Chapter I: Front Matter

_The Autobiography of Upton Sinclair_

_The Autobiography
of_
UPTON SINCLAIR

New York
HARCOURT, BRACE & WORLD, INC.

Printed in the United States of America

_Preface_

All through my seventy-one years of writing life--I started at thirteen--I have had from my readers suggestions that I should tell my own story. When I was halfway through those writing years I accepted the suggestion and wrote a book called _American Outpost_. The major part of that book, revised and brought up to date, is incorporated in this volume.

I put myself in the position of a veteran of many campaigns who gathers the youngsters about his knee. He knows these youngsters cannot really share the anguish and turmoil of his early years, for they belong to a new generation which is looking to be entertained and amused. So the old campaigner takes a casual and lighthearted tone.

If any old-timer is offended by this--well, there are any number of serious books, plays, and pamphlets of mine that he can read, plus an anthology and a selection of letters written to me by the really great writers of our time. If that is not enough he can travel to the University of Indiana and there, in the Lilly Library, he can read the 250,000 letters that have been written to me over the years--and the carbon copies of my replies. After he has read all this, I shall have written more.

_Contents_

_Preface_ v

I _Childhood_ 3

II _Youth_ 28

III _Genius_ 53

IV _Marriage_ 75

V _Revolt_ 99

VI _Utopia_ 127

VII _Wandering_ 147

VIII _Exile_ 169

IX _New Beginning_ 191

X _West to California_ 212

XI _The Muckrake Man_ 222

XII _More Causes--and Effects_ 243

XIII _Some Eminent Visitors_ 254

XIV _EPIC_ 268

XV _Grist for My Mill_ 278

XVI _Lanny Budd_ 291

XVII _Harvest_ 303

XVIII _A Tragic Ordeal_ 310

XIX _End and Beginning_ 318

XX _Summing Up_ 327

_Books by Upton Sinclair_ 331

_Index_ 333

_List of Illustrations_

(_The illustrations will be found between pages 166 and 167. All but the last three were supplied by the Upton Sinclair Collection, Lilly Library, Indiana University, Indiana._)

Priscilla Harden Sinclair

Upton Beall Sinclair, Sr.

Upton Sinclair at the age of eight

Upton Sinclair at twenty-seven, when he was writing _The Jungle_

Winston Churchill reviews _The Jungle_

George Bernard Shaw at Ayot-St. Lawrence, about 1913

Mary Craig Sinclair and Upton Sinclair in Bermuda, 1913

George Sterling, his wife, Carrie, and Jack London

Mrs. Kate Crane-Gartz

Sergei Eisenstein, about 1933

Upton Sinclair during the EPIC campaign, 1934

Upton Sinclair and Harry Hopkins, 1934

_Flivver King_ in Detroit, 1937

Upton Sinclair, about 1960, with autographed picture of Albert Einstein

Upton Sinclair standing before his home in Monrovia, California

May Hard Sinclair and Upton Sinclair, 1962

Upton Sinclair with seventy-nine of the books he has written

_The Autobiography of Upton Sinclair_

_1_

_Childhood_