As Jurgis and his family arrive in Packingtown, the narrator uses auditory imagery and a simile of buzzing swarms to describe their first impressions of the place:
Then the party became aware of another strange thing. This, too, like the color, was a thing elemental; it was a sound, a sound made up of ten thousand little sounds. You scarcely noticed it at first—it sunk into your consciousness, a vague disturbance, a trouble. It was like the murmuring of the bees in the spring, the whisperings of the forest; it suggested endless activity, the rumblings of a world in motion.
The author employs vivid sensory language to depict the Lithuanian family’s first auditory experience of the stockyards and Packingtown. The ambient sounds they encounter are described as "a thing elemental," emphasizing their power and the impossibility of comparing them to anything else. The auditory environment is so unlike anything they have encountered that it defies description. The use of imagery allows readers to imagine the immersive effect of these sounds on the characters. They hear Packingtown before they see it or smell it.
The simile comparing the sound to "the murmuring of the bees in the spring, the whisperings of the forest" also enhances the sensory experience of the passage for the reader. This large group of Lithuanian immigrants are country people: they’ve never encountered an industrial hub like this, and so their only point of comparison are sounds from the natural world. These natural images also refer to “endless activity” and the “rumblings” of large groups of things at work. Packingtown is always operating, like a beehive or a forest. The imagery of the sound “sinking into” the characters’ consciousness and creating a “vague disturbance” evokes a sense of unease. The sounds, even from this distance, are not a pleasant hum of activity. They are—at this early point—a flood of overwhelming size and unknown origin.
When the group of Lithuanian immigrants—including Jurgis and his family—initially arrive at Packingtown, they observe a strange and new series of weather patterns and architectural shapes. The narrator employs foreshadowing, hyperbolic language, and the sensory language of sight to create a vivid and ominous atmosphere in this scene. The group sees:
[...] half a dozen chimneys, tall as the tallest of buildings, touching the very sky—and leaping from them half a dozen columns of smoke, thick, oily, and black as night. It might have come from the center of the world, this smoke, where the fires of the ages still smolder [...] driving all before it, a perpetual explosion. It was inexhaustible; one stared, waiting to see it stop, but still the great streams rolled out. They spread in vast clouds overhead, writhing, curling; then, uniting in one giant river, they streamed away down the sky, stretching a black pall as far as the eye could reach.
The author uses visual imagery to paint a bleak picture of the family’s new home. Before they even get out of the train, they note that the landscape is getting "hideous and bare." Thick columns of dark, oily smoke rise from the stockyards and towers, casting an eerie pall over the surroundings. This visual imagery evokes a sense of darkness and destruction, setting the stage for the difficulties that lie ahead. Descriptions such as "tall as the tallest of buildings" and "stretching a black pall as far as the eye could reach" create an impression of immense proportions.
The chimneys of the stockyards and the processing plant are hyperbolically described as towering structures that seem to touch the “very sky.” These exaggerated statements underscore the overwhelming nature of the industrial landscape and the daunting obstacles faced by Jurgis and his family. Of course, these buildings aren’t really touching the sky, and the smoke isn’t “inexhaustible,” but they seem that way to Jurgis and his companions. Having never seen anything like Chicago's bulk and sprawl before, they are overwhelmed by its scale.
Foreshadowing is present here too, subtly hinting at the troubles that await Jurgis and his family. The foreboding nature of this first view of the factoryscape suggests that it will bring hardship and adversity. The reader is left with a sense of unease, suspecting that the stockyards will present significant challenges for the characters. The reader is transported into the grim reality of the meat factory and its "jungle" of indentured workers. Packingtown is a place where dark smoke fills the air, and the challenges faced by its immigrant communities loom large.
When describing the horrific conditions in some parts of the meat-packing trade, the narrator makes allusions to the works of the authors Dante Alighieri and Émile Zola. These, along with the visceral tactile imagery of the passage, provide context for the horrifying scenes at the stockyards:
[...] to hear this man describe the animals which came to his place would have been worthwhile for a Dante or a Zola. It seemed that they must have agencies all over the country, to hunt out old and crippled and diseased cattle to be canned. There were cattle which had been fed on 'whisky-malt,' the refuse of the breweries, and had become what the men called 'steerly'—which means covered with boils. It was a nasty job killing these, for when you plunged your knife into them they would burst and splash foul-smelling stuff into your face.
The narrator alludes to the hellish scenes depicted in Dante’s Inferno, as well as to the writings of Zola. Both of these authors famously wrote about journeys through hell. In referring to them in this way, Sinclair is drawing to mind the roiling, awful scenes of sinners in eternal damnation for his reader. The allusion illustrates the brutal, bloody horrors and scale of the stockyards. It also adds a timeless, eternal quality to the scene for the audience and emphasizes the gruesome nature and inescapability of the environment.
Additionally, Sinclair employs tactile imagery to portray the repulsive and diseased conditions of some of the cattle. Although there are no situations in the stockyards that would usually be considered pleasant, some of the cattle-processing work is worse than the rest. Sinclair depicts the horrible physical state of “steerly” cattle with vivid depictions of boils bursting and foul-smelling fluids splashing. The reader feels the sticky, unclean sensation of this “nasty job” as the narrator describes the “plunging” of the knives and the “foul-smelling” liquids they emit.
The Jungle was one of the first novels to describe the repugnant conditions and gruesome tasks faced by the workers in Chicago’s processing plants. In these harrowing moments, the reader's understanding of the immense challenges and dangers of stockyard work becomes nauseatingly realistic.
Sinclair employs scent imagery to evoke pathos and highlight Jurgis's pitiful state after he has fled the scene of his wife's dangerous childbirth. As he sits in a saloon relishing its warmth, the narrator tells the reader that:
It was too good to last, however—like all things in this hard world. His soaked clothing began to steam, and the horrible stench of fertilizer to fill the room. In an hour or so the packing houses would be closing and the men coming in from their work; and they would not come into a place that smelt of Jurgis.
