Category: Grapes of Wrath

Chapter 1 Encompassing Time-Space Relations

In literature, the temporal and spatial parameters of human time journey pass by past their acquainted dualism and are merged into space-time, inherent in every and each and each narrative work. Time and vicinity are integral to literary realism insofar as they aid the novelist to create a sense of genuine cause-and-effect and, especially, a feeling of social reality. John Steinbeck, popularly diagnosed as a big of American letters, used to be once born in Salinas, California on February 27, 1902. He used to be an American author and the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature winner for his practical and ingenious writings combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social perception. Many of his works are considered classics of western literature.

During his writing career, he authored 33 books, with one ebook co-authored alongside Edward Ricketts, collectively with sixteen novels, six nonfiction books, and two collections of rapid stories. He is considerably cited for the comic novels Tortilla flat (1935) and cannery row (1945), multi-generation epic East of Eden (1952), and the novellas The Red Pony (1933) and Of Mice and Men (1937). The Pulitzer Prize- prevailing The Grapes of Wrath (1939) Â is regarded as Steinbeck`s masterpiece and segment of the American literary Canon. In the first seventy-five years after it was as quickly published, it presented 14 million copies.

Steinbeck`s reputation rests higher frequently than now not on the naturalistic novels with proletarian things he wrote in the 1930s; It is in these works that his establishing of affluent symbolic constructions and his tries at conveying mythopoeic and archetypical traits in his characters are most effective. Steinbeck`s characters regularly emerge as idealized archetypes or epic heroes; on the other hand than the usage of them to discover the persona human psyche, the writer affords them as embodiments of well-known beliefs or struggles.

Most of Steinbeck`s work is set in central California, in most instances in the Salinas Valley and the California Coast Ranges Region. His works often explored the matters of future and injustice, especially as utilized to downtrodden or everyman protagonists. His achievement is particularly noteworthy due to the fact he never wondered of himself as a naturally knowledgeable creative genius and hardly ever ever ever believed he had ever arrived as a writer. If it is no longer viable to agree with naively in the romantic delusion of ingenious genius, with its heightened gain of transcendence and sovereignty, neither is it conceivable to acquire unhesitantly the modern poststructuralist posture that the writer is a cold cipher, absolutely determined with the aid of unconscious forces of language, race, gender, and class. Better to think of Steinbeck as on foot the line between these positions. He used to be a self-willed writer who prized the shaping electricity of imagination, but he additionally realized how indebted he was as soon as to a welter of historical particulars contextual determinants, and awesome people. I, as a novelist, he declared in a letter, am a product now no longer completely of my very own time on the other hand of all the flags and tatters, the fable and prejudice, the have faith and filth that preceded meâ novelist is a kind of flypaper to which the whole lot adheres. His job then is to strive to reassemble existence into some form of order.

Steinbeck accompanied his wave of success with the Grapes of Wrath(1939), based totally completely sincerely on newspaper articles about migrant agricultural people that he had written in San Francisco. It is usually viewed as his excellent work. The novel is set in the Great Depression and describes a family of sharecroppers, the Joads, who have been pushed from their Oklahoma domestic via capability of a way of drought, financial hardship, agricultural employer changes, and monetary institution foreclosures forcing tenant farmers out of work. Due to their nearly hopeless situation, and in the area due to the truth they are trapped in the Dust Bowl, the Joads set out for California alongside with heaps of different Okies Seeking jobs, land, dignity, and a future. The novel follows the family`s tough journey, commenting on the political nation of affairs of the land, and the effects it has on the people, locations, and the whole nation. The family of the Joads is used to signify the wider neighborhood of migrant personnel and is mentioned facet with the aid of way of aspect with the nameless group of Okies in the interchapters. The interchapters connect the man or woman family`s outing to the nationwide struggles. The novel`s integral characters are Tom, Ma Joad, and the former preacher Jim Casy. Out of these three characters, Tom Joad represents the collective energy that human beings have when they work together. The title is a reference to the fighting hymn of the Republic. Some critics headquartered it too sympathetic to the human’s plight and too essential of capitalism, then once more it found a huge target market of its own. It obtained both the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize for fiction and was once tailored as a film starring Henry and Jane Darwell and directed by means of the usage of John Ford.

The Grapes of Wrath is now no longer a closed computer of historical periodicity then again a rational field, a web of connections between textual content material fabric and context, nature and culture, bodily earth, and human inhabitants. Steinbeck devised a contrapuntal structure with quick lyrical chapters of exposition and history pertinent to the migrants as a group- chapters 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 12, 14, 17, 19, 21, 23, 25, 27, 29- alternating with the extended narrative chapters of the Joad family`s exodus to California chapters 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 13, 16, 18, 20, 22, 24, 26, 30. ( chapter 15 is a swing chapter that participates in every editorial and narrative mode.) Steinbeck structured his novel through the way of juxtaposition. His particular chapters are the slow-paced and prolonged narrative episodes that embody standard characterization and beautify the dramatic plot, even as his jazzy, speedy furnace interchapters work at some other level of cognition via way of expressing an atemporal, universal, synoptic view of the migrant condition. The novel demonstrates how the structure itself is a type of magic lantern, a transferring lens for magnifying and viewing more than one perspective of reality.

As each sturdy novel redefines our thought of fiction`s dimensions and reorders our pastime of its possibilities, The Grapes of Wrath has populist, homegrown quality: part naturalistic epic, section labor testament, section household Chronicle, part partisan Journalism, area jeremiad, segment captivity narrative, segment road novel, part transcendental gospel. The novel is endowed with a uniquely human context, a felt emotional quality, and a dramatic dimension his earlier than editions lacked. By conceiving the Joads as an over the essence of people, Steinbeck extended the whole documents of the migrant fight into the alarm of art, and he joined the mythic western trip with latently heroic family characters.

 In the works of fiction, location constitutes the heritage of the occasions taking region in relation with the characters and all these factors exist internal for a particular duration of time. Milford Jeremiah, In his brilliant article The use of Place in Literature described the idea of the region in relation with the different elements like time and things to do and informed that; Place is generally combined with time and events to what is recognized as social placing or the social context of a literary work(23).

This venture tries to become aware of the significance of time and house in John Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath. It dreams to divulge how the Bakhtinian thinking of chronotype can be used to illustrate the normal scope of the literary work through conducting a chronotopic locate out about of Tom Joad- the most essential character of the novel, alongside with inspecting the avenue chronotype. The mission additionally attempts to exhibit that the thought of chronotype is used to create a bodily place in the novel. For the purpose of this study, the challenge is divided into unique chapters.

The 2d chapter The stumble on out about of Spatiotemporal Continuum offers the theoretical records of this study. It introduces the Bakhtinian precept of literary chronotope, its primary elements, and the sorts of chronotopes that are going to be used later on in the subsequent chapters.

The 13 chapter The Heroic Path Chronotope, discusses about the avenue Chronotope and focuses on the chronotopic examination of Tom Joad whereby the avenue and heroic route Chronotope in the novel revolve around a battle nearer to an aim or excursion spot which is structured on some variety of metamorphosis of the protagonist (Tom Joad) into beings of extended self-knowledge. Here are and time are regularly seen as a giant to the extent that they furnish areas and activities for the improvement of this experience.

The fourth chapter The Ecological Conception of Chronotope focuses on the surroundings and in specifically on the concrete bodily areas in the novel. It defines how the thinking of chronotype, alon with nature and time is used in the novel`s narrative to create a bodily place.

The epic Of Mice and Men was first delivered in February 1937 and tells the story of the companions George and Lennie, who are transient specialists in California during the Great Depression. George is Lennie’s overseer as Lennie is intellectually debilitated. At the start of the novel, they show up at a farm near Soledad in California where they find a new line of work kicking grain. They stay in a bunkhouse for certain different specialists on the farm and there they become acquainted with men who have comparable expectations and dreams, that one day they will get their own place. (Steinbeck 16). Before long they meet their manager’s child Curley, and his significant other, who looks for the specialists’ consideration because of her own dejection. George cautions Lennie not to cooperate with her since he speculates that it will get them into difficulty. One of their kindred laborers, Slim, gives Lennie a pup that he gets a kick out of the chance to stroke in his leisure time. Later on in the novel, Lennie and Curley’s significant other is distant from everyone else in the stable. Before long she finds out about his affection for stroking delicate things and allows him to stroke her hair. At the point when she feels Lennie’s very solid hands she gets frightened and begins to shout in light of the fact that Lennie won’t relinquish her. Lennie goes crazy and incidentally breaks her neck and murders her. This particular hyperlink among novel and play shape has made the variation of Of Mice and Men onto the level a completely easy one as Steinbeck has finished a super deal of the paintings for the playwright. This fantastically simplistic narrative fashion is Steinbeck’s calling card and is one of the motives I like to apply his texts at paintings due to the fact college students of all skills can interact in his writing. In of Mice and Men, the American Dream is to just have a spot set up roots, to discover a spot to have a place. Setting in his book in California during the 1930s of the Depression, Steinbeck recounts the tale of the cruel real factors of life for poor incompetent specialists uprooted by the Great Depression – the best monetary decay and high joblessness in Western industrialized countries. Of Mice and Men voices more profound importance about the idea of human dreams and desires and the powers that neutralize them. In the story, we see the American Dream, however inaccessible, as a type of inspiration, giving a feeling of significance and expectation, stimulating individuals regardless of whether it is futile. People offer significance to their lives and prospects by making dreams. Before all else, the two heroes, George and Lennie, are presented and their vision of the American Dream is set up. The longing related with the aspirations in the existence of extraordinary depression and hardship of organization and companionship is uncovered. The two men are farm laborers and have not known a superior life, and along these lines, they make for themselves a dream for their future. ‘… we’re going to have a little house two or three sections of land and a cow and a few pigs… ‘ As a self-evident truth, rehashing the recounting the story turns out to be right around a custom between the two men, George giving the account and Lennie infrequently completing George’s sentences. For the greater part of the characters in Of Mice and Men, accomplishing the American Dream addresses freedom, security, and a position of confidence and acknowledgment. For every one of them, human poise is a basic piece of fantasy.

