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Oil!
In Oil! Upton Sinclair fashioned a novel out of the oil scandals of the Harding administration, providing in the process a detailed picture of the development of the oil industry in Southern California. Bribery of public officials, class warfare, and international rivalry over oil production are the context for Sinclair's story of a genial independent oil developer and his son, whose sympathy with the oilfield workers and socialist organizers fuels a running debate with his father. Senators, small investors, oil magnates, a Hollywood film star, and a crusading evangelist people the pages of this lively novel.
528 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1926
About the author
Upton Sinclair
682 books1,044 followersUpton Beall Sinclair, Jr. was an American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres. He achieved popularity in the first half of the twentieth century, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle (1906). To gather information for the novel, Sinclair spent seven weeks undercover working in the meat packing plants of Chicago. These direct experiences exposed the horrific conditions in the U.S. meat packing industry, causing a public uproar that contributed in part to the passage a few months later of the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act. The Jungle has remained continuously in print since its initial publication. In 1919, he published The Brass Check, a muckraking exposé of American journalism that publicized the issue of yellow journalism and the limitations of the “free press” in the United States. Four years after the initial publication of The Brass Check, the first code of ethics for journalists was created. Time magazine called him "a man with every gift except humor and silence." In 1943, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
Sinclair also ran unsuccessfully for Congress as a Socialist, and was the Democratic Party nominee for Governor of California in 1934, though his highly progressive campaign was defeated.
Sinclair also ran unsuccessfully for Congress as a Socialist, and was the Democratic Party nominee for Governor of California in 1934, though his highly progressive campaign was defeated.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 776 reviews
December 27, 2007
Oil! is one of my favorite American novels, because Sinclair was fascinated and bewildered by the beginnings of mass-consumer culture here in the U.S., and his descriptions here of oil rigs, cars, radios, jazz music, and Hollywood are very perceptive and eye-opening. Sinclair knew that we were losing something of ourselves as we bought into high convenience--but at the same time he loved driving fast on the newly paved hills of Southern California. The opening chapter is a tour-de-force description of taking a 50 mph drive in those early days. If you like to try to imagine what life was like back then, the details throughout the novel are invaluable. If you like true-to-life characters, well, that was never Sinclair's forte. That said however, the story in Oil! is probably the most affecting one he ever wrote, due to the complicated loving-though-debased father-son relationship at its core. It's true that the novel is didactic and that Sinclair was a socialist, so you may not agree with all the Big Points he tries to arrive at--but the ride he takes you on to get there is exhilarating for anyone interested in how the so-called "American century" was born.
February 8, 2015
Upton Sinclair drank my milkshake....he drank it up! I thought I was going to read a book about the oil industry in California circa 1920 but ended up with a book about World Communism. Oh well, at least it was interesting.
June 26, 2012
Oil! is not The Jungle, but it's damn close. In keeping with the politically-minded storyteller's way of using a fictional narrative to drive home a point, Sinclair has this time chosen a California oil baron and his idealistic son as the vehicles with which to air his own beliefs about corporate corruption and greed. Being a dutiful journalist, Sinclair does his best to show both sides of the story, giving examples of how big business doesn't only rape the land, but also keeps the common man employed, etc. He even spends a good deal of time displaying, in a very Fitzgerald-esque way, the carefree lifestyle led by the foppish son and daughter heirs to oil fortune. But make no mistake about it, Sinclair was always on the working man's side...
The movie There Will Be Blood is based on this book, but the two are quite different. I love Daniel Day Lewis' maniacal tyrant, but he's a murderous loon compared to the character from Oil!. The book is politics and people. The movie is about a person...one crazy-ass person.
The movie There Will Be Blood is based on this book, but the two are quite different. I love Daniel Day Lewis' maniacal tyrant, but he's a murderous loon compared to the character from Oil!. The book is politics and people. The movie is about a person...one crazy-ass person.
February 4, 2010
Like many of the other reviewers here I also read this book after seeing There Will Be Blood. Enough has been said about the differences between the novel and the film, so there's no need for me to chime in on that topic.
Sinclair definitely knows how to tell a story. The opening pages narrating Bunny's and "Dad's" high-speed drive through the hills of California en route to an oil lease signing, grabbed me and kept me turning the pages. It wasn't until about half to three quarters of the way through the novel that the narrative turned more towards a debate between socialism and communism, with some sprinklings of narrative that echoed the feel of the first half of the novel. Overall I enjoyed it and have recommended it to several of my friends who still believe in reading books.
A couple of my impressions of the novel:
While the oil industry and associated government corruption were portrayed in a damning light, I was surprised at how the majority of the main characters were portrayed in a balanced, human way - except for one particular character, I felt no one was portrayed as an extreme angel or villain. Being a muckraker, I had expected Sinclair to portray "Dad" as a sinister fat cat oil baron, rather than someone who was taking actions simply because that's how things were done in the oil industry, whether he agreed with them or not. In fact, Dad is the little guy who is - to a large extent - at the mercy of the large oil concerns who are really setting the rules of the game.
The latter half of the book gets bogged down in what seems to be a comparison between socialism and communism. Although propaganda at the time was trying to paint him as a communist, it seemed to me that he was more firmly planted in the socialist camp, though not 100% committed (despite his real-life work with the Socialist Party). He constantly brings up the violent aspects of he Bolshevik movement in the States and in Europe, but never to the degree of total condemnation. Bunny's constant inner conflict over which camp was the "right one" for him, left me with the strong impression that this inner conflict was a direct mirror of Sinclair's frame of mind at the time, and writing this section of the book was his way of weighing both ideologies and working things out for himself.
This novel paired with Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged would create a great opportunity for discussion in a lit. course or book group.
Sinclair definitely knows how to tell a story. The opening pages narrating Bunny's and "Dad's" high-speed drive through the hills of California en route to an oil lease signing, grabbed me and kept me turning the pages. It wasn't until about half to three quarters of the way through the novel that the narrative turned more towards a debate between socialism and communism, with some sprinklings of narrative that echoed the feel of the first half of the novel. Overall I enjoyed it and have recommended it to several of my friends who still believe in reading books.
A couple of my impressions of the novel:
While the oil industry and associated government corruption were portrayed in a damning light, I was surprised at how the majority of the main characters were portrayed in a balanced, human way - except for one particular character, I felt no one was portrayed as an extreme angel or villain. Being a muckraker, I had expected Sinclair to portray "Dad" as a sinister fat cat oil baron, rather than someone who was taking actions simply because that's how things were done in the oil industry, whether he agreed with them or not. In fact, Dad is the little guy who is - to a large extent - at the mercy of the large oil concerns who are really setting the rules of the game.
The latter half of the book gets bogged down in what seems to be a comparison between socialism and communism. Although propaganda at the time was trying to paint him as a communist, it seemed to me that he was more firmly planted in the socialist camp, though not 100% committed (despite his real-life work with the Socialist Party). He constantly brings up the violent aspects of he Bolshevik movement in the States and in Europe, but never to the degree of total condemnation. Bunny's constant inner conflict over which camp was the "right one" for him, left me with the strong impression that this inner conflict was a direct mirror of Sinclair's frame of mind at the time, and writing this section of the book was his way of weighing both ideologies and working things out for himself.
This novel paired with Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged would create a great opportunity for discussion in a lit. course or book group.
September 11, 2023
Sinclair wrote with the fervent energy of a true believer, but the entire time I read the book, I approached it with the perspective of history in mind. History has basically shown Sinclair, and those who subscribed to his idealistic view of the "workers", to be wrong. The camps that he describes for (basically) a good Socialist society at the end of the book were tried and failed.
This book was written in 1927 and has nothing but praise for the Soviets, claiming that the only reason we heard bad things on this side of the Atlantic was because of jingoistic journalism that was manipulated by the power brokers. Again, history shows this to be categorically untrue, especially when Lenin himself referred to people like Sinclair as "useful idiots."
And the worst part is, I can forgive the weak writing style in favor of the ardent idealism - if I can divorce the facts of the world from how Sinclair viewed them. But it gets tiring, as the book devolves, basically, into a whiny drone about how unfair it is that there are winners and losers at all. Everyone can agree that there need to be regulations and a truly free market cannot sustain itself, but the converse is true, that the "workers paradise" envisioned by Sinclair is a pipe dream manufactured by propagandists and power hounds (look at the history Chicago, for Pete's sake).
The one disturbing thing is that the rhetoric is so familiar in the present day. According to Sinclair, WWI was about oil. WWII was going to be about Oil. Apparently that drum beat has been pounding about every war America has ever gotten into. Is it completely true?
Still, I would love to find out how Sinclair would have reacted to the end result of Stalin's machinations: all are equal, none are special and all efforts are directed to the betterment not of the self but the state. Sinclair even advances the ideal of putting people in khakis only to get rid of "fashion" -- which sounds achingly familiar to something that was tried in the past as well.
So, it's interesting to read this from an historical perspective, it just devolves into whiny idealism by the end.
This book was written in 1927 and has nothing but praise for the Soviets, claiming that the only reason we heard bad things on this side of the Atlantic was because of jingoistic journalism that was manipulated by the power brokers. Again, history shows this to be categorically untrue, especially when Lenin himself referred to people like Sinclair as "useful idiots."
And the worst part is, I can forgive the weak writing style in favor of the ardent idealism - if I can divorce the facts of the world from how Sinclair viewed them. But it gets tiring, as the book devolves, basically, into a whiny drone about how unfair it is that there are winners and losers at all. Everyone can agree that there need to be regulations and a truly free market cannot sustain itself, but the converse is true, that the "workers paradise" envisioned by Sinclair is a pipe dream manufactured by propagandists and power hounds (look at the history Chicago, for Pete's sake).
The one disturbing thing is that the rhetoric is so familiar in the present day. According to Sinclair, WWI was about oil. WWII was going to be about Oil. Apparently that drum beat has been pounding about every war America has ever gotten into. Is it completely true?
Still, I would love to find out how Sinclair would have reacted to the end result of Stalin's machinations: all are equal, none are special and all efforts are directed to the betterment not of the self but the state. Sinclair even advances the ideal of putting people in khakis only to get rid of "fashion" -- which sounds achingly familiar to something that was tried in the past as well.
So, it's interesting to read this from an historical perspective, it just devolves into whiny idealism by the end.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 30, 2019
The Jungle will always be Sinclair's most acclaimed work, and rightly so given its impact, but I believe that Oil! has just as much relevance to contemporary life, if not more so, and deserves to be as well-known as its more venerable sibling even if it did not spur the same reforms of the oil industry that The Jungle did for food preparation and handling. I was spurred to read it after a rewatch of Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood, and the novel is so different from, and more complex than, the film adaptation that they probably should not be considered strictly related. Anderson's film is a small, close study, with Daniel Day-Lewis' oil tycoon patriarch a cryptic, amoral madman, whereas Sinclair's sprawling epic of ambition and capitalism has the son as its vastly subtler and more complex protagonist, arguing for and against several political philosophies against the backdrop of World War 1, the Teapot Dome scandal, evangelical religious revivalism, the film industry, and the generally explosive growth of Southern California. As always with books vs movie questions, one should decide how much the snappier running time and enhanced aesthetic experience of a film outweighs the greater richness and depth of a novel, but there is so much great stuff in Oil! that isn't the film that it deserves to be experienced as its own masterwork, particularly its exploration of how internal leftist debates interact with public opinion and the forces of big business.
