The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck

Published in 1939, The Grapes of Wrath was a timely novel highlighting the plight of displaced white farmers from the Oklahoman Dust Bowl and their treatment as migrant workers in ‘The Promised Land’ of California.


The story centers on the Joad’s, a family of Share Croppers who have been driven off their land by the large new mechanised farming corporations. They pack up everything they own and leave for the promise of plenty of work and good pay in the Californian orchards. Joined by the local ex preacher Casey, and their wayward son Tom who has just been released from prison after doing time for manslaughter, Ma, Pa, Grampa and Grandma, a newly pregnant Rose of Sharon, her husband Connie, two other adult sons, a young son, an uncle and a young daughter, pile up into their truck along with water kegs, salted pork, mattresses, pots and pans, a tarpaulin and the family dog.

The journey to California is a long and expensive one, and along the way they not only meet other migrant families with the same hopes and aspirations, but also families returning, beaten into retreat by their appalling treatment.

The Joad family story is told in alternating chapters. Between these chapters are brief narratives which are faster paced depicting the migrant scene as a whole. Their tale is one of hunger, severe poverty and misery though it strangely does not mention the Chinese, Filipino, Mexican and Japanese workers who actually made up a huge proportion of the Californian labour force.

This is not an uplifting story and you will not find any of the charm that was in East of Eden. I found it very difficult to find anything to like about any member of the Joad family although Noah, who was an autistic son, would have made an interesting character if he had not been ‘dumped’ by Steinbeck about a quarter of the way through the novel, along with Rose of Sharon’s husband Connie. I totally disliked the ending, although I understand it was meant to be symbolic.

Accused by some as being published as propaganda, the attention this novel brought to the American people effectively brought about the abolition of Anti Migration laws, the introduction of conscription, and brought migrant families to work in ship yards etc during the war.