Sacrifice is the toughest aspect to do, selfishness, thoughtlessness, and lots of flaws in our lifestyles preserve us from doing the nice aspect. In of Mice of Men, via way of means of John Steinbeck the two index entries were found. major characters George and Lennie have a deep, perplexing, and loving court. With George’s love and taking care of Lennie, he sacrificed a lot in the direction of him even if it’s maximum pain and the maximum benefit. We need to make a sacrifice for proper friendships regardless of ache because it ends in a nice average outcome. Initially, making painful sacrifices for buddies improves individuals. Throughout the complete novel, we see sacrifices that the characters make which develop them. Steinbeck indicates us that Lennie mentally holds George again from a clean lifestyle however George selected to sacrifice this all as it makes him distinct from the alternative farm hands, it makes him much less thoughtless. Especially withinside the 1930s, many migrant people had been thoughtless, lonely guys who went round for paintings and didn’t have a lot individuals. Another example wherein we see the progressed individual in George from sacrificing a distinct lifestyle is the caring, dependable character he has in the direction of Lennie. When George talks with Slim approximately his courting with Lennie he has a flashback: “I turn to Lennie and says, ‘Jump in.’ An’ he jumps. Couldn’t swim a stroke. He rattling close to drowned earlier than we may want to get him” (Steinbeck 40). When George informed Slim approximately this he stated approximately how he might cope with him from after that. Steinbeck makes this a flashback to reveal the readers that George nonetheless cares for Lennie. His individual undoubtedly modified and have become someone with the potential to take care of others. In a contrast, we see that Whit is someone that has a restricted individual.

The Grapes of Wrath was distributed in 1939 and quickly caused scholarly excitement, all around archived by Warren French. The top-selling novel of 1939, it won the Pulitzer Prize and the American Booksellers Award, merits which upheld Steinbeck’s political decision to participate in the National Institute of Arts and Letters. A film adaptation of the novel was before long shot and furthermore got basic honors. In spite of the fact that there are not explicit monetary records reporting the offer of the book, the various American printings and unfamiliar interpretations would validate a liberal expansion in Steinbeck. To adequately and precisely break down how John Steinbeck would respond to a recent development, I will think about two comparative occasions, one of the present-day and one of Steinbeck’s time frame. Steinbeck has widely shown compassion in his composition for the average workers and their battles. The current downturn that America has been in since 2008 up to this point can measure up to the Great Depression that Steinbeck survived, which affected a considerable lot of his works. Steinbeck prominently reacted to the Great Depression through his novel The Grapes of Wrath. In light of this, it is likely foreseen that he would react to the new downturn likewise. In The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck centers around a helpless group of tenant farmers who battle to conform to the moving economy, the dry season, and different difficulties made by the Great Depression. Steinbeck would likely utilize a cutting-edge family with comparative conditions as an abstract gadget to portray the downturn. For instance, it is conceivable that Steinbeck would consider the existence of somebody who does physical work, or a regular laborer, who was at that point battling and working limit measures of hours just to help his family. Perhaps the laborer’s abilities would be getting pointless because of the new changes in innovation. Such conditions would be comparable, yet not exactly as outrageous, to those in The Grapes of Wrath, as the striving family was confronted with changes of the monetary and farming enterprises. His book would definitely be thoughtful to the laborer.

Steinbeck, who dedicated his life to defending the privately owned and celebrating the highest potential of the human spirit, refuses to succumb to what Rebecca Solnit has so appropriately called ‘desperation, defeatism, cynicism[] amnesia and hypothesis.’ Fifteen centuries later, instead, Steinbeck quickly put on the indelible duality of human nature and on the cyclical character of the civilizational continuity, which we called history: a brilliant charioteer metaphor that was for good and evil.

‘Not that I have lost any hope. All the goodness and the heroisms will rise up again, then be cut down again and rise up. It isn’t that the evil thing wins — it never will — but that it doesn’t die. I don’t know why we should expect it to. It seems fairly obvious that two sides of a mirror are required before one has a mirror, that two forces are necessary in a man before he is a man. I asked [the influential microbiologist] Paul de Kruif once if he would like to cure all diseases and he said yes. Then I suggested that the man he loved and wanted to cure was a product of all his filth and disease and meanness, his hunger and cruelty. Cure those and you would have not man but an entirely new species you wouldn’t recognize and probably wouldn’t like.’

But in fact, the opposite is the case: Steinbeck suggests that our human feasibility does not negate our goodness or desire for betterment; instead, it provides both fuel and yard by which we measure our moral development. Steinbeck is sufficiently subtle to err in moral relativism. He wrests the mortal flaw of the Nazi regime and the grounds for hope for survival from an inevitable interplay of order and chaos that, if we do not forget this, many people around the world were sometimes afraid of being insurmountable.

‘It is interesting to watch the German efficiency, which, from the logic of the machine is efficient but which (I suspect) from the mechanics of the human species is suicidal. Certainly, man thrives best (or has at least) in a state of semi-anarchy. Then he has been strong, inventive, reliant, and moving. But cage him with rules, feed him, and make him healthy and I think he will die as surely as a caged wolf dies. I should not be surprised to see a cared for, thought for, planned-for nation disintegrate, while a ragged, hungry, lustful nation survived. Surely no great all-encompassing plan has ever succeeded.’

The Jewish figures are exemplary in their refusal to be broken by their circumstances. Steinbeck seems to be committed to showing dignity and respect at every turn; he stresses the importance of respecting oneself in order to spiritually survive. This is more obvious nowhere than at the end of the novel. The Joads had suffered incomparable losses: the family was left with Noah, Connie, and Tom; the child born in Rose of Sharon; the family had no food and no promise of work. At the moment, however, the families (Chapter 30), which shows that the Jewish people do not lose a sense of the value of human life, manage to overcome their hardship in order to perform an act of unmatched kindness and generosity. In his novel, Steinbeck clearly links dignity with rage. As long as they have a feeling of injustice and a sense of anger at those who try to undermine their self-righteousness, they never lose dignity. This belief is strengthened in the images of Steinbeck’s grapes of wrath (Chapter 25), as in the latter chapters of short expositions (Chapter29) in which the workers’ women are aware that these men ‘will remain strong as long as fear turns to wrath’ as they observe their husbands and brothers and children. The certainty of the women has based on their understanding that the wrath of the men reflects their well-being.

Individuals’ penance as an approach to quit any trace of something esteemed for others’ thought. A model that shows this in when George is at the lake with Lennie we the weapon to the back of his head, ‘George lifted the firearm and his hand shook, and he dropped his hand to the ground once more (Steinbeck 105). This genuinely finishing shows that it was so difficult for George to forfeit since it caused him such a lot of agony, despite the fact that it was the best circumstance for Lennie so he would have a decent result. Steinbeck accentuates this principally in the last section to show peruses that forfeits that cause the most agony are the ones for genuine fellowships and ones that make the best generally speaking result. Notwithstanding George making penances Candy additionally forfeits his friend. At the point when the men are in the bunk house, Carlson says, ‘ He’s all firm with an ailment. He ain’t nothing but bad to you, Candy. And he ain’t great to himself’ (Steinbeck 44). John Ford’s moving film, Grapes of Wrath, pulls at the heartstrings of watchers. The film recounts the tale of the Joad family and their battle to look for some kind of employment during the downturn. The story starts with Tom Joad, the oldest child of the Joad family, finding that his family has been removed from their home during the Oklahoma Dust Bowl and set out for California alongside a huge number of others looking for occupations, land, and expectations for a more promising time to come. Passage utilizes the narrative of the Joad family to pass on the subject that the need of the many exceeds the necessities of one. Passage utilizes Ma Joad, Tom Joad, and Jim Casey to represent the requirement for strong instead of individualistic beliefs during harsh occasions. Tom Joad is quite possibly the most intriguing. She keeps everybody solid and positive. At the point when the family is leaving their home to go to California Ma doesn’t glance back at her previous lifestyle, she rather she remains positive and just looks forward at the cheerful future. Motely states, ‘as the more established Joad men sink into ineffectualness and melancholy, family authority movements to Ma Joad. First, she forcefully challenges male-centric choices that may section the family, and before the finish of the novel she has stepped up. At the point when the men can’t look for some kind of employment at the public authority camp and have relinquished their man-centric jobs… ‘ Ma Joad is without a doubt the most grounded of the Joad group. As the family encounters an ever-increasing number of deterrents Pa Joad appears to not realize what to do. Mama and Tom are the ones who venture up and structure the spine that will uphold the family. In essentially every activity, Ma shows no worry for herself except for her family, and here and there outsiders. For instance, when the family is halted Ma needs to tell the gatekeeper that Granma is wiped out and needs to discover a specialist.