In fairness to Anderson, ones of Sinclair's weaknesses as an author is that it can be difficult to tell his digressions from his details, which is probably why the movie really only uses the plot from about the first 100 pages and then does its own thing. The very first chapter is a lengthy, floridly overwritten dramatization of J. Arnold Ross Sr. and Jr. driving into California to investigate some oil leases, but the story picks up rapidly and Senior, a small-time oilman, begins gradually making it big through smart investments and some cunning. He's a tough negotiator, and not averse to greasing the palms of public officials when necessary, but he's not at all like his movie depiction; he's always fair to his workers and generally supportive though skeptical of his son's ideological meanderings. His son, nicknamed Bunny, is the real main character, and over the course of the book he loyally defends his father's line of work to the various leftists and socialists he encounters as he gets continually more and more involved in the world of radical politics, especially after he meets Paul Watkins, a tough-minded worker, and his brother Eli, a religious charlatan (both played by Paul Dano in the movie). Like any good class traitor, Bunny feels guilty about the increasing wealth and privilege he accumulates as his father's business continues to expand, but that doesn't stop him from dating actresses and "reluctantly" enjoying the F. Scott Fitzgerald high society lifestyle while at the same time attempting to use his wealth for good. Eventually the brutal repression of socialists and anarchists after World War 1 in the Palmer Raids leads to Paul's being beaten to death at the hands of the authorities, and the novel ends with a solemn resignation at the unstoppable power of the impersonal capitalist juggernaut.
What's interesting is that the novel is for the most part quite nuanced and almost sympathetic in its explorations of industry and power. The Jungle, written 20 years before, was much more stridently anti-capitalist, but Oil! portrays the the struggle between large businesses and small for market share with real enthusiasm, and Sinclair openly admires the mix of guile, dedication, and vision it takes for an entrepreneur to grow from a small operator to a major political player. Ross and his operation in "Beach City" is an only barely fictionalized depiction of the real-life Edward Doheny's development of Huntington Beach in Orange County, and Sinclair's melancholy illustration of all levels of government as corrupt, feckless, and reactionary fits into a long tradition of California-as-American-microcosm, like in Chinatown, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, etc. At various points Bunny attempts to stand up to Vernon Roscoe, his father's much more ruthless business partner and the bad cop of capitalism to his father's good cop, and Roscoe's powerful defenses of the inexorable logic of capitalism are right in line with the famous monologues in Wall Street, Other People's Money, etc. By the end of the book the triumph of capitalism is taken as practically unavoidable, but at many points the characters are given room to portray this as an actual good thing, which Sinclair did not do in The Jungle. The oil industry has many casualties over the course of the novel, but Sinclair leaves it up to the reader to picture what if anything would change under a socialist system. With the hindsight of a hundred years, we can see that real-life socialist countries don't seem to have discovered a clearly superior method for resource extraction, but that doesn't make the imperial cruelty of the oil barons at the incredibly modest demands of the workers for simple wage increases any easier to swallow.
It's notable that all of the radicals Bunny encounters are well-meaning but ultimately doomed, whether by pointless factionalism, naivete, or government hostility via strike-breaking and state-sanctioned brutality. Sinclair spends a good deal of time on how the cannibalistic disputes between the various flavors of socialists, communists, anarchists, and leftists were unavoidable but ultimately meaningless, as the real powers operated with impunity on a plane far above them, and one does not have to think very hard to see how the equivalent forces of oligarchy ensure that the same system operates today. I was reminded of Steinbeck's In Dubious Battle, set a decade later, and how how liberal reformers in the FDR administration defused much of this kind of radical pressure with pro-union policy as part of the New Deal, but Sinclair can't bring himself to write anything close to the redemptive ending that Steinbeck was so fond of, and Paul's ultimate death at the hands of an anti-union goon squad is nothing but a fatalistic reminder of the power of unchecked greed. Even worse, Eli is able to cynically use his brother's death to advance his immense evangelist movement, making one long for the violent comeuppance Anderson gave him in the film. And even though Bunny and his new wife Rachel dedicate his inheritance to establishing institutions of reform, Sinclair doesn't have any illusions that they will matter greatly; all of the antagonists (and even Bunny's father) not only escape any consequences for their corruption in the Teapot Dome scandal, they successfully install Coolidge as president in a landslide.
Since this is historical fiction, it's easy to take the gloomy irrelevance of the American socialist movement as inevitable (though it is curious that Eugene Debs' surprisingly successful campaigns for president go unmentioned during the discussions about the viability of electoralism), I think the book raises a lot of excellent questions about how leftists should proceed when history is in motion. It goes without saying that none of the warmongering, nativist, plutocratic, petroleum-obsessed, reactionary impulses on display in the novel have left the American political landscape, yet it remains to be seen whether the current resurgence of socialism in the US is authentic or permanent. Oil! vastly improves on There Will Be Blood in its understand of how systems are far more powerful than individual men and women, and though Sinclair's own experience with electoral politics - he ran for governor of California less than a decade after Oil! was published and was crushed - does not provide a particularly inspiring example of how to challenge entrenched interests, perhaps now that even greater challenges like climate change are no longer quite so ignorable, a politics of kindness will be more successful now than it was back in his era.
In fairness to Anderson, ones of Sinclair's weaknesses as an author is that it can be difficult to tell his digressions from his details, which is probably why the movie really only uses the plot from about the first 100 pages and then does its own thing. The very first chapter is a lengthy, floridly overwritten dramatization of J. Arnold Ross Sr. and Jr. driving into California to investigate some oil leases, but the story picks up rapidly and Senior, a small-time oilman, begins gradually making it big through smart investments and some cunning. He's a tough negotiator, and not averse to greasing the palms of public officials when necessary, but he's not at all like his movie depiction; he's always fair to his workers and generally supportive though skeptical of his son's ideological meanderings. His son, nicknamed Bunny, is the real main character, and over the course of the book he loyally defends his father's line of work to the various leftists and socialists he encounters as he gets continually more and more involved in the world of radical politics, especially after he meets Paul Watkins, a tough-minded worker, and his brother Eli, a religious charlatan (both played by Paul Dano in the movie). Like any good class traitor, Bunny feels guilty about the increasing wealth and privilege he accumulates as his father's business continues to expand, but that doesn't stop him from dating actresses and "reluctantly" enjoying the F. Scott Fitzgerald high society lifestyle while at the same time attempting to use his wealth for good. Eventually the brutal repression of socialists and anarchists after World War 1 in the Palmer Raids leads to Paul's being beaten to death at the hands of the authorities, and the novel ends with a solemn resignation at the unstoppable power of the impersonal capitalist juggernaut.
What's interesting is that the novel is for the most part quite nuanced and almost sympathetic in its explorations of industry and power. The Jungle, written 20 years before, was much more stridently anti-capitalist, but Oil! portrays the the struggle between large businesses and small for market share with real enthusiasm, and Sinclair openly admires the mix of guile, dedication, and vision it takes for an entrepreneur to grow from a small operator to a major political player. Ross and his operation in "Beach City" is an only barely fictionalized depiction of the real-life Edward Doheny's development of Huntington Beach in Orange County, and Sinclair's melancholy illustration of all levels of government as corrupt, feckless, and reactionary fits into a long tradition of California-as-American-microcosm, like in Chinatown, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, etc. At various points Bunny attempts to stand up to Vernon Roscoe, his father's much more ruthless business partner and the bad cop of capitalism to his father's good cop, and Roscoe's powerful defenses of the inexorable logic of capitalism are right in line with the famous monologues in Wall Street, Other People's Money, etc. By the end of the book the triumph of capitalism is taken as practically unavoidable, but at many points the characters are given room to portray this as an actual good thing, which Sinclair did not do in The Jungle. The oil industry has many casualties over the course of the novel, but Sinclair leaves it up to the reader to picture what if anything would change under a socialist system. With the hindsight of a hundred years, we can see that real-life socialist countries don't seem to have discovered a clearly superior method for resource extraction, but that doesn't make the imperial cruelty of the oil barons at the incredibly modest demands of the workers for simple wage increases any easier to swallow.
It's notable that all of the radicals Bunny encounters are well-meaning but ultimately doomed, whether by pointless factionalism, naivete, or government hostility via strike-breaking and state-sanctioned brutality. Sinclair spends a good deal of time on how the cannibalistic disputes between the various flavors of socialists, communists, anarchists, and leftists were unavoidable but ultimately meaningless, as the real powers operated with impunity on a plane far above them, and one does not have to think very hard to see how the equivalent forces of oligarchy ensure that the same system operates today. I was reminded of Steinbeck's In Dubious Battle, set a decade later, and how how liberal reformers in the FDR administration defused much of this kind of radical pressure with pro-union policy as part of the New Deal, but Sinclair can't bring himself to write anything close to the redemptive ending that Steinbeck was so fond of, and Paul's ultimate death at the hands of an anti-union goon squad is nothing but a fatalistic reminder of the power of unchecked greed. Even worse, Eli is able to cynically use his brother's death to advance his immense evangelist movement, making one long for the violent comeuppance Anderson gave him in the film. And even though Bunny and his new wife Rachel dedicate his inheritance to establishing institutions of reform, Sinclair doesn't have any illusions that they will matter greatly; all of the antagonists (and even Bunny's father) not only escape any consequences for their corruption in the Teapot Dome scandal, they successfully install Coolidge as president in a landslide.
Since this is historical fiction, it's easy to take the gloomy irrelevance of the American socialist movement as inevitable (though it is curious that Eugene Debs' surprisingly successful campaigns for president go unmentioned during the discussions about the viability of electoralism), I think the book raises a lot of excellent questions about how leftists should proceed when history is in motion. It goes without saying that none of the warmongering, nativist, plutocratic, petroleum-obsessed, reactionary impulses on display in the novel have left the American political landscape, yet it remains to be seen whether the current resurgence of socialism in the US is authentic or permanent. Oil! vastly improves on There Will Be Blood in its understand of how systems are far more powerful than individual men and women, and though Sinclair's own experience with electoral politics - he ran for governor of California less than a decade after Oil! was published and was crushed - does not provide a particularly inspiring example of how to challenge entrenched interests, perhaps now that even greater challenges like climate change are no longer quite so ignorable, a politics of kindness will be more successful now than it was back in his era.
December 9, 2020
Als er ÖL! (OIL!; 1927) veröffentlichte, war Upton Sinclair schon lange eine öffentliche Figur, seine sozialen, sozialtreformerischen, teils sozialistischen Ansichten und Pläne hinlänglich bekannt und er hatte schon mehrfach versucht, in politische Ämter zu gelangen, um seinen Plänen auch Taten folgen zu lassen. Dennoch wird der damalige Leser zunächst kaum erwartet haben, daß in einem Roman, der offensichtlich im Milieu der Ölindustrie spielt, ein junger Sozialist die Hauptrolle spielt und über viele, viele Seiten hinweg sozialistisches Gedankengut dialogisch aufbereitet wird. Genau das aber bietet der Autor in diesem Werk, von dem er selbst behauptet, wie für kein anderes Recherche betrieben zu haben. Eine augenzwinkernde Aussage, da sie sich vor allem darauf bezog, daß er Jahre in Südkalifornien gelebt und dort den Ölboom der 20er Jahre hautnah miterlebt hatte.
ÖL! Ist – vor allem anderen – ein Coming-of-Age-Roman, eine Éducation sentimentale. Vor allem Letzteres, wenn man bedenkt, daß der Held aus Flauberts gleichnamigen Roman trotz all seiner Entwicklungen und Erfahrungen schlußendlich dort endet, wo er begonnen hat – in der von ihm gekannten und wenig goutierten Mittelschicht. Auch James „Bunny“ Ross Jr., der Hauptprotagonist in SInclairs Roman, müht sich, der eigenen Klasse zu entkommen – sozusagen in die andere Richtung – und muß doch im Laufe der Jahre erkennen, daß das gar nicht so einfach ist, wenn man sich erst einmal an einen gewissen Lebensstil und ein gewisses Einkommen gewöhnt hat. Und an Liebeleien, die ohne ein gewisses Vermögen kaum denkbar sind.
