_2 1968)held at Sendai,Japan, by Sendai American Cultural Center and Tohoku chapter AmericanLife「atu「e Society of Japan,The theme of the seminar was ''Social consciousness Expressedin American Literature.''

(2) The text used he「e iS the Signet Classic edition of 1960. All the subsequent references areto that edition.

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82 福島大学教育学部論集第20号 1968-11

was making putrid meat and tainted meat merchantable by chemical treatment.In the first half of The Jnngle,Sinclair inspects those evils from the standpoint of

sufferers.In other words,he is more concerned with revealing what is considered to be the results of the theory of surplus value than with analyzing the theory itself and verifying it in the work.That 'the terrible miserable workers”一another way of saying “the wage-slaves''do exist in American society,which has been proud of freedom and democracy,that the extremely dirty and filthy foodstuff does exist among the provisions they buy every day without any knowledge of sach tricks,- all these are the vicious secrets of the American eocietyof that time.What does Sinclair aim at by muckraking? While at first his aim is not clear,in order to accompli:h it he adopts a method of appealing to the readers'sensibility and humanism in the first half,as compared with an appeal to the readers'reason in the second half.For a proper understanding of the aim,it seems reasonable that we must follow the changes in Jurgis's consciousness and outlook on the community surrounding him.

Jurgis emigrates to America with a prejudice : “In that country,rich and poor,a man was free,it was said ; _ .he might do as he pleased,and count himself as good as any other man.SoAmerica was a place of which lovers and young people dreamed.”(p.27)After finding employment,he does not mind the “、,peeding up the gang,” and thinks “It was not the pleasantest work one could think of,but it was necessary work, and what more had a man the right to ask than a chance to do something useful,and to get good pay for doing it?" (p.61)and that “he had been round the world enough to know that a man has to shift for himself in it,and that if he gets the worst of it, there is nobody to listen to his holler.” (p.62) But his father's difficulty in getting a job and his fierce denunciation at the plant lead Jurgis to think “those might be right who had laughed at him for his faith in America.” (p.67)Against what is called “for the church” (p.91) i.e.extra work without pay, Jurgis begins to feel like fighting himself and finds that it seems a wonderful idea that “by combining they might be able to make a stand and conquer the packers!Jurgis wondered who had first thought of jt,and when he was told that it was a common thing for men to do in America, he got the first inkling of a meaning in the phra・e 'a free country.'''(p.91)Jurgis is willing to join the union,and di、_covers that he has brothers in affliction,and allies. Hjs wife Ona's hardships in making a llying make him think that workingwomen “ought not to marry,to have children.'(p,141) During his first imprisonment,hatred against the law and the fact that are on the side of power arises in him,and for the first time he fixe.,distrust of society in his mind.After release from prison,when he finds his house dispossessed and his family evicted,he is convinced that “the law was against them,the whole machinery of society was at their oppres・_ors'command!” (p. 178) Just after his son Antanas's accidental death,Jurgis instincti?ely runs away from home,desiring to“fling it off his shoulders,be free of it,the whole business,that night.”(p.210) And he makes up his mind that “he was going to think of himself,he was going to fight for himself,against the world that had baffled him and tortured him!”(p.210) But this declaration to fight means the loss of a ‘:・ense of solidarity as a member of the working class. Through the second experience of imprisonment, he bet、erne_.the henchman of a wicked politician,and a strikebreaker in the strike of 1904.

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THE AIMS OF THE JUNGLE BY U.SINCLAIR 83

When a new party,the Socialist Party,leaps into being,he is corrupted enough to be “content with his companion's explanation that the Socialists were the enemies of American institutions.''(p.256)He has no doubts whatever about carrying on a venal election campaign as a member of the anti-sor・ialist camp.After the second assault on the former boss of his dead wife,. Jurgis becomes a tramp again, and is starving, concerned only with getting something to eat,.when he wander.., into a political meeting, which is the turning-point of his conversion to socialism.

(AIM 1)Through the development of Jurgi、:,'s socialistic consciousness in the first half of The JungZe,Sinclair aims to transmit the experience of a single workman to all the workers, and moreover to emphasize that the extremely miserable life of workers should be attributed to “laissez-faire,” (p.62)that is,the absence of economic democracy in the United States.

(AIM 2)As for the conversion to the anti-socialist camp,Sinclair aims to give an emphatic contradiction to those who believe Americans have political democracy,by getting them to observe the corruption of the reactionary political world from wjthjn and to recognize its actual condition as the collapse of political democracy.

m.ANALYSIS OF THE SECOND HALF

Generally speaking, Americans have such a trend as this ; they offer a kind of 「esistance to any idea imported from foreign countries,especially to the idea aiming at Social reform such as socialism and Marxism.The t,end is indeed one part of their P「edisposition,but I believe they have another part that has been inherited from their ancestors.As evidence of my belief,I should like to take a few examples.

First,here is the testimony of the founders of the United States in The Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident,that all men are created equal,that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights,Governments are instituted among Men,deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed ;That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends,it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it,and to institute new Government;.laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form,as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.'''