In John Ford’s film variation of Steinbeck’s tale, Grapes of Wrath, three characters arise as less legends yet but rather than more caring pioneers. Tom, Casey, and Ma are altogether able to forfeit themselves, or what is best for them, to help the mass. Jim Casey’s Christ-like character is shown through his activities, yet can even be found in his initials; they are equivalent to Jesus Christ. At the point when Tom leaves his family, he anticipates proceeding to forfeit himself for the better individuals. He tells Ma, ‘insofar as I’m a fugitive at any rate perhaps I can accomplish something… and fix it.’ In The Grapes of Wrath, Steinbeck enormously portrays the subjects of solid penance and strength using the characters Ma Joad and Rose of Sharon. These two characters address the requirement for a sensation of solidarity and the franticness looked by such countless individuals overall who battle for endurance. The idea of the struggle for life is closely related to natural selection. In the most general sense, the struggle for life derives from the inequality between the great capacity of organisms to multiply and the limited amounts of space, food, water, and so forth necessary for the normal existence of organisms of any species. The Grapes of Wrath describes tenant farmers suffering firsthand, John Steinbeck writes this novel with the intention of give voice to the people who are homeless, starve, and face misery by landlords. In the 1930s California receive migrant people who came from various countries, like they accepted Okies from Oklahoma. Because, the Great Depression not haunt Kansas, Texas, and parts of New Mexico. It affected Oklahoma also. so, they were evicted by landlords. Migrant moved to California. Because they saw advertisements as labor jobs in California’s central valley. Oklahomans made the greatest impact on California and Arizona, where the term okies, denoted as poverty-stricken, migrants from the southwest from 1935 to 1940. California receives many migrants; the plurality of the impoverished once came from Oklahoma. Tom Joad from Oklahoma state prison, after serving years for a manslaughter conviction, Tom Joad makes his way back to his family. And his family was forced to go from their farm in the Depression Oklahoma Dust Bowl set out for California along with thousands of others in search of jobs. Joad travels to meet his family among the migrants who struggle to get food in the hands of landlords

“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”The author is trying to say that we are one and we cannot be someone else. This quote was stated by Oscar Wilde. He was an Irish poet and playwright Introduce author. In the crucible, the group has individual power. We saw it when we read it shows witchcraft in Salem which was forbidden at the time..’’It is rare for people to be asked the question which puts them squarely in front of themselves”.“You are pulling down heaven and raising a whore”. The second story, The Grapes of Wrath history tells the story of people who left their countries but did not want to do it but had to improve their lives. The third Story I Will talk about is La Cause because this is about how hard people worked and how women had no choice in their lives. “ I was working for so-and-so, and when I complained about something that happened there, I was fired”. ‘If you can take the women out to the fields, you can certainly take them to meetings”. “ You stay at home! You have to take care of the children You have to do I say!

In The Crucible Story, we see girls defending themselves so that they do not die and so they decide to lie to other people.’I cannot speak but I am doubted, every moment judged for lies, as though I come into a court when I come into this house!’ (Proctor, Act 2 p. 52) This quote shows that those people who lie and lie to other people then they will appear to die if someone finds out the truth about them. I only hope you’ll be so sarcastic no more. Four judges and the King’s deputy sat to dinner with us but an hour ago. I would have you speak civilly to me, from this out.’Mary Warren has more power and she gets respect in this story, respect is of great importance because people believed in the person who had great respect and she uses it to protect herself. Mary warren, with greater impatience with him: I told you the proof. It’s hard to proof, hard as a rock, the judges said.’ (Act 2, p. 54)The court believes her even when she has no real evidence. It shows us how the proctor has changed as a person from the momentary beginning of history into a more godly man who sacrificed his life for the sake of saving his family. In the second paragraph, I will have a very interesting story that you may like. And we move on to the other side because we have to write about the second story. The Grapes of Wrath.

The Grapes of Wrath talks about how humans can manipulate other people for their demands, but they can’t manipulate the whole world. This is about what I say in this text. For example, when you used a person for something and she did everything to help you, but you just used him and gave him nothing like himself.“ This is the beginning – from” I “ to” we “. (206) This quote author trying to explain to people. This is when people start with a bad life but they want to make it better. And then help people who have a bad life. The author wrote this quote because when people were fooling or wanting to protect themselves, the author wrote about it to explain it to us. For here “I lost my land” has changed, and the cell is split and from its splitting grows the thing you hate— “We lost our land. “For here “I lost my land” is changed, a cell is split and from its splitting grow the thing you hate- “ We lost our land. This quotе implies that people can be better for each other, and it happened in history that they began to help one another.“The western land was nervous under the beginning change. The western states were nervous as horses before a thunderstorm. The great powers nervous sensing a change, Knowing nothing of the nature of the change”.I think this is analyzing the fact that the power loses a lot of people who go to live in other states or countries here is just tell in this quote. I’m done with this poem and I want to go to the second paragraph because I’ve told all about this story and I want to tell about the second one.

In paragraph 3 I will tell you the story about “ La Causa” What is the life of immigrants as they live and how do they live? This was written by the immigrant herself, who helped people make changes in their lives, and how she became an author.

The author wants to tell us that women have to defend their rights and that they can go to a meeting because they too work at work just like men. ‘If you can take the women out to the fields, you can certainly take them to meetings”.This is important when the state can call women to meetings, it can show women that they not only need to work but they can participate in something. The author wants to say that women should have equal rights and not just do what the man said. “ I was working for so-and-so, and when I complained about something that happened there, I was fired”.It says that women can do nothing but look after their children and do in the fields. The author wants to say that they are women-only to do and look after children “ You stay home! You have to take care of the children You have to do I say! We read how difficult it was for those people who came from another country and how they did the hard work for a small amount of money so that they could support their families and make their lives better, which is why they did for a better life because in the next paragraph we will talk about how I wrote this essay and what these stories are related to my other stories that I wrote.

In The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck writes about the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, and the anguishing journey a family endures while trying to travel cross-country. The Great Depression was the cruelest financial decline in the account of the industrialized world from 1929. In contrast, the Dust Bowl was the time in history where severe dust blizzards occurred and deeply impaired the ecosystem of American lands. Similarly, The Grapes of Wrath was written in 1939 and tells the journey of one Oklahoma farm family. The Joads were kicked out of their homestead and forced to travel west to the promised land of California. While Steinbeck writes profoundly and emotionally about the political problem of this time and of the struggling family, many readers find characteristics of spiritual evidence. Specifically, Martin Shockley contributes many of the details demonstrated in The Grapes of Wrath with Christian symbolism; these details are nothing more than mere coincidences and are attributes of natural human behavior and science.

Shockley relates the mental exercise of meditation expressed by Jim Casy to the religious figure, Jesus Christ. Meditation is the technique practiced to pass a person’s awareness and experience essential nature. Jim Casy’s character is shown as an individual who changes careers after finding discomfort and dissatisfaction in his life. This type of behavior is common among the human population. Individuals become unsatisfied with their routine for a change. Similarly, Jim Casy is seeking a change in his everyday routine. Preaching was his previous line of work; there was ineffective management and detriment to his success. This type of feeling is mutual among individuals and there is no specific correlation with Jesus Christ. Furthermore, meditation has been known to bring people peace, happiness, and bliss. Therefore, by going out into the wilderness and experiencing peace and quiet Jim Casy is practicing introspection. He is seeking to acquire a better understanding of what he wants out of life.