Wir begegnen ihm und seinem Vater, James Arnold Ross, zu Beginn des Buches auf dem Weg zu einem Treffen mit Parzellenbesitzern in Südkalifornien, die sich zusammengeschlossen haben und ihr Land gemeinschaftlich verpachten wollen, in der Hoffnung, an möglichen Ölbohrungen partizipieren zu können. Wir erleben Ross Sr. dabei, wie er zwar fair, aber äußerst hart mit den Parzellenbesitzern verhandelt und mit dem Druck, den er auf sie ausübt, seine Verhandlungsposition zusehends verbessert. Während dieser Verhandlungen sitzt Ross Jr., jetzt noch ein Kind von gerade mal elf Jahren, dabei und hört zu – er soll lernen. Doch irgendwann erregt eine Stimme vor dem Fenster seine Aufmerksamkeit, er geht in den Hof des Hauses, in dem sie sich befinden, und trifft hier auf den hungrigen Paul Watkins.
Diese Begegnung wird Bunnys Leben bestimmen, denn Watkins, wollte man dialektisch denken, ist die Antithese zu allem, was Bunnys Welt ausmacht und ausmachen wird. Während die Firma des Alten prosperiert und die Familie Ross immer reicher wird, entwickelt sich Paul zu einem Sozialisten, später zu einem Kommunisten. Da Bunny seinen Vater bittet, mit ihm zur Farm der Watkins´ zu fahren, wo sie eigentlich nur Wachteln schießen wollen, dort aber bald Öl finden, verweben sich die Familiengeschichten miteinander. Der alte Ross kauft den Watkins die Farm ab, womit er der Familie aus bitterer Armut hilft, sie zugleich aber auch um die Reichtümer ihres Landes bringt, die nun ihm gehören. Das Ölfeld auf dem Land der Watkins und umliegenden Ländereien, die Ross sen. nach und nach aufkauft, ist immens und begründet seinen Aufstieg in die Liga der führenden Ölgesellschaften – zumindest die Liga der unabhängigen Ölgesellschaften.
Zwischen Bunny und Paul entsteht eine lebenslange Freundschaft, die vor allem für Bunny von Bedeutung ist, da er durch seinen Freund Bodenhaftung behält und sein Sozialgewissen ausbildet. In späteren Jahren treibt er sich als junger Mann an der Universität lieber in sozialistischen Kreisen herum, als mit seinesgleichen Tennis zu spielen oder auf Filmpremieren zu gehen. Doch taucht er auch in die Kreise der High Society ein, ist lange mit einer Schauspielerin liiert, weiß die Vorteile von Geld und Ruhm durchaus zu genießen. Und doch wird er eben auch als der „rote Ölprinz“ bekannt, da er wieder und wieder – vot allem bei Streiks – Positionen wider die eigene Klasse einnimmt.
Sinclair beschreibt nicht nur die Härte des Ölgeschäfts, auch die Härte der Arbeit auf den Feldern, an den Bohrtürmen und -löchern, und wie auf allen Ebenen mit härtesten Bandagen gekämpft wird, sondern – in einer Art Parallelmontage – eben auch die Entwicklungen der amerikanischen Linken in den 1920er Jahren. Die Auseinandersetzungen zwischen Sozialreformern, Sozialisten und Kommunisten werden vor dem Leser ausgebreitet und der sollte wissen, ob ihn diese Kämpfe und Streitereien interessieren, nehmen sie auf den fast 800 Seiten des Romans doch einen beträchtlichen Teil ein.
Sinclair gelingt es aber auch, mit viel Humor und Ironie von der Entwicklung des jungen Mannes, Bunny Ross, zu erzählen. Angesiedelt ist das alles in fiktiven Orten wie „Beach City“ und „Angel City“, doch liegt es nahe, daß man es mit Los Angeles und dessen Satelliten zu tun hat. So wurde „Beach City“ immer als Huntington Beach eingeordnet, einem Küstenort, südlich des eigentlichen Los Angeles angesiedelt. Sinclair betrachtet das Leben und Treiben in Südkalifornien mit einer Mischung aus Abneigung gegenüber der Dekadenz und der daraus resultierenden Ignoranz gegenüber den sozial Schwachen und einer gewissen distanzierten Ironie, mit welcher er den Lebensstil von Filmstars und Wirtschaftsmagnaten beschreibt.
Der Roman sorgte für Skandale und durfte teils nur gekürzt erscheinen, weil der Autor auch vor – für die späten 20er Jahre durchaus eindeutigen – sexuellen Anspielungen und einigen sehr eindeutigen Szenen nicht Halt macht. Die Darstellung der Entwicklung eines jungen, wohlbehüteten und doch auch recht intelligenten Mannes, der sich an seiner Herkunft reibt und aus den Schranken und Korsetten seiner Klasse auszubrechen versucht, ist äußerst gelungen und treffsicher. Daß dieser junge Mann letztlich dem Reichtum verhaftet bleibt – auch wenn er einen beträchtlichen Teil davon einbüßt und das, was ihm bleibt, für „die Bewegung“ einzusetzen sich müht – ist in der inneren Logik dessen, was Sinclair beschreibt, nur folgerichtig. Eher muten Bunnys Gewissen und seine soziale Ader in Bezug auf die amerikanische Wirklichkeit auch jener Jahre märchenhaft an. In Bunny Roos erfindet der Autor eine Figur, wie sie in Amerika vielleicht – zumindest in Erzählungen, Legenden und Märchen – gern gesehen wird, die aber in der Realität so kaum anzutreffen sein wird.
Geschickt versteht es Sinclair, die Zeitläufte in sein Werk einzubauen. Das ganze Konstrukt der Familie Ross beruht lose auf dem Vorbild von Edward L. Doheny, einem self-made-millionaire, wie auch Ross sen. einer ist. Dafür, das merkt man Sinclairs Text an, hat er durchaus auch Respekt. Der alte Ross ist ein Glücksritter, der sich hochgearbeitet und es schließlich zu etwas gebracht hat. Er zeigt auch ein gewisses Interesse an den Ideen seines Sohnes, ist im Zweifelsfall aber immer bereit, Widersprüche als normalen Lauf des Lebens zu akzeptieren. Er will keine Streikbrecher einsetzen, beugt sich aber den Leitlinien der Vereinigung der Ölgesellschaften, er will gern helfen, doch geht seine Hilfe nie so weit, daß seine eigenen Unternehmungen dabei irgendwie gefährdet wären. Zu Fall kommt er schließlich durch politische Ranküne, an der sein späterer Kompagnon beteiligt ist.
Sinclair bezieht also viele zeitgenössische Skandale und politische sowie gesellschaftliche Entwicklungen in seinen Roman ein[1]. Politische Verstrickungen und Intrigen, Korruption, die Brutalität dieser spezifisch amerikanischen Form des Kapitalismus, die vor Gewalt nie zurückschreckte, die Kälte gegenüber sozial Schwachen und die Eitelkeiten der Reichen, Kalifornien nicht als „gelobtes Land“ und Sonnenscheinstaat, sondern als ein von Bohrtürmen verunstaltetes und durch Bohrlöcher in eine Kraterlandschaft verwandeltes, nahezu rechtsfreies Territorium – all das lässt sich in ÖL! hervorragend nachverfolgen und nachvollziehen. Wie sein Freund und großes Vorbild Jack London zuvor den Goldrausch beschrieben hatte und die ungeheure Mühsal und Brutalität, die es erforderte, in den Weiten Alaskas zu bestehen, so schildert Upton Sinclair in ÖL! den Rausch des „schwarzen Goldes“, der ebensolche Aufbruchstimmung und Gier hervorgerufen hatte, jedoch mit anderen Mitteln und Bandagen ausgefochten wurde.
Es lässt sich darüber streiten, ob das literarisch wirklich groß ist. Paul Thomas Anderson, dessen Film THERE WILL BE BLOOD (2007) nach eigener Aussage auf die ersten 150 Seiten des Buches rekurriert, ist der Ansicht, der Roman sei weder gut, noch sonderlich bekannt. Es mag an dieser Sichtweise liegen, daß seine Geschichte fundamental von der des Buches abweicht. Eigentlich bedient er sich lediglich einer Nebenfigur – Paul Watkins hat einen religiös verbrämten Bruder, Eli, durch Ross sen. eher aus Spaß dazu angestachelt, eine „Kirche der dritten Offenbarung“ zu gründen und der damit sehr, sehr reich wird; Sinclair stellt also auch diesen dialektischen Bezug her: Kapitalismus, Kommunismus (dem häufig eine säkulare Heils- und Erlösungserzählung unterstellt wird) und dem (protestantischen) Glaube, der dann selbst wieder nach kapitalistischen Regeln funktioniert – um seinen Film in die für ihn passende Bahn zu lenken. Doch kann man seinem Urteil nicht ganz widersprechen.
So sehr der Roman auch Spaß macht, während man ihn liest, gerade weil Sinclair sich der Mittel von Ironie und Humor bedient, um die Geschichte zu erzählen und seine Figuren damit auch nicht allzu ernst nimmt, wirken Teile doch wie Seminaren einer Kaderschule entnommen. Man liest sich durch lange Passagen, in denen eine Art Vulgärsozialismus gepredigt wird, der – auch im Buch – weitestgehend folgenlos bleibt. Natürlich gibt die Geschichte Sinclair letztlich recht, denn der Sozialismus hat nie, nicht einmal in den schweren Jahren der Depression, als Franklin D. Roosevelt nahezu sozialistische staatliche Programme auflegte, eine Chance gehabt, in den USA anerkannt oder gar goutiert zu werden. Es werden soziale Mißstände und politische Skandale angeprangert, doch geändert hat es nichts. So ist ÖL! vielleicht als Zeitdokument für jene interessant, die sich für die amerikanische Geschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts interessieren.
Dennoch bleibt es ein gut konstruierter, süffig zu lesender, und immer unterhaltsamer Roman der amerikanischen Moderne. Nicht der beste, nicht der einflußreichste, aber sicherlich kein schlechtes Buch.
[1] Dieser Text bezieht sich auf die Taschenbuch Ausgabe des Manesse-Verlags, München, einer Neuübersetzung durch Andrea Ott. Dankenswerterweise hat der Verlag dem Roman einen ausgreifenden Anhang hinzugefügt, der sehr genaue Auskünfte über die Realbezüge gibt. Ein Nachwort von Ilija Trojanow rundet das Buch ab und gibt essayistisch Einblick in die literarische wie soziale und gesellschaftliche Verortung des Buches.
ÖL! Ist – vor allem anderen – ein Coming-of-Age-Roman, eine Éducation sentimentale. Vor allem Letzteres, wenn man bedenkt, daß der Held aus Flauberts gleichnamigen Roman trotz all seiner Entwicklungen und Erfahrungen schlußendlich dort endet, wo er begonnen hat – in der von ihm gekannten und wenig goutierten Mittelschicht. Auch James „Bunny“ Ross Jr., der Hauptprotagonist in SInclairs Roman, müht sich, der eigenen Klasse zu entkommen – sozusagen in die andere Richtung – und muß doch im Laufe der Jahre erkennen, daß das gar nicht so einfach ist, wenn man sich erst einmal an einen gewissen Lebensstil und ein gewisses Einkommen gewöhnt hat. Und an Liebeleien, die ohne ein gewisses Vermögen kaum denkbar sind.
