From Nowhere: Utopian and Dystopian Visions of our - Chris J. Young

56. The Iron Heel.
56. Jack London (1876–1916). The Iron Heel. London: Everett & Co, 1908.
Jack London’s The Iron Heel is a revolutionary socialist novel that portrays a fascist, oligarchical
dictatorship of Wall Street capitalists, intent on suppressing workers’ rights. This dystopia, modeled
on The Communist Manifesto, exposes the various stages of capitalism as described by Marx and Engels.
Workers are repressed as ever more extreme fluctuations in the economic system occur, leading (as in
the Manifesto) to a bloody revolution, constituting the main plot of the book. Set in the twenty-seventh
century, it reflects events of the early twentieth century, as recorded in the memoirs of Avis Everhard,
the widow of Ernest Everhard, a socialist who was crushed by the capitalists seven centuries earlier.
The reminiscences reveal Everhard’s efforts to challenge the capitalists by being elected to Congress
and enduring imprisonment before being freed by socialist rebels. Owing to his involvement in an
underground movement aimed at bringing about the collapse of the capitalist dictatorship, or the
iron Heel, he is eventually killed. London, however, concludes the dystopia with the final triumph of
socialism over capitalism, leading to a true utopian era of peace and plenty.
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