The historical fiction book, The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair, is about the fictional character Jurgis Rudkus. Jurgis lives in Chicago in the early 1900’s. He had moved to America from Lithonia in search of a better life. “Jurgis could see all the truth now-could see himself through the whole long course of events, the victim of ravenous vultures that had torn into his vitals and devoured him; of fiends that had racked and tortured him, mocking him, meantime jeering in his face” (Sinclair 177). Since moving to Chicago, life was anything but easy for Jurgis and his family.
The Movie Cinderella Man is about the real life boxer James Braddock. The movie takes place in New York and New Jersey, during The Great Depression. Beginning in 1929 before the stock market crash and then into The Great Depression. “I have to believe that when things are bad I can change them”. This is an actual quote from James that was included in the movie. Although Jurgis and James are different, they both have similar physical traits, but different family traits and personal values. “Jurgis Rudkus, …. he with the mighty shoulders and giant hands”(Sinclair 8).
Jurgis was a big and strong man, which combined with him being an immigrant got him his job. He did not speak English in the beginning so he could easily be tricked or even treated poorly. He keeps his job until he sprains his ankle. He then cannot work for a month or so. During that time he was unable to get out of bed, which is at the cost of his physical condition. “He was no longer the finest looking man in the throng… he was thin and haggard, and his clothes were seedy, and he looked miserable”(Sinclair 125). After that Jurgis had a hard time finding a job.
He looked and looked and spent lots of time out of work until he got to the fertilizer plant. He spends time as a tramp where he starts to feel better and look better but not long after he goes back to work in the city and ends up haggard and dirty once again. He is know where near as strong as he was originally nor is he quite the same size. While working in the tunnel being dug under the city he gets hit by rail car and hurts his shoulder once again being out of work. Jurgis spends more time hurt and than James and his physical condition depended more on what was going on in the story.
James however stays about the same in physical appearance and fitness in the movie. Although it is said that he will need to train before fighting again. James does break his hand which prevents him from boxing but he still takes a job at the docks with his hurt arm. Once he heals and can get back to boxing is when he begins to train again. He does not change from then until the end of the movie. Both characters are more alike in the beginning of both the book and the movie. Yes, they are alike in hair color as the book says and you can see from the movie. However, as the book progresses they are not alike in physical fitness.
They were both affected by different situations to cause this difference. James’ broken arm did not prevent him from working and moving in general. Jurgis was confined to the bed and unable to walk. Which is why for physical their physical traits that they are different. Jurgis had to care for a large family of twelve who all lived in this house with him and his wife Ona. In the beginning, six family members could work to provide for them. Although only 5 originally actually did work. Jurgis’s father dies which takes away an income from them. He and Ona then had a son.
“One morning Ona stayed home, and jurgis had the man docter, according to his whim, and she was safely delivered of a fine baby. It was an enormous boy” (Sinclair 109). He was named after Jurgis father Antanas. Later another family member goes missing who was the brother of Ona’s step mother who also lives with them her young children. Teta Elzbeta(Ona’s stepmother) the has to get a job as well. So these three and Ona’s cousin Maria are all that’s left soon in the book to provide for them. Ona later becomes pregnant again and dies in Childbirth. Leaving only the 3 adults left to provide for them.
His son Antanas dies because he drowned in the street. Jurgis is so heart broken he just leaves the family. He spends a lot of the book after that away from them. He does come back towards the end of the book to help support them. He does not live with them he just helps support them. James has a much smaller family. He and his wife and there three children. They struggled to get by on James’ salary alone. At one point James promises his oldest son that he and his siblings would not be sent away. His son had a fear of it because one of his friends had to do the same thing.
When they cannot keep the power on in their house, Mae, James’ wife acts alone and has the kids sent to her sisters where it is warm. James was upset but he then went out and got the money to get them back. James is able to keep his children at home for the rest of the movie. Both James and Jurgis lose their family. However, James gets everyone he lost back. Jurgis could not get all of his family back because they had died. James also does not purposely abandon his family. I will work harder. “No! No! I dare not! It will ruin us! ‘ But he answers her again: ‘Leave it to me; leave it to me. I will earn more money.
I will work harder” (Sinclair 25). No matter the financial situation they were in at the beginning of the book, Jurgis would not give up. Antanas was Jurigs’s life, he was all he had left. After abandoning the family he lived as a tramp and stole to get food. He also worked for farmers part time and during the harvest. After being in and out of jail he meets Jack Duane a criminal who had a good education but was a safecracker. He and Jack become muggers. He knew how it felt to be victim so at first he was uneasy about it, but he soon got over it. Jurgis works his way up to fixing an election and becomes a scab boss.
He once had lots of faith in America and hoped to make a living honestly. But he then steals from people who earned their money on their own. After his job as a scab boss and he fixes an election and then loses his job. He and the rest of the family were not afraid to beg in the streets if they had to. He spends a couple of nights sleeping in a church during a meeting. A few of the meetings were groups of men that would get angry when he slept and would snore. He ended up in a specific meeting, where this woman found him sleeping but told him to listen. Once he started to listen he learned about socialism.
Jurgis was ecstatic to hear about it. He felt like a different person. “Poor Jurgis was not very happy about his home life... and when things went wrong he could solace himself with a plunge into the Socialist machine movement… His life was a commonplace and uninteresting; he was a hotel porter, and expected to remain one while he lived; but meantime, in the realm of thought, his life was a perpetual adventure” (Sinclair 235). He was happy he now had something he could get behind. James does not leave his family during the movie purposely and always tries to provide for them.
He also was kind of a prideful man because it took a lot for him to have to ask for money. He went to the people who ran the boxing association, asked for money, and received Government assistance. As soon as he was fighting again and making money, he paid back the government. His son stole salami and James was very angry about it. He told his son that no matter how bad it was they would never steal. James never resorts to doing anything like mugging people to make a living. They both have to beg at different times. But James only does once and tries to avoid it.
Jurgis was became a mugger and help corrupt business men stay in power. Although Jurgis later turns around and realizes what he did wrong. It still makes he and James very different, as James would never go that far. Although Jurgis and James are different, they both have similar physical traits, but different family traits and personal values. “Jurgis could see all the truth now-could see himself through the whole long course of events, the victim of ravenous vultures that had torn into his vitals and devoured him; of fiends that had racked and tortured him, mocking him, meantime jeering in his ace” (Sinclair 177).
This quote about Jurgis is what makes Jurgis and James more different than alike. Jurgis has so much more tragedy in his life than James. Those tragedies are what makes Jurgis, become a criminal and beg in the street. If James had similar situations who knows how he may have handled them differently. They are alike in the physical aspect at the beginning of the book. They both face hardships, but Jurgis goes through so much more. In the End they are not that alike.