Wir begegnen ihm und seinem Vater, James Arnold Ross, zu Beginn des Buches auf dem Weg zu einem Treffen mit Parzellenbesitzern in Südkalifornien, die sich zusammengeschlossen haben und ihr Land gemeinschaftlich verpachten wollen, in der Hoffnung, an möglichen Ölbohrungen partizipieren zu können. Wir erleben Ross Sr. dabei, wie er zwar fair, aber äußerst hart mit den Parzellenbesitzern verhandelt und mit dem Druck, den er auf sie ausübt, seine Verhandlungsposition zusehends verbessert. Während dieser Verhandlungen sitzt Ross Jr., jetzt noch ein Kind von gerade mal elf Jahren, dabei und hört zu – er soll lernen. Doch irgendwann erregt eine Stimme vor dem Fenster seine Aufmerksamkeit, er geht in den Hof des Hauses, in dem sie sich befinden, und trifft hier auf den hungrigen Paul Watkins.
Diese Begegnung wird Bunnys Leben bestimmen, denn Watkins, wollte man dialektisch denken, ist die Antithese zu allem, was Bunnys Welt ausmacht und ausmachen wird. Während die Firma des Alten prosperiert und die Familie Ross immer reicher wird, entwickelt sich Paul zu einem Sozialisten, später zu einem Kommunisten. Da Bunny seinen Vater bittet, mit ihm zur Farm der Watkins´ zu fahren, wo sie eigentlich nur Wachteln schießen wollen, dort aber bald Öl finden, verweben sich die Familiengeschichten miteinander. Der alte Ross kauft den Watkins die Farm ab, womit er der Familie aus bitterer Armut hilft, sie zugleich aber auch um die Reichtümer ihres Landes bringt, die nun ihm gehören. Das Ölfeld auf dem Land der Watkins und umliegenden Ländereien, die Ross sen. nach und nach aufkauft, ist immens und begründet seinen Aufstieg in die Liga der führenden Ölgesellschaften – zumindest die Liga der unabhängigen Ölgesellschaften.
Zwischen Bunny und Paul entsteht eine lebenslange Freundschaft, die vor allem für Bunny von Bedeutung ist, da er durch seinen Freund Bodenhaftung behält und sein Sozialgewissen ausbildet. In späteren Jahren treibt er sich als junger Mann an der Universität lieber in sozialistischen Kreisen herum, als mit seinesgleichen Tennis zu spielen oder auf Filmpremieren zu gehen. Doch taucht er auch in die Kreise der High Society ein, ist lange mit einer Schauspielerin liiert, weiß die Vorteile von Geld und Ruhm durchaus zu genießen. Und doch wird er eben auch als der „rote Ölprinz“ bekannt, da er wieder und wieder – vot allem bei Streiks – Positionen wider die eigene Klasse einnimmt.
Sinclair beschreibt nicht nur die Härte des Ölgeschäfts, auch die Härte der Arbeit auf den Feldern, an den Bohrtürmen und -löchern, und wie auf allen Ebenen mit härtesten Bandagen gekämpft wird, sondern – in einer Art Parallelmontage – eben auch die Entwicklungen der amerikanischen Linken in den 1920er Jahren. Die Auseinandersetzungen zwischen Sozialreformern, Sozialisten und Kommunisten werden vor dem Leser ausgebreitet und der sollte wissen, ob ihn diese Kämpfe und Streitereien interessieren, nehmen sie auf den fast 800 Seiten des Romans doch einen beträchtlichen Teil ein.
Sinclair gelingt es aber auch, mit viel Humor und Ironie von der Entwicklung des jungen Mannes, Bunny Ross, zu erzählen. Angesiedelt ist das alles in fiktiven Orten wie „Beach City“ und „Angel City“, doch liegt es nahe, daß man es mit Los Angeles und dessen Satelliten zu tun hat. So wurde „Beach City“ immer als Huntington Beach eingeordnet, einem Küstenort, südlich des eigentlichen Los Angeles angesiedelt. Sinclair betrachtet das Leben und Treiben in Südkalifornien mit einer Mischung aus Abneigung gegenüber der Dekadenz und der daraus resultierenden Ignoranz gegenüber den sozial Schwachen und einer gewissen distanzierten Ironie, mit welcher er den Lebensstil von Filmstars und Wirtschaftsmagnaten beschreibt.
Der Roman sorgte für Skandale und durfte teils nur gekürzt erscheinen, weil der Autor auch vor – für die späten 20er Jahre durchaus eindeutigen – sexuellen Anspielungen und einigen sehr eindeutigen Szenen nicht Halt macht. Die Darstellung der Entwicklung eines jungen, wohlbehüteten und doch auch recht intelligenten Mannes, der sich an seiner Herkunft reibt und aus den Schranken und Korsetten seiner Klasse auszubrechen versucht, ist äußerst gelungen und treffsicher. Daß dieser junge Mann letztlich dem Reichtum verhaftet bleibt – auch wenn er einen beträchtlichen Teil davon einbüßt und das, was ihm bleibt, für „die Bewegung“ einzusetzen sich müht – ist in der inneren Logik dessen, was Sinclair beschreibt, nur folgerichtig. Eher muten Bunnys Gewissen und seine soziale Ader in Bezug auf die amerikanische Wirklichkeit auch jener Jahre märchenhaft an. In Bunny Roos erfindet der Autor eine Figur, wie sie in Amerika vielleicht – zumindest in Erzählungen, Legenden und Märchen – gern gesehen wird, die aber in der Realität so kaum anzutreffen sein wird.
Geschickt versteht es Sinclair, die Zeitläufte in sein Werk einzubauen. Das ganze Konstrukt der Familie Ross beruht lose auf dem Vorbild von Edward L. Doheny, einem self-made-millionaire, wie auch Ross sen. einer ist. Dafür, das merkt man Sinclairs Text an, hat er durchaus auch Respekt. Der alte Ross ist ein Glücksritter, der sich hochgearbeitet und es schließlich zu etwas gebracht hat. Er zeigt auch ein gewisses Interesse an den Ideen seines Sohnes, ist im Zweifelsfall aber immer bereit, Widersprüche als normalen Lauf des Lebens zu akzeptieren. Er will keine Streikbrecher einsetzen, beugt sich aber den Leitlinien der Vereinigung der Ölgesellschaften, er will gern helfen, doch geht seine Hilfe nie so weit, daß seine eigenen Unternehmungen dabei irgendwie gefährdet wären. Zu Fall kommt er schließlich durch politische Ranküne, an der sein späterer Kompagnon beteiligt ist.
Sinclair bezieht also viele zeitgenössische Skandale und politische sowie gesellschaftliche Entwicklungen in seinen Roman ein[1]. Politische Verstrickungen und Intrigen, Korruption, die Brutalität dieser spezifisch amerikanischen Form des Kapitalismus, die vor Gewalt nie zurückschreckte, die Kälte gegenüber sozial Schwachen und die Eitelkeiten der Reichen, Kalifornien nicht als „gelobtes Land“ und Sonnenscheinstaat, sondern als ein von Bohrtürmen verunstaltetes und durch Bohrlöcher in eine Kraterlandschaft verwandeltes, nahezu rechtsfreies Territorium – all das lässt sich in ÖL! hervorragend nachverfolgen und nachvollziehen. Wie sein Freund und großes Vorbild Jack London zuvor den Goldrausch beschrieben hatte und die ungeheure Mühsal und Brutalität, die es erforderte, in den Weiten Alaskas zu bestehen, so schildert Upton Sinclair in ÖL! den Rausch des „schwarzen Goldes“, der ebensolche Aufbruchstimmung und Gier hervorgerufen hatte, jedoch mit anderen Mitteln und Bandagen ausgefochten wurde.
Es lässt sich darüber streiten, ob das literarisch wirklich groß ist. Paul Thomas Anderson, dessen Film THERE WILL BE BLOOD (2007) nach eigener Aussage auf die ersten 150 Seiten des Buches rekurriert, ist der Ansicht, der Roman sei weder gut, noch sonderlich bekannt. Es mag an dieser Sichtweise liegen, daß seine Geschichte fundamental von der des Buches abweicht. Eigentlich bedient er sich lediglich einer Nebenfigur – Paul Watkins hat einen religiös verbrämten Bruder, Eli, durch Ross sen. eher aus Spaß dazu angestachelt, eine „Kirche der dritten Offenbarung“ zu gründen und der damit sehr, sehr reich wird; Sinclair stellt also auch diesen dialektischen Bezug her: Kapitalismus, Kommunismus (dem häufig eine säkulare Heils- und Erlösungserzählung unterstellt wird) und dem (protestantischen) Glaube, der dann selbst wieder nach kapitalistischen Regeln funktioniert – um seinen Film in die für ihn passende Bahn zu lenken. Doch kann man seinem Urteil nicht ganz widersprechen.
So sehr der Roman auch Spaß macht, während man ihn liest, gerade weil Sinclair sich der Mittel von Ironie und Humor bedient, um die Geschichte zu erzählen und seine Figuren damit auch nicht allzu ernst nimmt, wirken Teile doch wie Seminaren einer Kaderschule entnommen. Man liest sich durch lange Passagen, in denen eine Art Vulgärsozialismus gepredigt wird, der – auch im Buch – weitestgehend folgenlos bleibt. Natürlich gibt die Geschichte Sinclair letztlich recht, denn der Sozialismus hat nie, nicht einmal in den schweren Jahren der Depression, als Franklin D. Roosevelt nahezu sozialistische staatliche Programme auflegte, eine Chance gehabt, in den USA anerkannt oder gar goutiert zu werden. Es werden soziale Mißstände und politische Skandale angeprangert, doch geändert hat es nichts. So ist ÖL! vielleicht als Zeitdokument für jene interessant, die sich für die amerikanische Geschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts interessieren.
Dennoch bleibt es ein gut konstruierter, süffig zu lesender, und immer unterhaltsamer Roman der amerikanischen Moderne. Nicht der beste, nicht der einflußreichste, aber sicherlich kein schlechtes Buch.
[1] Dieser Text bezieht sich auf die Taschenbuch Ausgabe des Manesse-Verlags, München, einer Neuübersetzung durch Andrea Ott. Dankenswerterweise hat der Verlag dem Roman einen ausgreifenden Anhang hinzugefügt, der sehr genaue Auskünfte über die Realbezüge gibt. Ein Nachwort von Ilija Trojanow rundet das Buch ab und gibt essayistisch Einblick in die literarische wie soziale und gesellschaftliche Verortung des Buches.
March 17, 2009
'There Will Be Blood' is LOOSELY based on this book; that is to say there is oil drilling in each and there's a creepy charlatan for a religious leader, but that's about it. The first half of this book was excellent and gives a real explanation of how oil drilling worked at the turn of the century. The second half of the book is really about socialism, as the main character (the son of the 'oil man') struggles between the greedy wealth of his father and his belief in worker's rights. I found the second half of the book to be tiresome and to put it bluntly, boring and repetitive. I'd have to say I MADE myself finish it. The book could be considered timeless in the fact that it parallels modern society of the corrupt rich who control our political machine to cater to their needs, but it would have been much better served had they cut 100 pages out of the 2nd half of the book.
August 26, 2021
Aug 20, 11am ~~ Review asap.
Aug 26, 1130am ~~ I discovered Upton Sinclair back in high school in the early 1970's. I was taking a class in who remembers what and the teacher lectured to us the way he said professors would do in college. I listened and took notes, of course, but sometimes my eyes would roam over to a small bookcase that was right next to the row of desks where I sat. Naturally I liked to read the titles and wonder about the various books there. I also can't remember if these books were the teacher's personal property, but one day when I finally got up the nerve to ask if I could borrow one, he seemed very happy that someone had finally asked. The book I read was Sinclair's The Jungle, and it was amazing, and when I got my own copy to re-read years later I still thought so.