Similarly, Shockley finds a connection between Casy and Christ as they both share the same initials of JC. The human mind is a complex and intelligent organ that works in many ways. Science has demonstrated the brain has the ability to make physical and mental connections and produce a higher and more creative way to function. From a very young age, children have been trained to make connections by grouping information and acknowledging how they symbolize or relate to one another. So, the link between the two characters due to their initials is viewed as a mere coincidence as well as a mind connection. Shockley is joining the information he already knows about Jesus Christ and making a creative link with this figure of literature. Furthermore, the image Steinbeck portrays of Casy throughout the story represents some similarities to those descriptions illustrated of Christ in the Bible. Shockley’s thoughts have influenced his association between the two characters. After all, the mind is inherent, a realm to which everyone has his or her own immediate introspective access, this could justify Shockley’s rationale.

Introduction

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck is a classic novel that was published in the year 1939. Though the novel was published at the time the Great Depression was coming to an end, it describes the conditions and experiences that existed during the Great Depression. The novel brings out the poor and distressing situations experienced by the American migrating families in the 1930s. It describes a family migrating to California during the Crisis.

Brief Summary

The Grapes of Wrath begins by describing an occurrence of soil erosion in Dust Bowl Oklahoma that led to the destruction of crops, a decline in farming and farm produce and the migration of farmers and families to other regions. The novel gives the experiences of one such family, the Joad family. After the erosion, the Joad family set on a journey towards California with the hope of acquiring a better livelihood. (Steinbeck, p 2-3).

A young man named Tom Joad who is barely thirty years old arrives home only to find out that his family has been evicted. He later finds them, his mother,

brothers Al and Noah, and his sister Rose of Sharon living with his uncle John whose wife had died several years earlier living him in a state of depression. Rose who had recently gotten married to Connie Rivers is by then pregnant. The family begins their journey to California after selling some of their assets. (Steinbeck, p 112).

Along with their journey Joad’s grandfather and family dog passed away. The family later gets into California where they face great police brutality and harassment. They then find temporary refuge in a government camp. It is during their stay at the camp that the family’s grandmother dies after a short illness. The camp then closes down forcing them to work at an orchard where Joad meets up with Jim Casy, a former minister from back home in Oklahoma.

The workers and laborers have been highly oppressed a factor that leads them into forming unions with an aim of fighting exploitation. Casy who was then a labor organizer gets killed in one of the union strikes and Joad in turn avenges his death by killing the person responsible for a crime that becomes the second as he had previously killed a man back in Oklahoma. Joad’s family struggles to keep Joad far from the law.

Joad’s mother asks him to leave for the wellbeing of the family a request that he obeys. Rose of Sharon whose husband had already left unfortunately experiences a stillbirth. The family remains strong despite all their difficult situations that include strong floods that destroy the campsite leaving them almost helpless.

The novel ends with a painful and distressing scene where Rose of Sharon is seen breastfeeding a starving dying man with the hope that he will gain back his strength.

The novel that is filled with trials and depressions depicts a strong act of determination, faith and hope for a better tomorrow.

The Great Depression: A Brief Description

The Great Depression (1929-1939) is a period in the American history that led into a great and severe crisis in the economy. The crisis was majorly as a result of the October 29, 1929 stock market crash marked in the United States a situation that enhanced the growth of a poor society faced with extreme calamities that included a high level of unemployment, hunger, and political instability.(Columbia electronic encyclopedia). About sixteen million people in the United States were unemployed between the year 1932 to 1933 during depression. There was a rapid unusual increase in the number of hoboes who traveled very long distances in search of work. Families migrated into the countryside and away from the cities with the hope of finding a sustainable source of livelihood. (Hall Thomas and J. David, p 137-138).

From the United States, the depression spread to other parts of the world and produced similar impacts to those of the U.S. that included a decline in international trade, revenues and even individual incomes.

Though the depression’s impact on the various economy sectors and parts of the country differed , every sector and region in America was marked by an unusual increase in unemployment levels as well as a huge decrease in productivity and output, the depression did not only affect the high but also the middle and low class groups in the society. Farmers were however the most affected.

They were for example forced to lay off some of their casual laborers as a result of the decline in the farm productivity that resulted into a low output. A large number of farmers also lost their farms mainly as a result of the recurrent instances of erosion and drought over the years leading to the formation of the “Dust Bowl” that destroyed all crops and rendered farming impossible.

This situation led to the migration of millions of farmers and the unemployed from the Mid West to California in search of work. Hundreds of people became homeless with some living in shanties. Steinbeck’s main reason for writing about farmers was the hope that their difficult situation would be recognized and that America would come up with corrective actions for the situation. (Rothermund D., p 94).

One major cause of the Great Depression was the unincreasing wages of the workers that prevented them from accessing factory made goods. The high production of more goods than could be sold by farmers was also another reason for the depression. This meant that farmers made very little or no profit such that they would not manage to purchase the necessary machinery for fast production. (Drewry and O’Connor, p 559).

Other causes of the depression included the unequal distribution of wealth and resources among the Americans, harsh tariff and trade policies that led to a decline in foreign trade and poor money policies that led to the fall of the stock market. (Hall Thomas and J. David, p 346).

Other than the direct impacts of the Great Depression on the society, various indirect impacts can be seen at the individual, cultural, regional and even in the international level. Psychological stress and depression, increased mental complications and a rise in family violence among the affected individuals are examples of such impacts. ( Kindleberger c., p 109).

The depression’s impacts were felt in many other parts of the world. In Europe for example, the crisis hit barely before the recovery from the First World War effects. The crisis led to the rise of the dictator Adolf Hitler in Germany mainly due to the huge economic disruption and societal disruption as well as the 1932 election of President Franklin D. Roosevelt of the United States. The invasion of China by Japan was also as a result of the depression.( Friedman, Milton, and Anna J. Schwartz p 132)

The Great Depression ended with the start of the World War II that increased the demand for materials to be used during the war hence an increase in production of these materials and industrial growth. The industrial growth created employment for many people that were struggling with the effects of the Great Depression. The results of this was an increase in the amount of money circulating hence the beginning of an economic growth.(Margo, p 53).

Generally the Great Depression is a period that was marked by extreme levels of unemployment and a decline in the number of business enterprises and transactions resulting into a high level of dependency both on the government and aid or charity.(Wecter Dixon, p 23).

Grapes of Wrath and the Great Depression

From the above two summaries, there is an evident relationship between the novel ‘The Grapes of Wrath’ and the period of the Great Depression. The novel clearly brings out the experiences of many farming families during the Great Depression. John Steinbeck who was brought up during the era of the depression tries to present the effects of this crisis to the population.

The novel was set at a time when America was experiencing an overwhelming level of unemployment of about 25% by the year 1933. It depicts the impacts of this crisis some of which included homelessness, increased number of deaths and a high migration rate as well as the harsh and oppressive conditions under which he migrants lived in once they got to their various destinations.

Joad’s family is a representative of other farm families during the depression that were oppressed by banks and other large enterprises that included farm owners. The family represents all other disintegrating migrant families that had to travel long distances for employment and survival.

The author, John Steinbeck partly blames the banks, institutions, companies, the state and other organizations that use bureaucratic bodies or organizations on the occurrence of the Great Depression. He crictizes the acts of self interest shown by the people running these institutions as well as their interests in maximizing outputs at the expense of the poor. Steinbeck points out an evidence of that self interest as that of planning and implementing policies that will only serve the interests of the high class but not the rest of the public. A clear gap can be seen between the small individualistic elite group controlling these bureaucratic institutions and those in the lower class as well as the farmers living in high poverty levels and facing starvation.

The novel not only expresses the oppression and suffering of the poor migrants during the Great Depression but also the role played by the high class members of the society in promoting this situation. The conflict between these two classes can be identified with the laborers unions and strikes organized by Jim Casy. Jim Casy seeks to fight for the communal achievement and action by the laborers against the high, wealthy and ruling class. Although Steinbeck condemns the oppression of the workers, he does not support their every action but is instead concerned with their moral behavior and actions. He is against any violation of the human rights and dignity. Steinbeck is of the view that workers need to first of all change for any concrete and sustainable change to occur.

The author further describes the economic, social and historical factors or situations that categorize people into classes or that define them as rich or poor. He terms the state as being made up of greedy squatters who owned land that belonged to the Mexicans simply because they worked on the land and made it produce. He talks of this as the major threat as perceived by the California land owners who were afraid that the increase in the number of farmers migrating into the region would see the same history repeating itself once more. It is for this reason that the landowners oppress the immigrants as a protective measure. The migrant farmers are made to work and live under extreme poor conditions and at a very low wage.

Steinbeck compares the tractor drivers evicting tenants from their homes, landlords and the banks to the capitalist markets and forces that are merciless and that difficult to identify. (Steinbeck, p 50)

The eviction of the Jaud family and all the others from their rented farms and homes in Oklahoma does not only highlight the increasing gap between the high and low classes or rich and poor but also the tenant system failure. The introduction of mechanization and the harsh weather condition served as major reasons for the land owners to evict tenant families. (Steinbeck, p 50).