Jurgis is sitting in a bar waiting to hear the news of Ona's dangerous labor from Madame Haupt, a midwife he cannot afford. He knows he doesn’t have long until he’s kicked out into the cold, since he has no money to keep buying drinks. This anxiety is made worse by the fact that he knows he stinks. His entire body is soaked in particles of fertilizer from the factory, and they give off a horrifying odor. Even among the laborers of Packingtown, who all endure horrible conditions, working as a fertilizer man is considered an unbearable job.
By emphasizing the stench of fertilizer and its widespread effect on the room, Sinclair creates a vivid image of Jurgis's deplorable physical condition. The narrator suggests that the stench repels even his fellow workers, who might refuse to enter a place “that smelt of Jurgis.” Notice here that the narrator says “Jurgis” and not “fertilizer,” implying that it is the man himself who produces the stench, not the manure he’s coated in. The foul odor is just one aspect of his degradation and isolation. Jurgis has hit rock bottom and has nowhere to go. This portrayal—of a stinking, lonely, desperate man—elicits sympathy from the reader, invoking their sense of pathos. Rather than feeling disgusted by Jurgis, Sinclair asks the reader to consider the pitiful circumstances he faces in a world of hardship and indifference.
The narrator vividly describes Jurgis's observation of a child working metal at a steelworks factory. In this passage, Sinclair uses a simile and the sensory language of sound to compare the metallic ringing of steelworking to that of a train speeding through the dark:
The sounds of the bits of steel striking upon each other was like the music of an express train as one hears it in a sleeping car at night.
The “music of an express train,” as Sinclair describes it, is an unusually romantic form of auditory imagery in The Jungle. The language of this passage implies that Jurgis feels a sense of freedom and hope when he hears the sounds of steel production. It’s the opposite of the claustrophobic, nauseating atmosphere of the fertilizer plant and the stockyards. It recalls the initial hopefulness of the Lithuanian family’s journey to America, and it seems far away from the grim reality of Chicago.
At the beginning of his time at the steelworks, Jurgis is genuinely hopeful for a new beginning. The simile points to his dream for a better future with this new career, even in a cacophonously loud and dangerous industrial environment. The simile of the steel sounds as the train's "music" invokes both the aggressive nature of the work and the rhythmic quality of the sounds of production. Of course, Jurgis's tenure at the steel mill is very short-lived as it soon closes for business, but it's the only entirely happy workplace environment he experiences in the entire novel.
Sinclair utilizes rich, opulent visual imagery to contrast the extreme splendor of Frederick Jones's palatial apartment with Jurgis's penniless existence as a beggar. When he walks into Freddie’s apartment with the young drunkard, Jurgis sees:
[...] a domed ceiling from which the light poured, and walls that were one enormous painting—nymphs and dryads dancing in a flower-strewn glade [...] so real that Jurgis thought that it was some work of enchantment, that he was in a dream palace. Then his eyes passed to the long table in the center of the hall, a table black as ebony, and gleaming with wrought silver and gold. In the center of it was a huge carven bowl, with the glistening gleam of ferns and the red and purple of rare orchids, glowing from a light hidden somewhere in their midst.
The author vividly describes the lushness of Freddie's apartment through this visual imagery, emphasizing its enormity, richness, and many "wrought" details. The apartment is a plush, welcoming haven. This seems especially so when it's held up against the filth and stink of Jurgis's world of killing floors, frozen mud, and stinking chemicals. It's the opposite of his day-to-day life, which is overwhelmingly filled with dirt, ice and grayness at this stage of the book.
Freddie's abode is warm, bright with "red and purple" tones and glowing with golden light. Everything is “gleaming” and “huge” and “rare,” allowing the reader to feel the same sense of awe Freddie’s apartment provokes in the protagonist. The laborer feels like he's walked into a "dream palace" upon entering this wealthy boy's paradise.
Through this sensory language, Sinclair accentuates the stark disparity between the luxurious world inhabited by wealthy capitalist leaders like Freddie’s family and the harsh reality faced by Jurgis and the working-class population of Chicago. The description serves to intensify the sense of yearning for a better life that Jurgis feels. He can’t believe the sheer opulence of Freddie’s abode is real, and he feels intensely out of place and envious.
Toward the end of the novel, Sinclair uses tactile imagery to depict the physical excitement experienced by a wealthy lady attending a socialist rally. Jurgis, sitting uncomfortably next to her, observes:
She sat as one turned to stone, her hands clenched tightly in her lap, so tightly that he could see the cords standing out in her wrists. There was a look of excitement upon her face, of tense effort, as of one struggling mightily, or witnessing a struggle. There was a faint quivering of her nostrils; and now and then she would moisten her lips with feverish haste. Her bosom rose and fell as she breathed, and her excitement seemed to mount higher and higher [...]
Through this vivid description of the lady's physical reactions, Sinclair immerses the reader in the intensity of the meeting's atmosphere. As Jurgis sits next to her, he observes how every part of her body is affected by the speech. Although she sits "like one turned to stone," it is as if her entire being is “struggling” to remain still. She is so overexcited that it’s if she has contracted a "fever" from the speaker's words. Her clenched hands, quivering nostrils, and rapid lip moistening create a tangible sense of her heightened state of excitement and attention.
This tactile imagery emphasizes the profound impact of the speaker's words on his audience. This chapter's primary focus is the message Jurgis takes from this meeting, and this woman's reaction is the first inclination that something unusual is happening. His fixation on her responses implies that Jurgis recognizes the power of the speaker before he even focuses on his words. He can't help but observe and be profoundly affected by her intense response.
