- Paperback: 560 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Modern Classics (7 Feb 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0141031700
- ISBN-13: 978-0141031705
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.6 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 289,254 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Oil!: There Will be Blood
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Product Description
The New Republic
"He does his little bit of muck-raking. . . but the glorious story of the oil man and his son rushes on. It is a marvelous panorama of Southern California life. It is storytelling with an edge on it."
Product Description
Sinclair's 1927 novel did for California's oil industry what The Jungle did for Chicago's meat-packing factories. 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.
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First Sentence
The road ran, smooth and flawless, precisely fourteen feet wide, the edges trimmed as if by shears, a ribbon of grey concrete, rolled out over the valley by a giant hand. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
The road ran, smooth and flawless, precisely fourteen feet wide, the edges trimmed as if by shears, a ribbon of grey concrete, rolled out over the valley by a giant hand. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Solid stuff that meets all of Sinclair's ideological convictions without losing its sense of readability (though the 1st half is markedly more engaging than the 2nd). Very fine work (though rather different from what fans of the movie might expect).
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
We read "Oil" for our Book Group and everyone who came along to the discussion rated it highly. It has a light, amusing style and a witty turn of phrase, while the content is hugely wide-ranging, making it a novel to be read on many levels. I loved reading this book.
6 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Rather than being about Daniel Plainfield and to a lesser extent his "son" HW, the book is told mainly from the perspective of "Bunny" Ross, the actual son of oilman J Arnold Ross. There are very significant roles for two of the Watkins brothers: Eli the Pentecostal preacher, corrupt as in the film, but more believable here to those who know something of Pentecostalism in 1920s California (some of the material clearly influenced by the career of Aimee Semple Macpherson); and a very prominent role for Paul, the politically committed union activist who ultimately becomes a communist, and has a profound influence on "Bunny".
Why three stars? Well, for me three stars means averagely good, four stars is for significantly better than average and only the truly exceptional should get five stars. There is much to admire and enjoy here, but it was written in 1926, and the author's advocacy of socialism/communism, with his enthusiasm for communist Russia seems hopelessly naive and misplaced, given what we have known for many decades now. Human greed is an evil thing, and the capitalist beast needs taming, but communism proved a worse system than America in the 1920s in virtually every respect.
Why three stars? Well, for me three stars means averagely good, four stars is for significantly better than average and only the truly exceptional should get five stars. There is much to admire and enjoy here, but it was written in 1926, and the author's advocacy of socialism/communism, with his enthusiasm for communist Russia seems hopelessly naive and misplaced, given what we have known for many decades now. Human greed is an evil thing, and the capitalist beast needs taming, but communism proved a worse system than America in the 1920s in virtually every respect.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
what the hell?
I bought this on a reccomendation
(my friend said it was day lewis best performance ever)
so I bought it and it just wouldn't fit in the dvd player. Read more
(my friend said it was day lewis best performance ever)
so I bought it and it just wouldn't fit in the dvd player. Read more
Published 17 months ago by Perediam
Very dated
This novel succeeds to some extent in giving a detailed picture of Southern California in a bygone age with its details of the oil industry, the burgeoning film industry and life... Read more
Published 18 months ago by Mountain Man
Oil
I haven't read the book yet so can't review the content. The book itself however arrived quickly and was in very good condition.
Published 21 months ago by Richard L. Stavale
There Will Be Disappointment
First thing to say is that anyone looking for the same story of the film won't find it here - indeed, the inspiration taken from book to screenplay seems rather slight. Read more
Published on 10 Aug 2009 by R. A. Johnson
Boring
This bares no resemblence to the great film and it is a bit boring also.
Published on 26 July 2009 by Raven
A book that changes one who reads it...The film on the other hand is...
Sabahattin Ali is said to have commented on this book that whoever reads this book becomes a socialist. Read more
Published on 25 Feb 2008 by Ogun Eratalay
An excellent written book by a world famous author.
One of my favorite books of all times. Upton Sinclair is a literary master. The book is intense, and moves through all its nearly 600 pages. Read more
Published on 27 April 1998
A Good Historical Novel
If one can look through the Muckraking Sinclair is doing, the book paints a detailed portrait of the oil industry, movie industry and overall life in southern California in the... Read more
Published on 28 Nov 1997
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