But I never read any other works by Sinclair except once I tried his Millennium. I must not have cared for it since I am pretty sure it went into the donate pile when I got back to Arizona after my years away and needed to cull the bookcase herd. At least, I could not find it during a quick check of the shelves before I started reading this book.
So Sinclair was just a one book author to me until I happened to read recently that the movie There Will Be Blood was loosely based on his book Oil!, which was originally published in 1927. I never saw the movie, but when I learned about Oil! I rushed off and ordered a used copy and here we are.
And I thought this book was just as amazing as The Jungle.
The main character is actually 'Bunny' Ross, the son of J. Arnold Ross the ex-mule teamster who got himself into the oil game and is teaching Bunny all about it. We see things mostly through Bunny's eyes, thirteen years old in the first chapter and in his twenties by the end. So this book is not just about the oil business, politics, greed, corruption, and injustice, it is also about the process of maturity: how does a young man who is being groomed to take over his father's business deal with the differences between the world as he knows it is and the world as he feels it should be?
Because Bunny is an idealist. Dad is the business man, wanting more and more property to be able to produce more and more oil and therefore more and more money. He plays the big game by its crooked rules, some of which he helps create: wheeling and dealing in secret with lots of money changing hands when it suits his purpose because that's the way things are done, you know. But Bunny worries about other things: are the workers getting their fair share? Is it ethical to do THIS when your conscience says do THAT? How does one decide his own approach to life?
The symbolism throughout the book is obvious and so is Sinclair's anger. I am sure he would be even more angry these days to see that nothing much has changed.
Aug 26, 1130am ~~ I discovered Upton Sinclair back in high school in the early 1970's. I was taking a class in who remembers what and the teacher lectured to us the way he said professors would do in college. I listened and took notes, of course, but sometimes my eyes would roam over to a small bookcase that was right next to the row of desks where I sat. Naturally I liked to read the titles and wonder about the various books there. I also can't remember if these books were the teacher's personal property, but one day when I finally got up the nerve to ask if I could borrow one, he seemed very happy that someone had finally asked. The book I read was Sinclair's The Jungle, and it was amazing, and when I got my own copy to re-read years later I still thought so.
But I never read any other works by Sinclair except once I tried his Millennium. I must not have cared for it since I am pretty sure it went into the donate pile when I got back to Arizona after my years away and needed to cull the bookcase herd. At least, I could not find it during a quick check of the shelves before I started reading this book.
So Sinclair was just a one book author to me until I happened to read recently that the movie There Will Be Blood was loosely based on his book Oil!, which was originally published in 1927. I never saw the movie, but when I learned about Oil! I rushed off and ordered a used copy and here we are.
And I thought this book was just as amazing as The Jungle.
The main character is actually 'Bunny' Ross, the son of J. Arnold Ross the ex-mule teamster who got himself into the oil game and is teaching Bunny all about it. We see things mostly through Bunny's eyes, thirteen years old in the first chapter and in his twenties by the end. So this book is not just about the oil business, politics, greed, corruption, and injustice, it is also about the process of maturity: how does a young man who is being groomed to take over his father's business deal with the differences between the world as he knows it is and the world as he feels it should be?
Because Bunny is an idealist. Dad is the business man, wanting more and more property to be able to produce more and more oil and therefore more and more money. He plays the big game by its crooked rules, some of which he helps create: wheeling and dealing in secret with lots of money changing hands when it suits his purpose because that's the way things are done, you know. But Bunny worries about other things: are the workers getting their fair share? Is it ethical to do THIS when your conscience says do THAT? How does one decide his own approach to life?
The symbolism throughout the book is obvious and so is Sinclair's anger. I am sure he would be even more angry these days to see that nothing much has changed.
March 26, 2023
Upton Sinclair became famous for his muckraking or reform-minded journalism, but while most folks scramble for The Jungle, I prefer this drilling look at the nascent petroleum industry of California. The movie, There Will Be Blood was based upon this novel, although this was originally published in the 1920s.
The Roaring Twenties...think President Warren Harding and the Teapot Dome Scandal. A nation starts to move away from farms and the simple life as greed takes center place. If you've ever driven through Southern California, you will still see some of the original oil grasshoppers that are described in this novel, while the larger derricks once dominated the previously tranquil land.
If you liked the movie, be prepared for so much more in this great novel. Here, the main character is the son and the lessons learned about the pursuit of power and the exploitation of the land will resonate after the read is completed. The 1920s must have been an amazing era with so many progressive inventions and silent screen idols and orchards of oranges shimmering in the California sun. Most folks run to Fitzgerald for a review of that notorious decade, but for me, this book does the trick all by its lonesome.
Book Season = Summer (hot golden fields)
The Roaring Twenties...think President Warren Harding and the Teapot Dome Scandal. A nation starts to move away from farms and the simple life as greed takes center place. If you've ever driven through Southern California, you will still see some of the original oil grasshoppers that are described in this novel, while the larger derricks once dominated the previously tranquil land.
If you liked the movie, be prepared for so much more in this great novel. Here, the main character is the son and the lessons learned about the pursuit of power and the exploitation of the land will resonate after the read is completed. The 1920s must have been an amazing era with so many progressive inventions and silent screen idols and orchards of oranges shimmering in the California sun. Most folks run to Fitzgerald for a review of that notorious decade, but for me, this book does the trick all by its lonesome.
Book Season = Summer (hot golden fields)
August 25, 2020
1920 li yılların Amerikasına bir baba ve oğul ilişkisi ekseninde bakıyoruz. Tabiri caizse Bunny elimizde büyüyor. Petrol bulunuyor ve olaylar hem gelişiyor hem karışıyor. İtiraf ediyorum ki ağır ve zor bir okuma şahsen ben okurken filmleştirildiğini bilmiyordum ve hep içimden tam senaryolaşacak kitap dedim. Zaten kan dökülecek ismiyle beyazperdeye aktarılmış. Umarım filmi de izlemeye fırsatım olur.
Yazarın Şikago Mezbahaları kitabını da en yakın zamanda okumayı planlıyorum. Bu kitabını da zamana asla yenik düşmeyecek olması ve uzun emekleri için muhakkak okumanızı tavsiye ediyorum.
Yazarın Şikago Mezbahaları kitabını da en yakın zamanda okumayı planlıyorum. Bu kitabını da zamana asla yenik düşmeyecek olması ve uzun emekleri için muhakkak okumanızı tavsiye ediyorum.
April 13, 2015
This is a wonderful book on corruption and graft in the oil business and government of the early 20th century that is almost ruined a horrible ending. Before chapter XVIII, the book is great as we follow the main character, "Bunny" Ross, Jr., as he learns about the oil business and all of its corruption first hand from his father. We see Bunny struggle to convey truth to power, so to speak, and to stay good and honest in a world that is revealed to be more corrupt than the oil business itself. The narration is unique from most books I have read in that it is third person, but the narrator is both a part of and separate from the action, like someone telling a campfire story. Then after chapter XVIII, the story breaks down as Dad flees from investigations into the Teapot Dome scandal he has gotten himself into (despite the warnings of his son). Had the book ended more quickly, with Dad dying in America over a broken heart about his son's socialist stance and the investigations, if Vee, one of Bunny's girlfriends, made her exit from the stage sooner, allowing for Bunny and Rachel's romance more time to develop, and, especially, had the narration not turned from campfire story teller to an unabashed Socialist mouthpiece, I would have given this book five stars and made it one of my favorites. GOOD BUILD-UPS TO THE CLIMAX MUST BE ACCOMPANIED BY A GOOD ENDING!!!!
November 26, 2012
Few books have had on me the intellectual impact of Sinclair's "The Jungle," so it was with trepidation that I approached "Oil!"
Why trepidation? Because I was afraid that it wouldn't be as good, and that Sinclair's god-like status in my brain would be jeopardized.
I was wrong to worry.
It's true that I'm only giving "Oil!" four stars, but that's only because there were times in the book when I noticed that the writing leaned so heavily on description (instead of action) as to be a little repetitive.
In general, I thoroughly enjoyed Sinclair's whip-smart satire of the times in which he lived, especially because it applied so readily to the times in which we live.
It is difficult, I think, to write a novel that is more or less a book of philosophy - Sinclair's, of course, that rampant, unrestrained capitalism is good for approximately 3 people out of a billion - but he did it here, and "Oil!", along with "The Jungle" should be required reading for any burgeoning ideologue.
Why trepidation? Because I was afraid that it wouldn't be as good, and that Sinclair's god-like status in my brain would be jeopardized.
I was wrong to worry.
It's true that I'm only giving "Oil!" four stars, but that's only because there were times in the book when I noticed that the writing leaned so heavily on description (instead of action) as to be a little repetitive.
In general, I thoroughly enjoyed Sinclair's whip-smart satire of the times in which he lived, especially because it applied so readily to the times in which we live.
It is difficult, I think, to write a novel that is more or less a book of philosophy - Sinclair's, of course, that rampant, unrestrained capitalism is good for approximately 3 people out of a billion - but he did it here, and "Oil!", along with "The Jungle" should be required reading for any burgeoning ideologue.
September 5, 2020
Petrol!, Upton Sinclair’ın dünyasına girdiğim ikinci kitap oldu. 1926’da yayımlanan bu roman, özetle bir yolsuzluk romanı.
Upton Sinclair, Jacob Riis gibi “muckraker” yani “skandal ifşa eden gazeteci” olduğu için bizzat kendi tanık olduğu deneyimlerden yola çıkarak Petrol!’ü kaleme aldığı biliniyor.
ABD’yi kasıp kavuran kapitalist düzeni ve petrol sektörünü kimi zaman sert kimi zaman ironik bir dille exposé ediyor. Bu sektördeki büyük yanlışlar ve usulsüzlükler o kadar fazla ki. Emekçi ve işveren arasındaki çatışma, Hollywood’un “Kızılları” hedef alan propagandaları ve artistlerin gerçek yüzü, sosyalizm ve komünizm arasına çizilen sınırlar, romanın ele aldığı konulardan bazıları. Ayrıca, roman 1940’larda başlayan Senatör McCarthy’nin tarihe kazıdığı bir terim olan McCarthyism’in aslında 20’lerde bile varolduğunu gösteriyor. Cumhuriyetçiler, kendi fikirlerine ve hükümete destek olmayan her vatandaşa komünist etiketi yapıştırmak için çok hevesliler.
Fitzgerald’ın romanları ile aynı dönemde çıkan Petrol, Caz Çağı’nın aşırılıklarına, cinsel özgürlüğe ve 18. Yasa yani alkol yasağının nasıl çiğnendiğine de değiniyor. Petrol!, ABD tarihinin en çalkantılı dönemlerinin— Caz Çağı ve Büyük Buhran arası— belgeselini sunuyor adeta.
Petrol’ün aynı zamanda bir bildungsroman olduğunu ekleyeyim. Petrol devi Ross’ların veliahtı Bunny’nin ve fikirlerinin nasıl olgunlaştığına tanık oluyor okur.
Petrol!’ü “tam bir roman” olarak tanımlıyorum fakat beni Şikago Mezbahaları kadar etkilemediğini söylemeliyim. Yazarın natüralist bakış açısı, Şikago Mezbahaları’nda daha belirgin ve etkileyiciydi. Yine de Petrol! büyüğün küçüğü yediği düzeni başarıyla anlatan romanlardan biri. #SabitKalem kitap kulübüyle okuduğumuz beşinci kitap olan Petrol’ü büyük roman okumayı seven herkese öneriyorum.
