Sinclair, Upton - 1878–1968, American novelist and socialist, b. Baltimore, grad. College of the City of New York, 1897. He was one of the muckrakers, and an interest in social and industrial reform underlies most of his writing. The Jungle (1906), a brutally graphic novel of the Chicago stockyards, aroused great public indignation and led to reform of federal food inspection laws. With the money from that novel, Sinclair established in 1906 his short-lived socialist community, Helicon Home Colony, at Englewood, N.J. Among Sinclair's other novels exposing social evils are King Coal (1917), Oil! (1927), Boston (on the Sacco-Vanzetti Case, 1928), and Little Steel (1938). In his social studies, such as The Brass Check (1919), on journalism, and The Goose-Step (1923), on education, he tried to uncover the harmful effects of capitalist economic pressure on institutions of learning and culture. An ardent socialist, Sinclair was in and out of the American Socialist party. In 1934 he was defeated as the Democratic candidate for governor of California. World's End (1940) is the first of a cycle of 11 novels that deal with world events since 1914 and feature the fictional Lanny Budd as hero; the third, Dragon's Teeth (1942), won a Pulitzer Prize. Many of Sinclair's more than 80 books have been widely translated, and he is one of the best-known American authors in Europe. See his autobiography (1962) and reminiscences, American Outpost (1932) and My Lifetime in Letters (1960). See also study by F. Dell (1927, repr. 1970); bibliography by R. Gottesman (1973). The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright© 2004, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products N.V. All rights reserved. |
The first abolitionist young Allan meets in Boston is Levi Coffin, the reputed founder of the Underground Railroad. In this first of many meetings with historical figures, Allan forms a friendship with Coffin, who eventually takes him to hear a speech by former slave Frederick Douglass. Douglass's powerful words cement Allan's transformation into an abolitionist -- a transformation that will lead him back to his Deep South home with the hope of freeing slaves and eventually back to the North and the fateful Battle of Manassas.