The events in the novel also illustrate some of the indirect effects of the depression both to individuals and families. Family instability and breakup can be seen at the time when Joad’s family begins to disintegrate. As they begin their journey the family is closely knit together but this does not remain to be the case. The family begins to disintegrate with the death of Joad’s grandparents. Noah then decides to separate from the rest and moves to the woodlands. Joad’s uncle becomes a drunkard. Rose of Sharon’s husband Connie leaves her while she is still pregnant with the realization that California is not as he expected it to be. Joad on the other hand goes into hiding to escape from the law after killing a man to avenge the death of Jim Casy. Al marries into the Wainwright family with whom he decides to live with. This disintegration worsens the economic status within the family as it reduces the family income by half.

The need for work and family income during the Great Depression forced people to perform all kinds of jobs despite the negligible wages and harsh conditions within which they worked in. Farm families moved from place to place in search of work. This same desperation is seen in the novel the ‘Grapes of Wrath’. The migrants could do any kind of work for any wage. It was a matter of life or death (Steinbeck, p 110). The migrants also had to live in poorly built shelters using any kind of materials Steinbeck gives a description of the houses built by Joad’s family and others. He describes the walls as having been made of rusty iron sheets, a carpet filled with molds, strips of tattered canvas, roofing paper and old sacks. (Steinbeck, p 310-311).

The end of the novel with Rose of Sharon breastfeeding a starving man with the hope that he will regain his strenghth and general health signifies the hope felt by the people during the depression that the crisis would one day come to an end. John D. Rockefeller portrayed this same act of hope and faith when he said that the crisis would eventually come to an end and that prosperity would be seen again.

Conclusively the Grapes of Wrath is a story that reflects people’s lives and experiences during the Great Depression. It reflects actual happenings, struggles and situations observed by Steinbeck. The novel directly communicates not only to those who were present but also to the generations that followed hence a classic during the Great Depression and even today.

Works Cited

Drewry, Henry N. and Jr. O’Connor (1986). United States History: Beginnings through reconstruction. USA: Bell Howell.

Friedman, M. and Anna S. (1963). A Monetary History of the United States, 1867–1960. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.

Hall, Thomas E., and J. David Ferguson. (1998). The Great Depression: An International Disaster of Perverse Economic Policies. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Kindleberger Charles P. (1986). The world in Depression 1929-1939. Berkley: University of California press.

Margo, Robert A. “Employment and Unemployment in the 1930s.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 7, no. 2 (1993): 41–59.

Steinbeck, John. (1939). The Grapes of Wrath. New York: Viking press.

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. (2007). Columbia University Press.

Wecter Dixon (1948). The age of the Great Depression, 1929-1941. New York: Macmillan Co.

Introduction

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck continues to be one of the most commonly banned books in U.S. public schools and libraries. During the 1940s, Eric Johnston, a president of both the Motion Picture Producers Association and the United States Chamber of Commerce, denounced the novel and its film adaptation before screenwriters: “We’ll have no more “Grapes of Wrath”,’ we’ll have no more ‘Tobacco Roads,’ we’ll have no more films that deal with the seamy side of American life. We’ll have no more films that treat the banker as a villain”.

The major conflict of the story is the disastrous drought of the 1930s which forced farmers to move to California. This is also setting the migrants against locals and landowners against the destitute. Furthermore, Tom Joad’s story performs a conflict between the impulse to respond to hardship and calamity by focusing on one’s own needs and the impulse to risk one’s protection by working for a common good.

Main body

John Steinbeck faithfully describes a time of unreasonable poverty, unity, and the human spirit in the classic, The Grapes of Wrath. The novel narrates of real, dissimilar characters, who experience turmoil and hardship.

The novel “The grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck is claimed to describe the lives of ordinary farm workers all over the United States of America who moved to California during the period of the Great Depression in the seek of a happy life. The main character Tom Joad, after having been released from Oklahoma state prison comes back to his home and finds that the family farm and all the surrounding farmhouses deserted. He also finds out, that everyone has been “Tractored” off the land. All he could do in these circumstances was to move to California, like the other Oklahoma farmers. Jim Casy, the former preacher, plays a crucial role in Tom’s life throughout the novel. At the very beginning of the story, he declaims one of the main thoughts of the plot. It sounds that that all life is holy – even the parts that are typically thought to be sinful—and that sacredness consists simply in endeavoring to be an equal among the people. Thus, anything they did throughout the development of the plot, they considered holy and leading to the common good. In some way, they were right, as everything done by them caused positive changes in the lives of farmworkers and “Okies” in particular, and in the attitude of farm holders to the workers and “Okies”. But let us not overlap, and analyze everything gradually.

The political situation in the country at that moment is presented as the comparison of two presidents. The first one – Hoover is presented as the embodiment of evil, as a president who led the US into the depression. Roosevelt is introduced like the opposition to Hoover. As the head of the White House, he is associated with the talented leader, who was the only one able to solve America’s complex problems, caused by the Stock Exchange fall.

One of the ironic aims of the novel is to show Joad’s animal-like struggle for survival. Right through the novel, the poverty of the migrants is regarded as a pointer of their inhumanity, and the following moment when the gas station attendant at Needles cries ‘That goddamn Okies got no sense and no feeling. They ain’t human. A human being wouldn’t live like they do. A human being couldn’t stand it to be so dirty and miserable’ proves that. (Steinberg, 301). But it does not make any barriers for the Joads to gain clarity of spiritual insight, and discover a transcending sense of unification with all men.

As the author argues, all the challenges and troubles that plague the Joad family take root in the people’s selfishness. This negative feature motivates the landlords and businessmen to maintain a system that sinks thousands of families into poverty. The situation is worsened by the attitude of migrants towards each other. Having realized that the common good and success of their survival depends on the devotion to the collective good, the farmers unite – sharing their dreams as well as their burdens – in order to survive. All through the novel, Steinbeck constantly highlights selfishness and altruism as equal and opposite authorities, evenly matched in their conflict with each other. Various circumstances (i.e. historical, social, and economic) divide people into rich and poor, owner and renter, and the people in the dominant roles struggle brutally to protect their positions. Describing the brief history of California, Steinbeck shows the state as the product of land-hungry squatters who invaded the Mexican land and, by working it and making it produce, rendered it their own. The next generation of California landowners regards this historical example as a threat since they believe that the invasion of migrant farmers might lead to the repetition of history. In order to defend themselves from such risk, the squatters create a structure in which the migrant-workers are treated like animals, shuffled from one roadside camp to the next, denied exalted wages, and made simply to survive. The novel draws a simple line through the population—one that divides the privileged from the poor—and identifies that division as the primary source of evil and suffering in the world.

Steinbeck makes a distinct link in his tale between dignity and rage. As long as people keep a sense of unfairness—a sense of irritation against those who seek to weaken their pride in themselves—they will never lose their dignity

Some researchers compare the plot itself with the development of fascist totalitarian regimes in Europe, the main feature of which was the politics of the Holocaust. Thus the deputies and vigilantes are regarded as proto-fascists and the migrants as hounded Jews. To this 1930s mix, Steinbeck himself gives one of the variants of the plot interpretation from the Marxist point of view. The interpretation of history and of economic processes is viewed as a struggle of classes. The migrants were exploited because of the abundance of labor, the “lesson of history” is that the increasing gap between the “haves” and the “have-nots” will result in revolution, and organization of the masses – from camp sanitation committees to labor unions – is the solution to all social problems.

The first two parts of the narration of The Grapes of Wrath — the Joads in Oklahoma and on their way to California make us realize that the more we come to know and admire the humanity of the family of the Joads the more inhumanely they are treated. Steinbeck’s success in involving us in this irony derives in part from his ability to place the Joads within two interrelated mythic sources of value: they are primitives and they are folk. Their “natural” ways and feelings touch upon a core belief which in various forms runs through American life from the Enlightenment to the primitivistic faith of such moderns as Faulkner and Hemingway. The Joads have their own natural processes and rhythms of life. They are farmers who dedicated whole their lives to farming and hunting. They have little education they have never lived in a city, so they have absolutely no imagination about city life. Their world is included in the family with its “natural” crests of birth, juvenility, and marriage at one end of life and aging with death at the other. Indeed, from the point of view of some researchers, the Joads seem to live in a pre-tribal period of social evolution, since their contacts are mainly with other families but not with social and state institutions like school, church, or municipality. Joads communicate within the family largely by action and by an instinctive sensitivity to unspoken feelings. The readers first get to know about them not in person but by the means of the long series of anecdotes about them which Tom and Casy share at the opening of the novel, anecdotes which establish their shrewdness, openness, and understanding in a context of crudity and occasional bestiality. But even this texture of animality in their lives helps establish their naturalness.