Bu güzel çeviri için Kıvanç Güney’e teşekkürler!
Upton Sinclair, Jacob Riis gibi “muckraker” yani “skandal ifşa eden gazeteci” olduğu için bizzat kendi tanık olduğu deneyimlerden yola çıkarak Petrol!’ü kaleme aldığı biliniyor.
ABD’yi kasıp kavuran kapitalist düzeni ve petrol sektörünü kimi zaman sert kimi zaman ironik bir dille exposé ediyor. Bu sektördeki büyük yanlışlar ve usulsüzlükler o kadar fazla ki. Emekçi ve işveren arasındaki çatışma, Hollywood’un “Kızılları” hedef alan propagandaları ve artistlerin gerçek yüzü, sosyalizm ve komünizm arasına çizilen sınırlar, romanın ele aldığı konulardan bazıları. Ayrıca, roman 1940’larda başlayan Senatör McCarthy’nin tarihe kazıdığı bir terim olan McCarthyism’in aslında 20’lerde bile varolduğunu gösteriyor. Cumhuriyetçiler, kendi fikirlerine ve hükümete destek olmayan her vatandaşa komünist etiketi yapıştırmak için çok hevesliler.
Fitzgerald’ın romanları ile aynı dönemde çıkan Petrol, Caz Çağı’nın aşırılıklarına, cinsel özgürlüğe ve 18. Yasa yani alkol yasağının nasıl çiğnendiğine de değiniyor. Petrol!, ABD tarihinin en çalkantılı dönemlerinin— Caz Çağı ve Büyük Buhran arası— belgeselini sunuyor adeta.
Petrol’ün aynı zamanda bir bildungsroman olduğunu ekleyeyim. Petrol devi Ross’ların veliahtı Bunny’nin ve fikirlerinin nasıl olgunlaştığına tanık oluyor okur.
Petrol!’ü “tam bir roman” olarak tanımlıyorum fakat beni Şikago Mezbahaları kadar etkilemediğini söylemeliyim. Yazarın natüralist bakış açısı, Şikago Mezbahaları’nda daha belirgin ve etkileyiciydi. Yine de Petrol! büyüğün küçüğü yediği düzeni başarıyla anlatan romanlardan biri. #SabitKalem kitap kulübüyle okuduğumuz beşinci kitap olan Petrol’ü büyük roman okumayı seven herkese öneriyorum.
Bu güzel çeviri için Kıvanç Güney’e teşekkürler!
March 23, 2023
Το συστημα δεν διαβρωνεται απο καλες προθεσεις ουτε εκ των εσω
Εντροπικο ειναι κ θα κατασπαραξει απο οποιαδηποτε ρωγμη βρει, κ οποιαδηποτε απειλη μπορει να εμφανιστει
Δεν είναι ακινητο, δεν καθεται στα πεπραγμενα αλλα πολεμαει λυσσαλεα να υπερασπιστει τους βασιλιαδες του
Στις ηττες βρισκει εξαλιστηρια θυματα τοτε στους παλιους βασιλιαδες
κ αναδυκνει καινουργιους τους οποιους ευκολα κ παλι θα καβαραθρωσει οταν παραστει αναγκη
Ανεκαθεν
Το συστημα είναι τοσο δυνατο γιατι η βαση του είναι τα αγελαια ενστικτα του ανθρωπου
Η ουτοπια απλα δεν υπαρχει
Εντροπικο ειναι κ θα κατασπαραξει απο οποιαδηποτε ρωγμη βρει, κ οποιαδηποτε απειλη μπορει να εμφανιστει
Δεν είναι ακινητο, δεν καθεται στα πεπραγμενα αλλα πολεμαει λυσσαλεα να υπερασπιστει τους βασιλιαδες του
Στις ηττες βρισκει εξαλιστηρια θυματα τοτε στους παλιους βασιλιαδες
κ αναδυκνει καινουργιους τους οποιους ευκολα κ παλι θα καβαραθρωσει οταν παραστει αναγκη
Ανεκαθεν
Το συστημα είναι τοσο δυνατο γιατι η βαση του είναι τα αγελαια ενστικτα του ανθρωπου
Η ουτοπια απλα δεν υπαρχει
March 26, 2009
¡Petróleo! tiene un arranque muy enérgico, es decidido, con planes de atraparte desde el principio y pareciera que es una adaptación fidedigna la que hiciera Anderson del libro.
Hay que reconocer que el trabajo documental que despliega Sinclair es de altura. La perforación de los pozos, su explotación y el levantamiento del entramado industrial y social que se crea a su alrededor son descritos con detalle, ritmo e interés.
Sin embargo la solidez narrativa de Sinclair se despedaza al adentrase en el segundo tercio de la novela. Se queda pegadísimo con el tema de la primera guerra mundial. A partir de este punto la novela pasa a ser una interminable demostración de la lucha de la clase obrera por sus derechos políticos y económicos, muy aburrido.
¡Petróleo! fue publicada en 1927 y su autor deseaba comprobar hasta qué punto el movimiento obrero podía conmover una conciencia a priori poco proclive a ello.
There Will Be Blood, la reciente adaptación al cine de la novela, abarca sólo el primer tercio del libro. Se exploran las motivaciones del buscador de petróleo y el precio moral que paga en su ascenso al cielo de los negocios. Los maravillosos resultados obtenidos por Anderson demuestran su calidad como adaptador y también, al actuar como contraste, lo mal que envejece la literatura política.
La película es una joya, el libro...deja mucho que desear.
Hay que reconocer que el trabajo documental que despliega Sinclair es de altura. La perforación de los pozos, su explotación y el levantamiento del entramado industrial y social que se crea a su alrededor son descritos con detalle, ritmo e interés.
Sin embargo la solidez narrativa de Sinclair se despedaza al adentrase en el segundo tercio de la novela. Se queda pegadísimo con el tema de la primera guerra mundial. A partir de este punto la novela pasa a ser una interminable demostración de la lucha de la clase obrera por sus derechos políticos y económicos, muy aburrido.
¡Petróleo! fue publicada en 1927 y su autor deseaba comprobar hasta qué punto el movimiento obrero podía conmover una conciencia a priori poco proclive a ello.
There Will Be Blood, la reciente adaptación al cine de la novela, abarca sólo el primer tercio del libro. Se exploran las motivaciones del buscador de petróleo y el precio moral que paga en su ascenso al cielo de los negocios. Los maravillosos resultados obtenidos por Anderson demuestran su calidad como adaptador y también, al actuar como contraste, lo mal que envejece la literatura política.
La película es una joya, el libro...deja mucho que desear.
February 2, 2022
I am always on the lookout for "political economy novels." This one hits the bullseye.
I listened to Oil! and King Coal, back to back (and I am now listening to the Jungle which I read as a 20 something).
In both novels Sinclair's strategy is similar: show the operations of capitalist logic through the eyes of capitalists themselves. Specifically, take the child or college level progeny of a capitalist and let him discover the life of workers. These books are close to ethnography. But also Sinclair makes sure that we learn about how the commodities (oil and coal) are made. He takes you through every step of the process, from extraction, to processing, to sale -- a kind of narrative vertical integration. He also shows you what has to be done by capitalists to make all this happen, the graft - from small tips to civil bureaucrats- to the rigging of presidential elections. Oppositional ideologies are the beating heart of his novels.
He does not demonize the capitalists. This is because their humanization allows him to showcase the logic of the system instead of focusing on the merits of this or that person. Actions flow from roles rather than from individual impulses.
All the while Sinclair is explicit about his concerns -- unionization, socialism, the overthrow of capitalism. His narrator never says these things but some of his working class characters do. This is no small miracle, the simultaneous presentation of his politics with the humanization of all his characters. Sheer genius of vision.
I haven't seen books like this. Some come close: John Nichols' Milagro Beanfield trilogy and Abdelrahman Munif's Cities of Salt trilogy. But neither of these present the working class, unions, and socialism as vital energy within the novels. Remarkable.
I listened to Oil! and King Coal, back to back (and I am now listening to the Jungle which I read as a 20 something).
In both novels Sinclair's strategy is similar: show the operations of capitalist logic through the eyes of capitalists themselves. Specifically, take the child or college level progeny of a capitalist and let him discover the life of workers. These books are close to ethnography. But also Sinclair makes sure that we learn about how the commodities (oil and coal) are made. He takes you through every step of the process, from extraction, to processing, to sale -- a kind of narrative vertical integration. He also shows you what has to be done by capitalists to make all this happen, the graft - from small tips to civil bureaucrats- to the rigging of presidential elections. Oppositional ideologies are the beating heart of his novels.
He does not demonize the capitalists. This is because their humanization allows him to showcase the logic of the system instead of focusing on the merits of this or that person. Actions flow from roles rather than from individual impulses.
All the while Sinclair is explicit about his concerns -- unionization, socialism, the overthrow of capitalism. His narrator never says these things but some of his working class characters do. This is no small miracle, the simultaneous presentation of his politics with the humanization of all his characters. Sheer genius of vision.
I haven't seen books like this. Some come close: John Nichols' Milagro Beanfield trilogy and Abdelrahman Munif's Cities of Salt trilogy. But neither of these present the working class, unions, and socialism as vital energy within the novels. Remarkable.
September 26, 2008
I didn't see the movie. And I had low expectations for Sinclair's work, as he's regarded as prolix and melodramatic, but this is good, surprisingly good--absorbing enough to make me ignore my surroundings and nearly miss my train stop.
While I'm only a third of the way into the book, it is something of a War and Peace set in Southern California. It's the story of Bunny Ross, a boy who follows his father, J. Andrew Ross, one of the more successful independent oil men, a self made man. Their lives are intertwined with the Wyatt family, a family of fundamentalist sheepherders, whose black sheep, Paul, is a freethinking pro-worker that Bunny idolizes. Like War and Peace, the characters' lives are shaped by forces beyond their control, such as war, revolution and unions. And like Tolstoy, Sinclair strives to make every decision and thought of his protagonist over the length of his life, open to the readers. Yes, Sinclair strives to advance his thoughts on socialism, but I didn't find it anymore overbearing than Tolstoy's interpretation of the invasion of Russia and Tolstoy's not so subtle push for finding God.
Edit: I've since seen the movie. I can see that seeing it would detract from reading, as the movie's adaption is a very different beast.
Now that I have finished reading the book, I have to deduct a star. It's a good book. It was a great book, but it is about 100 pages too long. It does turn into a bit of an unrealistic, full-throated discussion about communism vs. socialism. Since neither have relevance in the US today, it's an unfortunate turn in the book. Still, there are a lot of things that make this story contemporary, and I'm still struck by how little some things have changed from the 20s.
While I'm only a third of the way into the book, it is something of a War and Peace set in Southern California. It's the story of Bunny Ross, a boy who follows his father, J. Andrew Ross, one of the more successful independent oil men, a self made man. Their lives are intertwined with the Wyatt family, a family of fundamentalist sheepherders, whose black sheep, Paul, is a freethinking pro-worker that Bunny idolizes. Like War and Peace, the characters' lives are shaped by forces beyond their control, such as war, revolution and unions. And like Tolstoy, Sinclair strives to make every decision and thought of his protagonist over the length of his life, open to the readers. Yes, Sinclair strives to advance his thoughts on socialism, but I didn't find it anymore overbearing than Tolstoy's interpretation of the invasion of Russia and Tolstoy's not so subtle push for finding God.
Edit: I've since seen the movie. I can see that seeing it would detract from reading, as the movie's adaption is a very different beast.
