The Grapes of Wrath: Analysis
The purpose of this paper is to introduce, discuss, and analyze the book "The Grapes of Wrath" by John Steinbeck. Specifically it will contain a book review on the book. Steinbeck's classic novel of poverty, the Great Depression, the Dustbowl, and inequity is especially poignant today, when so many Americans are facing their own form of the Great Depression with a depressed economy, mortgage foreclosures, and high energy prices. The book follows the hapless Joad family as they lose their farm in the Midwest and make their way to California in hopes of making a new life for themselves during the 1930s.The Joad family is dirt poor, and much of the book chronicles their struggle to get across the country in a broken-down car they can barely afford to fix. They lost family members along the way, learn that California is not the "promised land" they were led to believe, and learn they will still have to live in poverty and despair once they reach the fields of California, because the wages are barely wages at all, and there are too few j
In conclusion, this classic novel has enduring themes and characters that are memorable and sympathetic at the same time. 'We could get ready by daylight an' go," Tom suggested" (Steinbeck 105). Another picker tells him, "Ten hours for a dollar an' a half, an' ya can't stay on the place. It is dark and thought provoking, because it shows how difficult life can be, and how uncaring humans can be toward one another. Steinbeck's main theme of this book are the many inequities of life between the rich (the growers and the bankers) and the poor (Tom and the other agricultural workers), and how Tom simply cannot overlook these differences. Steinbeck writes, "And in the south he saw the golden oranges hanging on the trees, the little golden oranges on the dark green trees; and guards with shotguns patrolling the lines so a man might not pick an orange for a thin child, oranges to be dumped if the price was low" (Steinbeck 234). Steinbeck's simple style and short sentences match the styles of other classic authors of the time, like Ernest Hemingway, and the emotion in the novel makes it memorable and interesting to the reader. Tom attempts to form the workers into a union to gain better wages, and that makes him an enemy of the growers, and ultimately the law, even though the law is corrupt and Tom's motives are all just and pure. Steinbeck does not sugarcoat the novel, or give it a happy ending. Tom, especially, proves he is a leader and that he has the tenacity to keep the family together. That is what makes the ending all the more tragic - Tom is torn from his family by necessity, and it is extremely unsure that he will ever see them again. Got to burn gasoline getting' there" (Steinbeck 245). They will survive, Steinbeck makes the reader very aware of that, but it is tragic and heartrending just the same, and this is one of the reasons the book has remained so popular for so many decades after it was written.
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