GRAPES OF WRATH, THE

For several years before 1939, John Steinbeck had been familiarizing himself with the plight of the Okies, the Depression-era Oklahoma migrants to Steinbeck's native California. He had written about oppressed agricultural workers in his 1936 novel In Dubious Battle and that same year in a series of reports on "the Harvest Gypsies" in the San Francisco News. Steinbeck had also visited migrant camps around his hometown of Salinas and at Bakersfield. In the fall of 1937, he retraced the migrants' westward journey along Route 66. He began his masterpiece in May 1938, and finished the final draft in late October. The Grapes of Wrath was released by Viking on April 14, 1939.

The novel tells the story of the Joads, a poverty-stricken, uneducated, and "dusted out" family of Oklahoma farmers. The first fifth of the book describes the desolate and dreary landscape of Dust Bowl Oklahoma, the Joads' hopeless situation, and the excruciating decision to load their meager possessions on an ancient jalopy and head for the promised land of California. Another fifth of the novel depicts the arduous cross-country trek and the hardships endured by the steadily dwindling Joad family. The rest of the story traces the disappointments of California, disappointments in the midst of plenty, caused by the selfishness, heartless dishonesty, and paranoia of the landowners and their law-enforcement lackeys. The only relief the Joads know comes during their stay at a "government camp," where they temporarily find democratic self-government, communal good-fellowship, and dignity.

The raw oppression of the migrants leads Tom Joad and Jim Casy, a former preacher traveling with the family, to become labor organizers. Casy, a kind of secularized Christ figure, is killed, and Tom is forced to leave the family and continue his work in the shadows. The novel ends with a controversial scene: The remaining Joads find a starving man in a barn, and Rose of Sharon, her own baby stillborn because of the horrid conditions the family faces, feeds the stranger with her breast milk. Alternating with the chapters about the family, Steinbeck brilliantly inserts brief "interchapters." These comprise about a sixth of the novel and attempt by dramatic episodes, eloquent exposition, and sometimes outright preaching to generalize and make universal the experience of the Joads.

The Grapes of Wrath was an instantaneous sensation. Despite angry responses from some who objected to the novel's "vulgarity," and from some proud Californians and Oklahomans (one Oklahoma congressman branded the work "a lie, a black, infernal creation of a twisted, distorted mind"), the book sold 430,000 copies its first year. It has never been out of print. It was also adapted into an acclaimed film with the same title, produced by Darryl Zanuck and directed by John Ford and rushed into release on January 24, 1940.

The novel's high reputation springs in part from Steinbeck's ability to deftly combine two purposes within the same work. First, he presents a graphic, realistic, heartrending account of a terrible social problem of the Great Depression era. In this way the book resembles other sociological novels, such as Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin (1851–1852) and Upton Sinclair's The Jungle (1906); like those works, The Grapes of Wrath raised the awareness and aroused the sympathies of Americans. Second, The Grapes of Wrath is a literary triumph, beautifully and movingly written, artistically interweaving great themes of westward movement, Biblical sacrifice, human courage and endurance, the centrality of the family and of women within the family, the importance of community and human brotherhood, and the evils of selfish individualism. In the end, Steinbeck's skill in employing magnificent writing to explicate a shocking social injustice of the 1930s will insure the continuance of the book's reputation as a national epic and a classic expression of the courage and vitality of the American spirit in the face of adversity.

See Also: FORD, JOHN; GENDER ROLES AND SEXUAL RELATIONS, IMPACT OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION ON; OKIES; STEINBECK, JOHN.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Davis, Robert Con, ed. The Grapes of Wrath: A Collection of Critical Essays. 1982.

Ditsky, John, ed. Critical Essays on Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath. 1989.

French, Warren, ed. A Companion to The Grapes of Wrath. 1963.

Heavilin, Barbara A. Critical Response to John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath. 2000.

Heavilin, Barbara A. John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath: A Reference Guide. 2002.

Steinbeck, John. Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath, 1938–1941, edited by Robert De-Mott. 1988.

DAVID W. LEVY