Now that I have finished reading the book, I have to deduct a star. It's a good book. It was a great book, but it is about 100 pages too long. It does turn into a bit of an unrealistic, full-throated discussion about communism vs. socialism. Since neither have relevance in the US today, it's an unfortunate turn in the book. Still, there are a lot of things that make this story contemporary, and I'm still struck by how little some things have changed from the 20s.
March 30, 2018
You know, I didn't love this one as much as Sinclair's The Jungle. Perhaps because I think so incredibly highly of The Jungle, my expectations for this one were a little unrealistic.
Let me put it this way. In job interviews when I'm asked to name a hero, I always list Upton Sinclair and Rachel Carson, because they both manage to be artful, moving, emotional artists, while also writing with an iron pen and changing the world with words on a page.
But here, the characters are not quite so compelling as in The Jungle; the plot not so gripping; the emotional scenes not so gripping. So Oil! didn't quite meet what I expected from Sinclair.
That said, it's a good book, it's an important book, and like The Jungle it's written with purpose, with passion and intent rather than mere art. I like how Dad, though seen by the workers as the Evil Oil Tycoon, is not painted quite so simply. He's a mixed bag of a character, and an acknowledgement that nobody is a trope or a stock character in real life.
And of course, there's Sinclair's famous socialism again, the red flag whipping crisply in the wind behind all his books. He's noooooot exactly one to hide his light under a bushel, is he?
Let me put it this way. In job interviews when I'm asked to name a hero, I always list Upton Sinclair and Rachel Carson, because they both manage to be artful, moving, emotional artists, while also writing with an iron pen and changing the world with words on a page.
But here, the characters are not quite so compelling as in The Jungle; the plot not so gripping; the emotional scenes not so gripping. So Oil! didn't quite meet what I expected from Sinclair.
That said, it's a good book, it's an important book, and like The Jungle it's written with purpose, with passion and intent rather than mere art. I like how Dad, though seen by the workers as the Evil Oil Tycoon, is not painted quite so simply. He's a mixed bag of a character, and an acknowledgement that nobody is a trope or a stock character in real life.
And of course, there's Sinclair's famous socialism again, the red flag whipping crisply in the wind behind all his books. He's noooooot exactly one to hide his light under a bushel, is he?
September 13, 2014
I found this book a great pleasure to read-Sinclair's writing style still holds up very nicely, but it's the story that's most enthralling to me: not the story of the oil business, or a parent becoming a millionaire, but rather the one of becoming politically conscious. I identified very much with Bunny, and Paul of the book. I was raised in a politically soft left/centrist family (though for what's considered "liberal" in this country that's not saying much). In any instance I too underwent my own political shift leftwards winding up a socialist myself. For Bunny and Paul World War 1 and the Russian Revolution taught them the truth of the world. That is: the myth of American and capitalist benevolence. For myself: Abu Ghraib, and Scott Walker. This novel is an excellent coming of age, and coming of consciousness story that the film (while a good movie) largely castrated.
April 25, 2014
Overall a pretty interesting book, focused on the period of American history from the outbreak of World War I to the end of the Harding administration, particularly in relation to the Red Scare and the labor movement. Sinclair's ideological slant, though at times painfully naive, does lend freshness; when the characters encounter actual historical events, they aren't the usual ones. His characters rarely rise above the level of propaganda, but Sinclair has a gift for storytelling that makes the story work. Dull, preachy expositions are balanced by occasional bursts of true eloquence (such as a beautifully written death scene juxtaposed with a post-election party). I didn't love this book, but I found it interesting, well worth a first read.
June 6, 2019
First of all, if you come to this book because you liked the movie version (There Will be Blood), you will be disappointed to learn that they are have nothing to do with each other. I really mean it: absolutely nothing. Different plot, different characters, totally different stories.
As for the book itself, I liked it well enough. I liked the first quarter better than the rest, when Bunny was a kid just hanging out with his dad and finding wonder in everything around him. As Bunny grows up and things start getting political, it becomes a bit long for what it is and very preachy (even when I agreed with the points he was making).
As for the book itself, I liked it well enough. I liked the first quarter better than the rest, when Bunny was a kid just hanging out with his dad and finding wonder in everything around him. As Bunny grows up and things start getting political, it becomes a bit long for what it is and very preachy (even when I agreed with the points he was making).
December 14, 2013
Just finished this, which was supposed to be the basis for the movie There Will be Blood. To claim that is like believing Sarah Palin consulted Nancy Pelosi concerning her political career. Just didn't happen. Book is much better and explores the social, economic and political struggles in early 1920s America. Think The Jungle only about the development of big oil. Wonderful characters.
July 30, 2020
One of the most interesting and most boring books I’ve ever read
March 19, 2024
I picked up this book originally because I knew that the film ‘There Will Be Blood’ (2007) was based on it but i got hooked due to Upton Sinclair’s superior writing technique. The way this book is written is not too difficult to read that you have to reread passages and take notes or have a dictionary nearby, but it’s also not too easy to read that you feel like your not learning anything. It sits right in that golden area of writing where you can understand but also learn. For that I would give a 5 star review, but due to the way the ideas in this book are presented, NOT the ideas presented, i decided to dock it a star. Personally, I would not consider myself a socialist or a communist, but i’m also not against learning and indulging in other ideas and beliefs to my own! Both the book and the film started with the same stories but after about 100 or 200 pages they diverge EXTREMELY far from one another. The book takes this route of almost Bolshevik then Socialist propaganda and throws these politics in your face by literally having the last 300 pages of the book just be the main character, Bunny, going through a political journey. I would much rather have a story in which THROUGH the story, these ideas are presented, instead Sinclair tried to just tell you how he feels through the words of Bunny almost like the God of the third revelation talking through Eli, which is thoroughly denounced in the book. This book seemed extremely hypocritical in that sense but also many others, which usually hurt my opinion of it, but in some instances came off almost comedic, like the idea of a oil magnate’s millionaire son preaching socialist and communist ideas. I personally think the film adaptation is better, not because of any reason, other than the fact that it was able to portray the ideas mentioned through the story instead of in plain text like in the book.
June 17, 2022
This 1926-1927 serialized novel is a veritable epitome of American socialist thought and analysis. Corporate greed and the concomitant gross inhumanity and political machinations of the powerful few to ensure that their insatiable lust for more and more money will be forever satisfied is baldly presented, as are the relatively feeble efforts of the working classes to meet this oppression and try to salvage some semblance of a decent living.
Taking as his historical background the Teapot Dome Scandal of the early 1920s (in which oil interests essentially bribed the Harding administration into giving them unfettered access to reserves on government land), the over-the-top evangelical movement of Aimee McPherson, the abortive strikes of the period, which were normally crushed by official heavy handedness and out and out violent intimidation, as well as the self-inflicted wounds of the left in the disagreements between socialists and communists, Sinclair nonetheless weaves a strongly empathetic story of the son of one of the oil barons who simply wants to ensure that all men, not just the rich and powerful, have access to the wealth the country is producing.
Never becoming too didactic or preachy, Sinclair keeps his story moving well along with its developments in Bunny's relations with his well-meaning but rapacious father; his father's unscrupulous business colleague Verne Roscoe; his movie-star sweetheart Vee Tracy; his moral conscience, the communist Paul Watkins; his colleague in a labour newspaper Rachel Menzies; his socially ambitious sister Bertie, the 'Zulu' and 'Juno' (sexually uninhibted Amazon-like Californians) girls from whom he learns about sex; his progressive former teacher Mr. Irving; the quiet but steadfast devotee of her brother, Ruth Watkins; and the self-important hypocrite and blowhard of an evangelical preacher Eli Watkins. The novel seems to verge on the picaresque, with its central character being the sole common link between so many different social, political, cultural and economic situations.
There are a host of other minor characters, as well as pointed commentaries on the slaughter of World War I, the naivety of President Wilson's trip to Europe, the blindness of the framers of the Treaty of Versailles, the subtle and not-so-subtle manipulation of public opinion through the press and through Hollywood movies, the blatant stupidity and self-serving duplicity of those engaged in spiritualism, the wilful misrepresentation of the true situation in Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution, and the true motives and practices of the Allies who invaded Russia in the years immediately following that event. Indeed, the fear the Soviets brought out in the American capitalist class is shown to have further stoked the rapacious machine of greed which had them manipulate both presidential elections dealt with in the novel, but also the brutal breaking of the nascent union movement and any true semblance of political democracy and freedom of speech, at least in as far as critics of capitalist greed were allowed any viable expression. Fortunately for the capitalists, their left wing opponents are shown to spend far too much of their energy castigating one another and arguing about tactics.
For such stirring social relevance, one would expect that the writing would take a back seat to the polemic, but it doesn't. The final scene is a moving marvel of dramatic juxtaposition in which radio (a new development, upon which Sinclair comments that the 'fact that is one way, it has great usefulness to the capitalist system [by forming] the basis on which to build the greatest slave empire in history') intersperses reporting of Coolidge's landslide victory, mindless jazz tunes and scenes of an earnest labour leader lying lies at death's door of a fractured skull administered by hired thugs.
The rich never seem to be satisfied with how rich they are. They also lack any reasonable amount of moral conscience about the way in which they augment their already obscene levels of wealth. Taxes, to them, are only there to be cut. Workers are to be driven into submission and merely discarded should they demand any semblance humane treatment. Politicians, judges, newspapers are there to be bought in order to further the Gaberdine-swine like charge for more money, more money, more money.
Sinclair's work is almost a hundred years old. It is due to works like this that health insurance, old age pensions and unemployment insurance were developed to mitigate the most heinous excesses of the capitalist system. Sadly, it still provides a very relevant message to be heard today, as climate change, youth unemployment, income inequities and immigrant-baiting all show that compassion and respect for fundamental human dignity are a long way from replacing greed as the prime motivating spirit for human endeavour.
What was true of the times of Harding and Coolidge in the States in the early 1920s is not dissimilar from the America of Trump, the Britain of Johnson, the Philippines of Duterte, the Brazil of Bolsanaro: the crudity and moral vacuity of these leaders shows that they are mere fronts for the f---ing rich who are still in power and, by pulling the strings on these puppets, are getting richer and richer and richer.
Highly recommended. It is much, much better than the movie There Will Be Blood upon which is was purportedly based, but which ignores so much of the thrust of Sinclair's vision that I really doubt the screenwriter gave the novel more than a cursory glance.
Update (May 2021): Biden wants to tax those who make over $400,000/yr to help pay for health services, preschool education and community college tuition. The Republicans have told him 'No' and will effectively block his moves to improve the lives of so many people. It is more important to them that the very very rich stay very very rich. For what do they really need the final $100,000 of income on top of their other wealth? I feel that it is just their fractured moral compass that worships at the all-mighty dollar sign and occludes any proper appreciation of the nature of the humanity around them.
And Lewis wrote his book almost a hundred years ago! What a sad commentary on the limited nature of man's sense of fairness and equity.
Taking as his historical background the Teapot Dome Scandal of the early 1920s (in which oil interests essentially bribed the Harding administration into giving them unfettered access to reserves on government land), the over-the-top evangelical movement of Aimee McPherson, the abortive strikes of the period, which were normally crushed by official heavy handedness and out and out violent intimidation, as well as the self-inflicted wounds of the left in the disagreements between socialists and communists, Sinclair nonetheless weaves a strongly empathetic story of the son of one of the oil barons who simply wants to ensure that all men, not just the rich and powerful, have access to the wealth the country is producing.
