Analysis Of The Novel Grapes Of Wrath By John Steinbeck
The novel Grapes of Wrath written by John Steinbeck does a wonderful job of depicting the migration of a poverty stricken farmer family from Oklahoma to California. From the beginning of the book, it is clear that the Great Depression has hit the United States devastatingly. When Tom Joad is released from prison, he is ironically trading a life where he is well fed with steady shelter, for one of “freedom” in which his family has lost their home and land because they can no longer afford to the pay the landowners/banks, or rather the “monsters” as they are referred to at the beginning.
The book begins with Tom coming home to find the lands in his town deserted and the Joad family must leave their farm, beginning their tough journey into migration. Throughout the book the Joad family keep an optimistic attitude despite the hardships, starving, loss and death they experience. Throughout the book, Steinbeck uses descriptions of the conditions, class discrimination, and the anger of the migrant people to examine capitalism, the class system, and the inequality of the Great Depression. The book begins with Tom returning to find his hometown in Oklahoma to be deserted. This is because most of the families have been driven off their lands for tractors and the work of a group of men can now be done using one man and a tractor. California becomes the promise land for farmers who have lost everything as there is word that there is much farm out there and lots of work.
In Chapter 9, Steinbeck describes how the tenant people are forced to sell their possessions and leave the houses that they’re families have lived in for many years, however, they can barely get any money for it. The poverty of the farmers is becoming overwhelming as the landowners and the banks strip them away of everything. The Joads set off and find that there thousands of other people who are attempting to find work out there like they are. They pass many empty houses which is ironic as there are now tons of homeless people, but no one is living in these vacant houses. When they go down Highway 66 to head to California they see many people who are camping on the side of the road and who are sleeping in ditches. They themselves are starving and early on in their journey they meet a man who is leaving California and who describes the harsh realities of moving there. He tells them, “Nobody couldn't tell me, neither. I can't tell ya about them little fellas layin' in the tent with their bellies puffed out an' jus' skin on their bones, an' shiverin' an' whinin' like pups, an' me runnin' aroun' tryin' to get work”. His whole family starved to death because there is absolutely no work. Workers are so poor that fight over who will take the lowest salary. The Joads are faced with the harsh reality that the starvation and poverty is just as bad in California as it is anywhere else in the country, but they remain optimistic and decide to keep going. The thousands of small farmers who are forced off their land are now forced to camp and transition their lives from farmers to migrants. “They were not farm men anymore, but migrant men” describes this huge change in life for a huge portion of Americans. The conditions of life are heavily changing as shown through the Joads as they migrate with little food, money, and constantly changing locations looking for a solid shelter and desperate for work. The Joads, like many others, migrate between various camps, a Hooverville, and finally a boxcar that they share with another family never able to live somewhere for too long.
It is tragic that thousands of families in the United States at this time did not have permanent shelter. The inequality in the country at the time is painstakingly clear throughout the book. In addition, the people from California have no sympathy for the farmers who lost their land and show them much hostility. The tensions start rise between people. The Californians start to call the migrant people “Okies”, which a man leaving California described to the Joads as meaning “dirty-son-of-a-bitch” and “scum”. Not only do they resent the migrant people, but the man describes how there is a man who lives on a vast land with oranges, but is one tries to take them he will shoot. This man with the vast land is a stark contrast to the people who are starving with no land and shows how great inequality was at the time. “There ain’t enough room for you an’ me, for your kind an’ my kind, for rich and poor together in one country, for thieves and honest men. For hunger and for fat. Whyn’t you go back to where you come from” is a quote from the book that perfectly sums up the societal inequalities and the lack of sympathy that peoples have for the vast majority of people who are living in poverty during the depression.
In chapter 19, Steinbeck does a good job of pointing out the stark contrasts of class at the time. He points out the hypocrisy of the landowners in California, who years before stole their land from the Mexicans. The very thing they fear happening to them, which is the poor and unemployed revolting and taking their land, is the exact thing that they did when acquiring it. Steinbeck also illustrates this inequality in describing the differences in what the two classes wanted. The California landowners wanted many things such as “amusement” and “luxury while the only thing that the migrants wanted was “food” and “land”. It makes sense that the Western states are getting because as Steinbeck said, “when property accumulates in too few hands it is taken away”. As more people are being replaced by tractors, machines, and losing their farms the resent and anger starts to surface among the migrant people. “Repression works only to strengthen and knit the repressed” is said by the narrator. As more people are being replaced by tractors and machines and losing their farms, the resent greatens. “The Western Lands are nervous under the beginning change” describes how the wealthier people are becoming worried about the migrant people.
The Joads move to a Hooverville, where Tom meets Floyd Knowles who tells him that if there is even word of the people organizing they are termed “red” by the police. It is evident throughout the book that the people with money and the police are against anything that even looks similar to communism. This is ironic because it appears that the deep separation of the classes arguably appears to somewhat have been a result of capitalist oppression of the farmers. Knowles later gets shot at by a policeman who ends up accidentally killing another woman. This shows how much little the lives of the poor meant to the state. Another instance of police brutality due to suspected communism is when Jim Casy, a onetime preacher and friend of Tom’s, is killed by police. Casy was killed because he tried to organize the farmers and was pegged a communist. The book shows that at that time, the poor were merely considered a problem to the people with money and the police. Another instance of the country’s fear and hatred towards communism occurs when the Joads briefly lived at the Weedpatch government camp. They are finally living in safe camp among a community of people who take care of one another and govern themselves. The Farmer’s Association and the police attempt to stage a riot at the camp because ultimately their afraid “folks in the camp are getting used to being treated like humans. When they go back to the squatters’ camps they’ll be hard to handle”. Cleary, the landowners want to keep the migrant people repressed because it benefits them and ultimately they don’t care what kind of conditions they live in or if they die.
The Grapes of Wrath is a novel about a family suffering while migrating during the Great Depression, but it also evident that Steinbeck was writing from a political point of view about the injustices and greed of that time period. Steinbeck demonstrates the great losses of jobs and homes using the Joad family and those who they meet. He also often highlights the ginormous difference in the gap of wealth between the poor and the rich at the time. This novel successfully critically examines politics of the time and the oppressive class system during one of nations toughest periods in history. A great deal can learned about the Great Depression and what happens when money is in the hands of only a feel when reading this book.