The plot of the present narration is full of symbols. Readers can face them throughout the whole story, and the one in the formers seems to define one of the main thoughts of the American People tragedy. The moment, when Joads’ dog dies, may be considered as such. When the Joads stop for gas not long after they begin their trip west, they are met by a hostile station attendant, who accuses them of being beggars and vagrants. While there, a fancy roadster runs down their dog and leaves it for dead in the middle of the road. This death symbolizes the forthcoming difficulties in the lives of the Joads in particular, and the workers in general

The primitivity and the folk-like character of the Joads, which make them more realistic on the background of the other personalities included in the plot. The life-denying forces of mechanics, institutions, and intellect, which the Joads face in California, are allegorized by the banks and corporations which have the law and wealth on the one hand but lack the human abilities of understanding and sympathy. The forces are denoted by the mechanical tractor which destroys the homes of all the farmers and by the car with an unknown driver, who attempts to drive over the turtle as it goes about its own “business”. Yet, the mechanics are not always presented as something evil. The little jerry-built truck soon starts to symbolize the family unity as a means of fulfilling their striving for a better life. Steinbeck gives an assumption, that if the Joads owned their own tractor, it would become the beneficial force in their hands. But the real evil of the farmers’ lives are not mechanics, which ruins their houses, or complicated state institutions, but the feelings and deeds by the people, their fail to anger, envy, and selfishness. Steinbeck’s illustration of this essentially human conflict lets us understand that his attempt in The Grapes of Wrath was not to exaggerate a labored primitivistic ethic. It was rather to keep the readers, within the context of primitivistic and folk values, in one of the constant centers of human experience, that of the difficulty of recognizing the personality and needs of others.

Tom is regarded as a “natural man”. He is tall and scrawny, he feels uncomfortable in store-bought clothes, as he is able to skin a rabbit professionally himself or roll a cigarette. He has a sense of humor, sympathy. He feels to be independent and proud of it. He judges everybody surrounding him from the position of spirit, but this faith has been tempered after his imprisonment for killing a man in the drunken bowl. But this murder happened in the conditions of self-defense. He is not able to understand the justness of his accusation and decides to live from moment to moment and not to seek some understanding, and he refuses from planning his future life. The description of Ma Joad is viewed as the continuation of the description of the “natural humans”. The mother of the Joad family – Ma is imagined as a woman who gladly plays her role as “the citadel of the family.” She heals the family deceases, arbitrates argues, and her positive impact grows throughout the novel. A short description of her appearance and features of character could give the full picture of this heroine:

Her full face was not soft; it was controlled, kindly. Her hazel eyes seemed to have experienced all possible tragedy and to have mounted pain and suffering like steps into a high calm and a superhuman understanding. She seemed to know, to accept, to welcome her position, the citadel of the family, the strong place that could not be taken… And from her great and humble position in the family, she had taken dignity and a clean calm beauty… She seemed to know that if she swayed the family shook, and if she ever really deeply wavered or despaired the family would fall, the family will to function be gone. (Steinberg, 110)

Since Tom and Ma are absolutely regarded as symbols, Casy acts principally as a symbol. As he is disappointed in the conventional Bible truth, he tries to find God in his own spirit instead of seeking it in Testimony or church. He often appears in the novel as a moral voice, articulates many of the novel’s most important themes. The holiness of people and the unity of mankind are among them. The readers can see him as a fundamental philosopher, a motivator and unifier of mankind (farmers of Oklahoma, then California), and a sufferer. In some measure, he may be compared with Jesus Christ, as even he has the same initials. From the very beginning of the novel, the readers get to know that Casy is the former preacher. Because of that, he is seeking how to apply his talent as the soul healer and speaker, as he is not a leader of any religious congregation. During the development of the plot, he learns how to apply his talents in the sphere of organizing and motivating the migrant workers. And like his real-life prototype he strongly believes in his mission of saving the workers, and willingly gives his life for the sake of their liberation from suffering.

The moment in the concluding part of the novel, when Rose of Sharon, the oldest of Ma and Pa Joad’s daughters, gives her breast to a starving man in the barn, symbolizes the family unification, and readiness to succor. Throughout the novel, Rose’s pregnancy is described as one of the major occasions in the life of the Joad family. This pregnancy is in some measure sacred as it is a donation to family continuity, and unity. With the birth of her still-born child, she starts saying, in effect, that all those starving children are her children, just as Tom has sacrificed himself for the sake of anonymous migrants and Ma for “anybody” who needs. The statement of all-over unification can be explained by the idea of the book to show the saving power of fellowship and family. In general, there are two main characters in the story, the Joads family, and the “family” of migrants. Since the Joads are united “by blood”, there is a version, that their family is united not by genes, but by commitment, loyalty, and tolerance. In the book, the biological basis of the family undermines, as all the workers do not have their own homes, which defines the borders of the families, and life on the road, which the characters live in the first half of the story, demands the establishment of new relations, contacts, and kinships. In a significantly short time, the two families of Joads and Wilsons merge in one. This amalgamation takes place among the migrant society in general as well: “twenty families became one family, the children were the children of all. The loss of home became one loss, and the golden time in the West was one dream” (Steinberg, 336).

At the beginning of the novel, and the journey made by the Joads, they rely on radical family structure and strongly believe that men should take decisions, and women should obediently do what they tell. So, they continue honoring Granpa as the head of the family, even when he lost his ability to be the head, and sound like a leader. As the journey to California goes on the dynamics of the changes within the family are rapid. Discouraged and defeated by his growing collapses, Pa withdraws from the role of a leader and starts spending his time in thoughts. So, Ma decides to be responsible for taking decisions. At first, this shocks Pa, who, at one point, lamely threatens to beat her into her so-called proper place. The threat is empty, however, and the family knows it. By the end of the novel, the family structure has undergone a revolution, in which the woman figure, traditionally powerless, has taken control, while the male figure, traditionally in the leadership role, has retreated. This revolution parallels a similar upheaval in the larger economic hierarchies in the outside world. Thus, the workers at the Weedpatch camp govern themselves according to their own rules and share tasks in accordance with notions of fairness and equality rather than power-hungry ambition or love of authority.

Conclusion

In the pages of the narration, Steinberg provides numerous symbols, a great deal of which refer to the biblical episodes. The moment, in which Uncle John disposes of the corps of the still-born child, recalls the episode of Moses being sent down the Nile. This analogy presents a thesis that the people, like the Hebrews in Egypt, will be released from the slavery of the present circumstances, and better times will come soon. Rose of Sharon’s pregnancy symbolizes expect of a new beginning. But the expectation seems not fulfilled when she bears the stillborn child. Instead of slipping into despair, the family attains a feeling of growing brevity and grace, and the novel ends on a surprising (albeit unsettling) note of hope.

References

1. Steinberg, John. The Grapes of Wrath. Penguin; Steinbeck Centennial edition, 2002
2. Cassuto, David. “Turning Wine into Water: Water as Privileged Signifier in ‘The Grapes of Wrath.’.” Papers on Language & Literature 29.1 (1993): 67
3. Goodwin, James. “The Depression Era in Black and White: Four American Photo-Texts.” Criticism 40.2 (1998): 273
4. Heavilin, Barbara A., ed. The Critical Response to John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000.
5. Johnson, Claudia Durst. Understanding the Grapes of Wrath: A Student Casebook to Issues, Sources, and Historical Documents. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999
6. Lobao, Linda, and Katherine Meyer. “THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANSITION: Crisis, Change, and Social Consequences of Twentieth Century US Farming.” Annual Review of Sociology (2001): 103.
7. Mcgovern, James R. And a Time for Hope: Americans in the Great Depression. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2000.
8. Palmer, Rosemary. “Understanding the Grapes of Wrath: A Student Casebook to Issues, Sources, and Historical Documents.” Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 44.5 (2001): 479
9. Pizer, Donald. Twentieth-Century American Literary Naturalism: An Interpretation. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1982.
10. Stein, Walter J. California and the Dust Bowl Migration. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1974.
11. Theobald, Paul, and Ruben Donato. “Children of the Harvest: the Schooling of Dust Bowl and Mexican Migrants During the Depression Era.” PJE. Peabody Journal of Education 67.4 (1990): 29-45.
12. Zirakzadeh, Cyrus Ernesto. “John Steinbeck on the Political Capacities of Everyday Folk: Moms, Reds, and Ma Joad’s Revolt.” Polity 36.4 (2004): 595

Introduction

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck won the Pulitzer and the Noble prize and is regarded as one of the classics of modern American literature. It related the story of the Joad sharecropping family, caught in the throes of The Great Depression. They are hit hard by the drought, financial hardship, and the changing agricultural industry. They move to California in search of jobs, land, and to lead a life of dignity. The novel speaks of the stark economic and social hardships the family faces. This paper answers some key questions about the theme and key characters in the novel. Consider this quote by Casy as Steinbeck uses him as his alter ego to voice the misery of the immigrants moving on Route 66 “Two hundred and fifty thousand people over the road. Fifty thousand old cars—wounded, steaming. Wrecks along the road, abandoned. Well, what happened to them? What happened to the folks in that car? Did they walk? Where are they? Where does the courage come from? Where does the terrible faith come from?”