Second,here is an example in the field of literature.In A Connectj'cfit yankee in K加g Arthttr's Court,Mark Twain makes the distinction between the country and the institutions :

You see my kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, act fe lts institutions or itsofficeholders.The country is the real thing,the substantial thing,the eternal thing ;it isthe thing to watch over,and care for,and be loyal to ; institutions are extraneous,theyare its mere clothing,and c1othiag can wear out,become ragged,cease to be comfortable,cease to protect the body from winter,disease,and death.To be 1oyal to rags,to shoutfor rags,to worship rags,to die for rags- that is a loyalty of unreason.._ .The citizenwho thinks he sees that the commonwealth's political clothes are worn out and yet holdshis peace and does not agitate for a new suit is disloyal ;he is a traitor.(pp.84_85)

So far I have dealt with the reformative side of American peaple. I come now to

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84 福島大学教育学部論集第20'Ii 1g68-11

the second half of The Jttngle,Sinclair makes clear the posture of socialists in the formulating of two propositions: “First, that a Socialist believes in the Common ownership and democratic management of the means of producing the necessities Of life ; and, second, that a socialist believes that the means by which this iS to be brought about is the class-conscious political organization of the wage-ea「no「S.'; (P・ 330)

Judging from this posture;it goes without saying that the two propositions a「e based upon his belief in the above-mentioned reformative character of Ame「jean People・ And to evoke jt he begins with the explanation of the miserable status quo Of WO「ke「S, and then he arranges the materials and fixes a clear rank of the we「king Class in the society.That may be called a kind of inductive procedure.

In chapter 31,Sjnclajr shows a vision of Utopia open-handedly through the mouth of a socialist,Dr.Schliemann.There may be different ideas,of course,about the vision; if we estimate jt at present.But I for one should like to raise a point fo「 analysis,not on the different ideas,but on the wav er method to get to the desi「able goal, Utopia・

From such a point of view,we find that Sinclair offers three methods to get the「e, examines them comparatively,denying what he thinks to be inefficient and inCO「「eCt。 The first is the method based upon Christianity ; the second,the method by Which betterment is to be found without a basic change in the characte「 Of the P「eSent system; the third, the method by which a basic change in the charaCte「 Of the present system is to be brought at:)out.concerning the first method, Sinclair brings forward a problem in chapte「 29 as

follows :'.'the Socialist movement was a world movement,anorganiz'ationof all mankind to estabtjsh ljberty and fraternity. It was the new religion of humanity - o「 you might say it was the fulfilment of the old religion,since it implied but the literal application of all the teachings of Christ.” (p.310) And then,he tells through Lucas that Ch「1st was '、'the world''s first revolutionist,the true founder of the Socialist movement,''(P・ 328)but he concludes that the present Christian organizations are part of the established order crushing men down and beating them,and “a Civic Federation decoy-duck fo「 the chloroforming of the wage workingman.” (p.330) About Christianity itself, it would not be a realizable method even if ''the kingdom of Heaven''were replaced by

“the co_operative commonwealth,''because it is 'within you,.” (p.331) he thinks,and denies it,

concerning the second method,Sinclair affirms that “one of the necessa「y accom- paniments of capitalism in a democracy is political corruption.' (p.338) So long as capitalism depends upon wage_slavery,the workingman cannot wish for any bette「mont in the true sense of the word,Sinclair tells through an orator,“We shall have the Sham reformers self_stultified an self - convicted; we shall have the radical Democ「aCy left without a lie with which to cover its nakedness!” (p.341) and that is the denial Of the second method.

when we come to the third method,it is essential to go further into details aboutsome concrete means by which Sinclair aims at the basic change in the cha「acto「Of the present system. He suggests two means : first,a relatively moderate mearls,“the working class should go to the polls and seize the powers et governmer・t,and Put an

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THE AIMS OF THE JUNGLE BY U.SINCLAIR 85

end to private property in the means of production''(p.308);Second,a 「adiCal meanS, i.e. a revolution by the uprising of the working class. As fo「 the latte「 means : in the speech In chapter 28, the orator of which is regarded as SinClai「 himself, he compares ‘‘Labor” to “a mighty giant'' (p.302) and expects the giant tOSti「, Snap a fetter spring to his feet,and shout in his new-born exultation・And in the Closing speech of the book he cries, 'the rallying of the outraged WO「kingmen Of Chicago to our standard 1 And we shall organize them,we sha11drm them,We Shall ma「Shat them for the victory 1 we shall bear down the opposition,We shall Sweep it bete「e uS・” (P・ 341) Behind these expectations, I judge,there lies Sinclai「'S implicit admission of revolution.

After analyzing the second half of The Jungle from the Point Of View Of examining several methods that sjnclajr offers to get to the desirable goal fo「 the WO「kingman' I should like to conclude by asserting that Sinclair 31ms at the emancipation Of the wage slaves by a radical means by which the capitalistic system iS to be fundamentally changed,and that he never believes any Othe「 means・

(June 30,1968)

Bibliography

sjnclajr,Upton ; The Jungle,Signet Classics,1960R1deout wa1ter B ; The Radjcal Notle1 in the Urn'ted States 1900-1954, ila「Va「d UniVe「Sity

Press,1956.Twain Mark : A connectj'cut Yankee m .Ktng Arthur's COu「t,Signet Classics,1963・Frledr1ch,carl J.and Mcc1oskey,Robert G.(Eds.): From the DeCla「atiOn Of Independence to

the constitution,Forum Books,1954・