The Jungle And The Progressive Era

In many ways, the time period in which an author lives greatly affects their writing. The time period influences an author in how they write, and also in what the author writes about. The events during the lifetime of Upton Sinclair influenced his writing enormously. During the 1900’s the working conditions of the meat-packing industry were very harsh. Many workers were injured and many were even killed. Countless Americans at this time were not aware of the terrible conditions the workers were going through. Along with this, Americans were also not aware of the lies the meat-packing plants were telling them. Upton Sinclair wrote the novel The Jungle to expose the conditions of the meat-packing plants, as well as to change the conditions …show more content…
Sinclair used these events to his advantage to write a novel about. Sinclair not only wrote in depth about the meat-packing industry, but also went as far as becoming a worker himself in the industry to be able to write exactly what it was like. Sinclair spent many weeks in Packingtown to gather information to include into his novel. Sinclair used this information to expose the meat-packing plants (The Jungle and the Progressive Era). Although many Americans ate the food the plants provided, not many Americans actually new what is was that they were consuming. Sinclair surprised many Americans with the details of the plants they were not aware of; “His description of diseased, rotten, and contaminated meat shocked the public and led to new federal food safety laws”(Meat Packing Lies: Exposing The Fiction Of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle). After spending several weeks obtaining information, Sinclair was able to use his information to expose to America what the meat-packing industry was truly like (The Jungle and the Progressive …show more content…
Sinclair was given a $500 advance to write his novel to help expose the meat-packing industry (Conditions in Meatpacking Plants). This not only helped Sinclair start the writing of his novel, but also motivated him more to want to expose the true horrors of the meat-packing plants. Sinclair, being a journalist and activist, took up the opportunity and wrote the novel to expose the companies. Because he was an activist, Upton Sinclair wanted to see a change in the world regarding the meat-packing industry. As an activist he hoped that in writing his novel he would start an improvement in the meat-packing industry. Upton Sinclair simply wanted to see America become a better place, and in writing his novel he was able to make that happen. His purpose for his novel was to let Americans around the country become aware of what was truly going on in the meat-packing plants, in which case he greatly succeeded (The Jungle and the Progressive