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The Grapes of Wrath
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The Grapes of Wrath
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My review: This was a great novel, following a family from Oklahoma to California after their farm is repossessed by the local bank at the start of the Great Depression and Dust Bowl. The family rigs up a truck to carry all of the family and all their possessions, including Grandma and Grandpa, who are so old and weak they cannot survive the trip.The family discovers all the various hardships that faced migrant families displaced by the Depression, and finds out very quickly how little anyone values poor people. They struggle to hang on to their dignity as their living conditions sink lower and lower.
This was one of my last novels to finish by Steinbeck. It is not my favorite (East of Eden is my #1, Winter of Our Discontent is #2 for me) but it may be my #3 favorite of his books so far. I gave this book 5 stars on ŷ.
This is an amazing novel of the migrant experience during the Dust Bowl and Depression. I truly appreciate Steinbeck's ability to describe the places and events so clearly. I did not enjoy it as much as East of Eden because I did not feel as much of a personal attachment to the individual characters, but other than that it was a great read. I listened to the audiobook narrated by Dylan Baker and thought it was incredibly well done. *read for TBR Takedown December 2021
This is only my second Steinbeck and I am excited to read that others believe that East of Eden may be a superior book as now I have something to look forward to. I read this as part of my 2023 Random Challenge.
I thought that this book was amazing.
This is the book that gave the US the iconic character of the "Okie", the hard working, morally upright, families that fled the Dust Bowl states of Oklahoma, Kansas, Arkansas, and Texas to find work that would feed their children. Steinbeck did exhaustive research at the Hoovervilles and the Federal Government camps like Weedpatch and brought the plight of these people to the attention of much of the rest of the nation. It was a best seller when it was first published.
I felt that Steinbeck's approach of giving us a moment in time with one family was a solid way of letting us into that world. Also, unlike the myth and the movie, Tom Joad was certainly not all good. The character of Casey, the preacher, and Ma were very well drawn and even Ruthie with her fierce pride was very sympathetic even if not a nice little girl.
There were times when Steinbeck got just a bit too preachy and many a middle school student has suffered from his descriptions. ŷ is full of 1 star reviews. I, on the other hand, simply loved the descriptions and felt that his approach to presenting the common man and the need to help each other through a common cause was likely exactly what the country needed to read in 1939. And exactly what is needed now too. There are still many people who believe that anyone who does not share their exact political beliefs are "Reds".
The book ends with the family at its utter ebb, with many of their members lost to them either through death or other circumstances. Yet, one believes Ma when she says they will go on simply because they must.
There is no way of getting an exact count but it is believed that the 350,000 Okies that flooded into California have reproduced to 3.75 million people claiming Okie ancestry. Fully 1/8th of the state population. They not only survived, eventually they thrived and changed California markedly.
Mod
“In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.�
I have had this book on my to-do list for a long time and I am finally glad to have read it. I enjoyed Of Mice and Men immensely and was looking forward to reading more Steinbeck.
This book reminded me of my grandmother's upbringing. She grew up in California at the turn of the twentieth century and they moved around a lot. My grandmother went to twelve different schools growing up. I knew going in to this story that California was not going to be the promised land that the family hoped for.
This story taught me more about the depression. Those not from California were treated really poorly. I was also struck about “border crossings� in which you entered another state. Hooverville was another term I had to look up.
I enjoyed my journey with the Joad family. I would say Ma was the strongest of the bunch. She proved to be smart, resourceful, optimistic and she never gave up. What prevented me from giving it 5 stars was the shear doom of the novel. Nothing ever went right for the Joad family. Halfway through the book I knew that what little break they had achieved would not last because that was the pattern.
I think the book is still relevant today. We still have issues with the way we treat “pickers� or farm workers. The race of the people may have changed but the issues have not. Big business is still alive and well, mechanization of work and the whole profit over people.
�66 is the path of a people in flight, refugees from dust and shrinking land, from the thunder of tractors and shrinking 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.�
This book vividly outlines the desperation of poverty and the horrors of prejudice. It allows the reader to sink into the fears of the characters who populate California in the 1930s, to experience the shock of the Oklahomans forced from their homes in a scramble to find food for their families. I found myself angry at the injustices experienced by the Joad families. I found myself grieving each time they lost someone they loved. And mostly I found myself thinking about how impressed I was that Mr Steinbeck -- a Californian who came from some money -- could so deftly illustrate the plight of the Okies. I left this book wishing that he had revisited this family in a sequel because I really wanted to see where their journey took them, and I really wanted to see them find a way out of the sad spiral they were in.
John Steinbeck writes about difficult, sad and tragic parts of life. But he does so with such sweet and beautiful use of the English language and with so much attention to the development of his characters that you find yourself feeling hopeful. I will be reading my 6th Steinbeck in the next few days!