Federal migrant worker camp at Weedpatch

1. Weedpatch as a representation of the socialist ideal: Weedpatch, a representation of the socialist ideal, finds special mention in the novel. It seemed to the Joad family like an oasis in the desert. Westwood is a refugee camp run by the government, and there are no policemen to enforce brutal discipline. The farmers are able to make the rules, ensure that everything runs smoothly, and they also help the people to get jobs in the nearby farms. The place serves as an ideal worker’s paradise, run by the farmers and managed by them. The nearby townpeople resent this camp as they feel threatened by the presence of so many immigrant farmers. They incite the police to break up the camp and even try to create trouble on a dance night.
2. Joad family adjusting: The Joad family is new to this concept as they have come from a harsh life, where the depression had hunted them, and the police made their lives even worse. The family adjusted to the codes of conduct in the camp, and Tom even managed to find a job picking fruits at a local farm. It is to be noted that Pa did not get a job. The farmers encouraged the whole family to join as this allowed them to exploit them further.
3. How does the socialist concept actually work for the farmworkers at Weedpatch: The socialist concept initially worked very well at the camp, and everyone was happy to be a part of the camp. There was trouble with the women’s committee set up in the camp that looked after women’s affairs.
4. Why do the Joads ultimately leave Weedpatch: The camp initially helped the Joad family to gather themselves and live in peace for some time, without worrying about the hardships they had faced on the road, and there was no worry even from the police. Tom managed to find a job and was able to provide food for the family. But pretty soon, work around the camp dried out, and the family realized that they had to move to keep from starving to death as there was nothing left to eat.
5. Significance of Weedpatch: Weedpatch was the ironic utopia that the immigrants could hope for. They believed that they had found a sanctuary in the camp as their own people managed it, and they could find jobs nearby. The ideal goal of the migrant was to find a safe place and a job so that the family could survive. But again, Steinbeck has shown how fickle security was for the migrants, as the nearby townspeople did want this camp in their neighborhood. They wanted the camp to be broken up by the local police. This symbolism has been effectively used as it pits the hapless and poor immigrants against the rich town people who are bent on driving the immigrants out and exploiting them for cheap labor.

Tom Joad as an ideal of the American working man

1. Personal Qualities: Tom Joad had an indomitable spirit that made him to endure the hardships of the jail and his later experiences. Even though jail life was tough, he resisted the problems he faced in jail. He had become what could be called as a hardened criminal and had become self centered and concerned only with his own survival. Tom had been jailed for four years for killing a man in self-defense and he wanted to redeem himself. When he was in jail, his strong character did not make him bitter or angry but gave a strong will so that he could face all future hardships.
2. Main role along Route 66: Tom Joad joined Uncle John and the family on their migration to California. Tom’s work included caring for the family and looking after the vehicle they were going in. He was a good mechanic and had helped to repair the car of the Wilson’s family that had broken down on the road. He had to repair the car again and also asked around for jobs. When jobs came up such as picking peaches and other fruits, he worked to earn as much as he could. Tom also got involved in fights with other people and in protesting against the native population that resented their coming.
3. Toms changing role: Tom has slowly metamorphosed into a more humane person who cared for others and was willing to fight for the right to live a dignified life. He had become more receptive to the grief and hurt of others and the deaths of Granpa and Granma on Route 66 had made him more concerned about others. In the incident in the camp in the desert, he fights beside Floyd Knowles who is trying to get a signed contract from the farmer for the work offered. He manages to fight off the cops who have come to beat and arrest Fred and gets almost arrested by the cops but the pastor Casy takes the blame on himself else Tom would be on serious trouble since he was on parole.
4. What happens to Tom as a worker in the field at Pixley: The Joad family had heard that there was work available to pick peaches and that they would be paid 5 cents for each box. But then later Jim comes to know that the farm owners had decided to illegally and unfairly reduce the rate to 2 and half cents. Jim is organizing a strike against the owners and the police to know about this. They rush in to quell the unrest and beat Jim on the head, killing him. This make Tom very angry and he fights with the policemen and kills the one who had killed Jim. In the confusion, Tom manages to run off but he has been hit on the face and his nose is broken. The policemen have raised a serious alert about him and he knows that his broken nose will get him identified easily. So he decides to hide in a cave until it heals and Ma Joad gives him food every now and then.
5. Tom is a forceful character in the novel and it speaks eloquently about the depression era and the hardships the general population faced. The character reveals the desperation and the helplessness and the unending injustice that was their share of life’s burden. The character evokes the diehard character of the general American who was willing to put up with hardship and ready to do honest work but was ready to fight when the injustice became too much to bear.

Jim Casy and his character

1. Casy at the beginning of the novel: Casy is a preacher by profession but the hardships he has faced and the misery of the people in the Great Depression era and the draught have forced him to abandon his calling. One of his quotes are “The people in flight from the terror behind—strange things happen to them, some bitterly cruel and some so beautiful that the faith is refired forever”. He has of late lost his calling for god and does not preach any more. When Tom was young he had listened to the Pastors sermons and to many people, Casy was a pillar of hope. But now he does not believe in God but still believes however mean are gods creation and should not be judged harshly. He was pious in his leanings and goes by the book, perhaps inuring himself from the fate of his people and finding comfort in his holy task.
2. Change in Casy’s Character: The character of Casy has changed as the story progresses. Earlier he has turned philosophical and deeply embittered by the suffering and misery and could not do anything about it since there was only the depression and drought both of which made his people miserable. Later when he starts on his journey to California from to Oklahoma, he sees the unjustness and needless hardships inflicted by the rich and crooked farm owners who were bent on exploiting the poor migrants by paying them very low wages, that would not be sufficient to feed even a family. The Route 66 has had a profound effect on him and he has made this quote “66 is the path of a people in flight, refugees from dust and shrinking land, from the thunder of tractors and n ownership, from the desert’s slow northward invasion, from the twisting winds that howl up out of Texas, from the floods that bring no richness to the land and steal what little richness is there. From all of these the people are in flight, and the come into 66 from…side roads….66 is the mother road, the road of flight.”
3. Casy’s change in attitude towards women: Casy earlier had a detached view about women. But then he saw the stoic courage of Grandma who died in the desert crossing but did not complain at all and encouraged the people to move on. She dies silently and the family is forced to abandon her body with the coroner as they do not have money to bury her. He realizes the hardships a woman can bear and the courage that they have.
4. Casy as a Christ figure: Casy was a priest at the beginning but had later left his calling, as he was disillusioned by the misery he saw. As the story progresses, turns slowly into a pillar of hope and support among the immigrants who do not have any hopes left and feel that even god has abandoned them. Casy’s presence seems like the great healer and an analogy could be made to him with Christ, as one who was leading the oppressed immigrants out of the slave like conditions in which they lived.

References

Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Nina Baym. 2232-2244. New York: W.W. Norton, 2003.

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Introduction

For me, this chapter could stand alone. It is a beautiful and poetic story of life. There are many interpretations possible, because Steinbeck chose to leave it that way. The meaning depends on two things, what the writer meant and what the reader understands. In comparing this chapter to the rest of the book, I see that the land turtle could symbolize many things: nature, the Joads, family, the working man. Without the rest of the book it is simple: the turtle is uniquely suited to his environment as are all the seeds that grab at every passing creature. The turtle is confronted with a barrier, and it gets across, in spite of the dangers of heat and attackers. His shell protects him. However, he does drag the wilds oat seeds with him, and he plants them as he moves away. So the cycle of life is complete.

Main text

If comparing this chapter to the rest of the book, one really strong impression is that this chapter symbolizes the story of the sharecroppers, especially families like the Joads. The land turtle is an ancient animal and he fits a specific niche. He is almost totally safe within his niche. The road is not part of that niche, nor is the four-inch wall, and they seem to be symbols of progress and also of change and troubles. The two vehicles are dangerous. The woman avoids hitting the turtle, but does not stop to put it safely off the road, so she might be just “those good men who stand by and do nothing.” The man driving the truck actually tries to hit the turtle for no other reason than that he is there, a target. The man hits the turtle, but his shell protects him and he is only slowed down, because he is upside-down and must right himself.

Steinbeck leaned toward socialism and the early American Communist Party held out attractive ideals for him. So he believed in the resilience and eventual triumph of the working class. It is easy to look at the turtle as the symbol for the sharecroppers and maybe of the Joad family, but I just cannot ignore the real winner in this chapter: the wild oat. The little seed head manages to get picked up by the turtle and carried all the way across the road and finally has three of its seed planted quite nicely by the turtle. When you think about this, weeds are the most resilient of all. Whatever passes is a vehicle for spreading their seeds. Steinbeck devotes the entire first paragraph to describing the sleeping life, ready to be spread. Then he is careful to mention the success of the wild oat at the end of the chapter: “The wild oat head fell out and three of the spearhead seeds stuck in the ground. And as the turtle crawled on down the embankment, its shell dragged dirt over the seeds.” Communist leaders of the time saw the working class as a sleeping giant that would awaken and take its rightful place ruling the world.