Never becoming too didactic or preachy, Sinclair keeps his story moving well along with its developments in Bunny's relations with his well-meaning but rapacious father; his father's unscrupulous business colleague Verne Roscoe; his movie-star sweetheart Vee Tracy; his moral conscience, the communist Paul Watkins; his colleague in a labour newspaper Rachel Menzies; his socially ambitious sister Bertie, the 'Zulu' and 'Juno' (sexually uninhibted Amazon-like Californians) girls from whom he learns about sex; his progressive former teacher Mr. Irving; the quiet but steadfast devotee of her brother, Ruth Watkins; and the self-important hypocrite and blowhard of an evangelical preacher Eli Watkins. The novel seems to verge on the picaresque, with its central character being the sole common link between so many different social, political, cultural and economic situations.
There are a host of other minor characters, as well as pointed commentaries on the slaughter of World War I, the naivety of President Wilson's trip to Europe, the blindness of the framers of the Treaty of Versailles, the subtle and not-so-subtle manipulation of public opinion through the press and through Hollywood movies, the blatant stupidity and self-serving duplicity of those engaged in spiritualism, the wilful misrepresentation of the true situation in Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution, and the true motives and practices of the Allies who invaded Russia in the years immediately following that event. Indeed, the fear the Soviets brought out in the American capitalist class is shown to have further stoked the rapacious machine of greed which had them manipulate both presidential elections dealt with in the novel, but also the brutal breaking of the nascent union movement and any true semblance of political democracy and freedom of speech, at least in as far as critics of capitalist greed were allowed any viable expression. Fortunately for the capitalists, their left wing opponents are shown to spend far too much of their energy castigating one another and arguing about tactics.
For such stirring social relevance, one would expect that the writing would take a back seat to the polemic, but it doesn't. The final scene is a moving marvel of dramatic juxtaposition in which radio (a new development, upon which Sinclair comments that the 'fact that is one way, it has great usefulness to the capitalist system [by forming] the basis on which to build the greatest slave empire in history') intersperses reporting of Coolidge's landslide victory, mindless jazz tunes and scenes of an earnest labour leader lying lies at death's door of a fractured skull administered by hired thugs.
The rich never seem to be satisfied with how rich they are. They also lack any reasonable amount of moral conscience about the way in which they augment their already obscene levels of wealth. Taxes, to them, are only there to be cut. Workers are to be driven into submission and merely discarded should they demand any semblance humane treatment. Politicians, judges, newspapers are there to be bought in order to further the Gaberdine-swine like charge for more money, more money, more money.
Sinclair's work is almost a hundred years old. It is due to works like this that health insurance, old age pensions and unemployment insurance were developed to mitigate the most heinous excesses of the capitalist system. Sadly, it still provides a very relevant message to be heard today, as climate change, youth unemployment, income inequities and immigrant-baiting all show that compassion and respect for fundamental human dignity are a long way from replacing greed as the prime motivating spirit for human endeavour.
What was true of the times of Harding and Coolidge in the States in the early 1920s is not dissimilar from the America of Trump, the Britain of Johnson, the Philippines of Duterte, the Brazil of Bolsanaro: the crudity and moral vacuity of these leaders shows that they are mere fronts for the f---ing rich who are still in power and, by pulling the strings on these puppets, are getting richer and richer and richer.
Highly recommended. It is much, much better than the movie There Will Be Blood upon which is was purportedly based, but which ignores so much of the thrust of Sinclair's vision that I really doubt the screenwriter gave the novel more than a cursory glance.
Update (May 2021): Biden wants to tax those who make over $400,000/yr to help pay for health services, preschool education and community college tuition. The Republicans have told him 'No' and will effectively block his moves to improve the lives of so many people. It is more important to them that the very very rich stay very very rich. For what do they really need the final $100,000 of income on top of their other wealth? I feel that it is just their fractured moral compass that worships at the all-mighty dollar sign and occludes any proper appreciation of the nature of the humanity around them.
And Lewis wrote his book almost a hundred years ago! What a sad commentary on the limited nature of man's sense of fairness and equity.
February 11, 2023
Came for the There Will Be Blood references, stayed for the… idk why I stayed. Turns out There Will Be Blood uses like 100 pages of this book tops. Anyways, I found the beginning of the book fascinating. The author gets into detail on some of the early business models (and rackets) of late 19th-early 20th century California. I found the simplicity of the American economy at the time the most interesting thing. After that, the book progresses into a story about labor vs. capital, corrupt politicians and journalists, and it gets depressing very quickly.
By the end of the book, it became difficult to determine if the main character, Bunny, was supposed to be a naive idealist or a certified moron. The final third of the book seems to catch him by surprise, even though the reader can see what is coming down the pipe pretty clearly. I don’t think he was meant to come across poorly, but by the end of the book he ends up just looking dumb.
5/10 needed more bowling and milkshakes
By the end of the book, it became difficult to determine if the main character, Bunny, was supposed to be a naive idealist or a certified moron. The final third of the book seems to catch him by surprise, even though the reader can see what is coming down the pipe pretty clearly. I don’t think he was meant to come across poorly, but by the end of the book he ends up just looking dumb.
5/10 needed more bowling and milkshakes
Read
July 19, 2021Upton Sinclair’s Oil! Is a dense historical epic of the early 20th century American oil industry, diving into both the coming-of-age of a young oil prince, the tension between the supressed working class and the drunken upper class, and everything in between whilst laying bare all the degeneracy and conflict society has to offer.
Despite it being a detail-packed historical insight, the novel lacks the art of suggestion. Almost every action or change of events is being supplied by an explanation that narrows any interpretation whatsoever, screaming: “Capitalism is the bad guy!”. The novel reads smoothly, but Sinclair just can’t help but explain himself, which cancels-out that extra value…
Tied with this, Sinclair chose to dig into every aspect of society, but failed to keep things interesting for me all the time. Whatever situation was being carefully built up, sooner or later you knew money and corruption would bring an end to the fairy tale (with a fat wink to the alternative of everything Socialist). The problem is not this point of view, but my sense that the text functions more as a social protest with an overemphasized message than a well-written novel. The climax made up for this and that, but honestly, I’m relieved I’m finished.
Despite it being a detail-packed historical insight, the novel lacks the art of suggestion. Almost every action or change of events is being supplied by an explanation that narrows any interpretation whatsoever, screaming: “Capitalism is the bad guy!”. The novel reads smoothly, but Sinclair just can’t help but explain himself, which cancels-out that extra value…
Tied with this, Sinclair chose to dig into every aspect of society, but failed to keep things interesting for me all the time. Whatever situation was being carefully built up, sooner or later you knew money and corruption would bring an end to the fairy tale (with a fat wink to the alternative of everything Socialist). The problem is not this point of view, but my sense that the text functions more as a social protest with an overemphasized message than a well-written novel. The climax made up for this and that, but honestly, I’m relieved I’m finished.
April 13, 2023
In the first 150 or so pages, the story follows the rise of an oil baron, and his son. This part of the book was excellent and I thought it could be a 5/5 book. The book shifts focus into some other characters like Paul, a socialist, who has no other characteristics besides being a socialist. Oil is still a major part of the book, but socialism seems to be Sinclair’s main interest. It felt like he wrote the book conveniently so that it fit the anti-capitalist narrative. Upton Sinclair does bring up many issues that spur from capitalism, but calling America the most successful slave state in History is absolutely crazy! I’m just happy I was able to finish this book 😅
May 23, 2023
A Rare Occurrence: "There Will Be Blood" Outshines its Literary Source
Upton Sinclair's "Oil" is a sprawling novel that delves deep into the world of the oil industry, but it is the film adaptation, "There Will Be Blood," that truly shines, surpassing its source material in a rare feat of cinematic brilliance.
While Sinclair's novel offers a comprehensive exploration of the themes and dynamics surrounding the oil industry, it is director Paul Thomas Anderson's masterful translation of the story to the big screen that elevates the narrative to new heights. Anderson's vision brings a distinct visual and auditory experience that captivates viewers from the opening scene to the final frame.
"There Will Be Blood" manages to distill the essence of Sinclair's story into a more focused and captivating narrative. Anderson's screenplay condenses the sprawling plot of the novel while maintaining its core themes and key moments. This streamlined approach allows the film to maintain a gripping pace, keeping audiences on the edge of their seats without sacrificing the story's depth and complexity.
Central to the success of "There Will Be Blood" is Daniel Day-Lewis's mesmerizing performance as Daniel Plainview, the ambitious oil tycoon. Day-Lewis's portrayal is a tour de force, breathing life into the character with a level of intensity and nuance that is difficult to achieve on the written page. His magnetic presence and captivating delivery elevate the film to an entirely new level, earning him critical acclaim and numerous accolades, including an Academy Award for Best Actor.
Furthermore, the cinematography, score, and overall visual design of "There Will Be Blood" contribute to its superiority over the source material. The film's hauntingly beautiful landscapes, coupled with Jonny Greenwood's evocative score, create an immersive atmosphere that further intensifies the story's themes of greed, power, and the dark underbelly of ambition.
While "Oil" provides a comprehensive and detailed exploration of the subject matter, it is the expertly crafted film adaptation that condenses and enhances the essence of the story, resulting in a more engrossing and impactful experience. Anderson's directorial vision, combined with Day-Lewis's unforgettable performance, cinematography, and score, come together to create a cinematic masterpiece that surpasses its literary counterpart.
In the rare instance where the movie outshines the book, "There Will Be Blood" stands as a testament to the power of visionary filmmaking and exceptional performances. While Upton Sinclair's "Oil" should be recognized for its contribution to literature and its exploration of significant themes, it is through the transformative adaptation to the screen that the story truly finds its cinematic glory.
Upton Sinclair's "Oil" is a sprawling novel that delves deep into the world of the oil industry, but it is the film adaptation, "There Will Be Blood," that truly shines, surpassing its source material in a rare feat of cinematic brilliance.
While Sinclair's novel offers a comprehensive exploration of the themes and dynamics surrounding the oil industry, it is director Paul Thomas Anderson's masterful translation of the story to the big screen that elevates the narrative to new heights. Anderson's vision brings a distinct visual and auditory experience that captivates viewers from the opening scene to the final frame.
"There Will Be Blood" manages to distill the essence of Sinclair's story into a more focused and captivating narrative. Anderson's screenplay condenses the sprawling plot of the novel while maintaining its core themes and key moments. This streamlined approach allows the film to maintain a gripping pace, keeping audiences on the edge of their seats without sacrificing the story's depth and complexity.
Central to the success of "There Will Be Blood" is Daniel Day-Lewis's mesmerizing performance as Daniel Plainview, the ambitious oil tycoon. Day-Lewis's portrayal is a tour de force, breathing life into the character with a level of intensity and nuance that is difficult to achieve on the written page. His magnetic presence and captivating delivery elevate the film to an entirely new level, earning him critical acclaim and numerous accolades, including an Academy Award for Best Actor.
Furthermore, the cinematography, score, and overall visual design of "There Will Be Blood" contribute to its superiority over the source material. The film's hauntingly beautiful landscapes, coupled with Jonny Greenwood's evocative score, create an immersive atmosphere that further intensifies the story's themes of greed, power, and the dark underbelly of ambition.
While "Oil" provides a comprehensive and detailed exploration of the subject matter, it is the expertly crafted film adaptation that condenses and enhances the essence of the story, resulting in a more engrossing and impactful experience. Anderson's directorial vision, combined with Day-Lewis's unforgettable performance, cinematography, and score, come together to create a cinematic masterpiece that surpasses its literary counterpart.
In the rare instance where the movie outshines the book, "There Will Be Blood" stands as a testament to the power of visionary filmmaking and exceptional performances. While Upton Sinclair's "Oil" should be recognized for its contribution to literature and its exploration of significant themes, it is through the transformative adaptation to the screen that the story truly finds its cinematic glory.
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