First published in 1903, ‘The Pit: A Story of Chicago’ was Norris’s most successful novel in terms of sales and initial reception; this may have been aided in part by its publication so soon after his sudden death, but it was also a novel that spoke directly to the times.
‘The Pit: A Story of Chicago’ was the second novel in Norris’s proposed trilogy called “
The Epic of the Wheat .” In this “story of Chicago, ” Norris moves from the production of wheat to its distribution on world markets, from the natural countryside of California to the artificial terrain of futures speculation. Continuing his portrayal of the effects of temptation and greed, Norris also depicts the decline evident in the space of only one generation—from the moral generation of elders who made their money through honest labor to their degenerate offspring who labor only after money and the power it bestows.
The first book of the trilogy, ‘
The Octopus, ‘ was published in 1901. Norris died unexpectedly in October 1902 from appendicitis leaving the third book, ‘
The Wolf: A Story of Empire, ‘ incomplete.