So the turtle could symbolize the sharecroppers, overcoming barriers and avoiding dangers, plodding along towards an unknown goal and spreading new ideas on their way. It could as easily symbolize the Joads. As a family they are suited to their niche, but the niche is vanishing and they must adapt. They must overcome problems and move from one area to another. In the process they will be ignored by some and targeted by others. However, they will survive and continue towards their goal and spread new ideas on the way, perhaps help to create a new way of life. The oat seed head is something they pick up accidentally and take with them for a time until they reach fertile ground and then it falls away and they plant it by their passing.

Summary

Any of these interpretations work, and yet, I really like the way this chapter reads all by itself. There is much I get from it that I really cannot express. It is so poetic and beautiful I will remember it.

Introduction

John Steinbeck’s novel, The Grapes of Wrath, is a classic of American literature and an interesting piece of writing for any analysis. A number of the chapters in the book can be classified as intercalary, which means that their presence does not serve to further the plot in a meaningful or significant way. Instead, these parts of the text resonate thematically with the rest of the work, reinforcing the existing messaging or better contextualizing it for the reader. The specific chapter that is discussed in this paper is chapter eleven. While some critics and readers may find the mentioned chapter irrelevant, its message about technology and life and literary devices like symbolism and metaphors support key topics in the novel – dehumanization and the power of nature.

The Message of the Chapter

Although the chapter in question is quite short and, as mentioned above, is not critical to the novel’s plot, it still brings great value to the overall understanding of the author’s ideas. To begin with, it is important to notice that the book itself is more devoted to following the characters’ development and adventures. On the contrary, Steinbeck uses this small section to show what happens to the houses and the land once people leave their areas because this process of nature raising its power is also viewed as crucial. Thus, “the weeds sprang up in front of the doorstep, where they had not been allowed, and grass grew up through the porch boards” (Steinbeck 159). Animals like rats, cats, weasels, and others take control of the abandoned buildings, and this triumph of nature leaves readers with a slight sadness and a sense of rightness (Steinbeck 158-159). In other words, the examples above show that nature takes back what humans never wanted or took care of.

Literary Devices

The poetic language used in the chapter allows to highlight one of its messages, precisely, the absence of ‘life’ and ‘nature knowledge’ in some people. The author uses metaphors, personification, and similes to describe those who use tractors to farm the land they do not feel or understand, as well as to contrast living creatures and these technological tools. Thus, in the barn, “the feet shift on the straw, and the jaws champ on the hay, and the ears and the eyes are alive,” which are the symbols of life and nature (Steinbeck 157). However, “when the motor of a tractor stops, it is as dead as the ore it came from. The heat goes out of it like the living heat that leaves a corpse” (Steinbeck 157). These quotes show the striking difference between what is alive and what is not, and people who prefer the latter are barely alive themselves because they do not feel the warmth or the land. Such persons are no longer humans as they fail to see the wonder in the ground and in farming this land, which is when the topic of dehumanization is highlighted.

Conclusion

In conclusion, it can be said that chapter eleven of The Grapes of Wrath is important for understanding the novel’s messaging and themes despite being largely unimportant to its plot progression. In the chapter, Steinbeck once again emphasizes the power of nature that can take control over what has long belonged to humans but has not been truly ‘alive’ or ‘humanized.’ Further, with the use of literary devices, Steinbeck also highlights the difference between technology and nature. The author makes sure to note that people lose their ability to see wonders and feel their land when they prefer technological solutions.

Work Cited

Steinbeck, J. The Grapes of Wrath. Gardners Books, 1993.

The Grapes of Wrath is a perfect example of a political novel that narrates the experience of the Joad family after being evicted from their farm in Oklahoma and their discouraging journey to California.

In the first few chapters, the author gives the reader an opportunity to participate in the story of the Joads by exploring their experience in their traditional life and their new found life, but in the last sixteen chapters; the author takes a broader look at the experience of displaced migrants in America as a whole. As a result, the novel portrays the issue of land ownership in California and America at large, the conflicts between the Haves and the Have-nots, people’s reactions to injustices, and the strength of a woman (Steinbeck ix).

It also delves into the impact of the Great Depression and the nature of parity and fairness in a larger context regarding America. Thus, this essay presents an in-depth analysis of The Grapes of Wrath, which reveals that the novel develops upon a wide range of themes including hope, class conflict, fanaticism, and commitment as described in the preceding discussions.

The theme of hope develops through the character of Ma Joad who struggles to keep her family together despite that the Joads have encountered many deaths, hardships, and deprivations. In fact, at the end of the narrative, the author describes the family as barely surviving (Steinbeck 455).

Conversely, the Joads display an optimistic mood because as the family expands, the family members get to recognize the need to identify with the group, and thus, they begin to realize the importance of group consciousness. Hope is also derived from the family’s long and challenging journey, whose experience enlightens some family members such as Ma Joad, Pa Joad, Tom, Jim Casy, John, and Rose of Sharon.

Actually, the family members are optimistic that the end of their long journey will come after realizing the American dream (Steinbeck 65). As a result, the desire to have a good life coupled with other motives encourages some family members to fight harder as opposed to those who are unable to see the end result of the journey including Al, Connie, and Noah.

Moreover, the family is determined to experience a different way of life, which gives them a broader perceptive of the world compared to their traditional life. In the end, it is obvious that the family has succeeded in terms of understanding and exploring life-time experiences in the face of different challenges.

Another major theme in The Grapes of Wrath entails class conflict. A conflict exists between the poor migrants, native Californians, and the powerful business people (Steinbeck 23). This conflict presents a clear picture of the characteristics of economic injustices in America during that time.

From a social perspective, the novel describes the economic disasters that arise after the migrants are forced to forgo their agricultural activities not only because of the natural disasters, but also because of the establishment of larger farms by the landowners, business people, and the banks.

Actually, at the beginning, the author notes that the land owners and banks evicted the tenants from the farms thereby making them to move to California in large numbers (Steinbeck 13). Thus, it is apparent that the business people and landowners are insecure in some way because they understand that the presence of migrants in their farms is a threat to their business and financial establishments.

Here, the migrants symbolize increased government interference, labor unions activism, and increased taxes on privately held property. This form of class conflict is the cause of the violence observed between the two groups and even the torching of government camps by state residents in California who are of the idea that the presence of migrants in their land is a threat to their financial interests (Steinbeck 305).

Moreover, class conflict can also occur when hardships, materialistic interests, and problems within the family are personalized. For instance, within the Joad family, Rose of Sharon is obsessed with her pregnancy and the future dreams instead of helping in the journey while her husband, Connie is still angry that they left Oklahoma, and thus he prefers to disappear rather than help in the family hardships (Steinbeck 45).

Fanaticism is also a major theme developed in The Grapes of Wrath. From both the religious and the social perspectives, it is obvious that fanaticism should be condemned because it is a trick used by a certain class of people to deny life, happiness, and advance economic deprivation in the society.

For instance, the former preacher, Jim Casy tells Tom that religion denies different aspects of life such as sexuality. Furthermore, in the camp, a fanatic religious woman claims that dancing is sinful, and thus, poor people should not dance but instead they should wail and moan because they are sinners (Steinbeck 55). On the other hand, religious fanatics claim that religion allows for economic classes within the society including the poor class.

Additionally, the experience of the Joads and their American counterparts shows that social fanaticism and prejudice causes fear and lack of faith among the migrants. As a result, this phenomenon led to instances of violence between the migrants and the native Californians, homelessness, starvation, and malnutrition among other shameful events. Therefore, it is certain that fanaticism, be it religious or social, is not a good thing after all.

Lastly, the novel develops on the theme of commitment in an extensive manner. Here, we note that the members of the Joad family were committed to certain goals and values, which kept them going and finally led to their success.

For instance, Tom and Jim Casy were committed to making Christ-like sacrifices for the rest of the family. As a result, Jim decided to surrender to the authorities to replace Tom and Floyd in order to show his commitment to loving all. Additionally, Jim becomes a labor activist and he dies while fighting for the rights of laborers.

Conversely, despite that at the beginning of the Journey, Tom does not want to identify with the group, his experience and friendship with Jim makes him to realize the need to fight for social justice and the significance of group consciousness within the family and in the society (Steinbeck 445). Therefore, commitment is a virtue that should be emulated by each member of the society if at all collective tasks and goals are to be accomplished.

Work Cited

Steinbeck, John. The grapes of wrath. New York: Penguin Books, 2002. Print.