chrysemys 's review for:

The Iron Heel by Jack London

4.0

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An interesting dystopian alternate history. True, there was a lot of Marxist rhetoric in the first half that some readers might find distasteful. I was okay with it because I haven't read Das Kapital and it was a much quicker way of getting some of the ideas across. What was most interesting to me was the way London envisioned society polarizing even more than it actually did- particularly his conception of the Oligarchy as a group dedicated to keeping the poor man down out of pure malice. I also enjoyed the footnotes, amusingly explaining 19th and 20th century culture to an audience seven centuries after the events in the book. Finally, I was thrilled to read a book from that era where great and important things begin on the west coast instead of in the eastern US.