The Iron Heel (1908) is a dystopian novel by American writer Jack London. Narrated through the memoir of Avis Everhard, wife of socialist revolutionary Ernest Everhard, the novel envisions the rise of a brutal capitalist oligarchy—the "Iron Heel"—that crushes the American working class and violently suppresses socialist movements. Set in the early twentieth century, it depicts class warfare, rigged markets, treachery, and massacre as the ruling elite consolidates absolute power. Though the revolutionaries are ultimately defeated, scholarly footnotes reveal their cause triumphs centuries later. Regarded as a precursor to modern dystopian fiction, the novel powerfully critiques capitalism and warns against tyranny.
