Spotlight on Books: WFM’S All Time Best: “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck was already an established voice of California’s dispossessed when The Grapes of Wrath appeared in 1939. His earlier novel Of Mice and Men had explored the lives of migrant workers with sympathy and realism. The Grapes of Wrath was different in scale and ambition. It won the Pulitzer Prize in 1940 and became the centrepiece of his 1962 Nobel Prize for Literature with the Academy specifically citing “his realistic and imaginative writing, combining sympathetic humour and keen social perception.” Yet even as the literary establishment honoured him, Steinbeck remained a controversial figure- attacked by corporate interests and labelled a communist.
I encountered the novel through John Ford’s 1940 film adaptation and it hit me like a freight train. I saw the movie at the age of 16 while a student at Quigley. I had never experienced such an emotional reaction to a film. It was stark- utilising black and white cinematography. The movie gave us tight closeups of displaced families and refused to look away from hunger and humiliation. The film was unapologetic in its portrayal of cruelty. Henry Fonda as Tom Joad, the lead character was a revelation. Jane Darwell played Ma Joad, a woman of fierce and unbreakable dignity and won an Oscar for her performance. They were ordinary people who refused to let their family be destroyed no matter what the world threw at them. The film shook me so profoundly that I immediately bought the book because I wanted to learn how Steinbeck had created the world that Ford brought so skilfully to the screen.
Wow! The book made the movie seem like a walk in the park for the Joad family. The novel was bleak and uncompromising- a realistic tour de force that pulled no punches. Steinberg’s narrative was not subtle- it was political and unambiguous- almost propaganda. However, it was not preachy. Instead, it grabbed your gut and squeezed it from page 1 onward. It made an enormous impression on me because my education had presented a sanitised and triumphalist version of American history. We were winners- Manifest Destiny was a glorious westward expansion; we freed the slaves after a brutal Civil War; we saved Europe in World War I and were prosperous and our democratic political system was enlightened. The Depression was just an unfortunate interlude and we recovered quickly. Our system was the role model for the world. Trust me, you became a vigorous patriot if you attended Chicago Catholic grammar schools. Steinbeck showed me a different perspective- a society that systematically exploited its most vulnerable citizens, where banks were modern “scrooges” and corporate interests were passionately opposed to unions and workers rights. Certainly, a more complicated picture than simplistic jingoistic patriotism.
The Joad family is the fulcrum of the narrative. They lost their land in Oklahoma after disastrous dust storms destroyed the soil. They commenced a family journey from Oklahoma to California to begin a new life- to continue their pursuit of the American dream. Instead, they confront obstacles every step of the way and become disillusioned. Tom Joad is the conscience of the novel, an ordinary fellow pushed to the edge, his anger growing just beneath a deceptively easy manner. Ma Joad is a picture of determination and resolve- striving to hold the family together. Pa Joad is a broken man, but Ma assumes command and her final line in the book is a hall of famer: “We’re the people that live. They can’t wipe us out- they can't lick us.” What impacted me most was the complete inversion of what I had been taught about American success. Here, the losers, the exploited were the good guys- the Joads, Jim Casy (the Jesus lite figure who trades in his preacher role and becomes a labor organiser), the anonymous families surviving in Hoovervilles. The successful, the rich and the powerful were villains, not necessarily through personal cruelty, but because they managed a system that reduced human beings to commodities.
Steinberg’s prose was unvarnished and merciless. The language is raw, muscular and unafraid of sentiment or anger. Each chapter is a cry of rage against injustice. Tom Joad’s farewell speech to Ma crystallised everything for me. “I’ll be everywhere you look, wherever there is a fight so hungry people can eat, I’ll be there, whenever there is a cop beating up a guy, I’ll be there.” The message was to stand with the dispossessed and to challenge authority. Be engaged whenever human dignity is under assault. Basically, the Sermon on the Mount was activated by fiery labor organisers, activists and “troublemakers.” The lesson is to examine who holds power and how they got there. Understand who benefits from the system and what are the human costs of a prosperity plagued by inequity and inequality? I understand now there was an organised response to The Grapes of Wrath. The book was banned and the FBI opened a file on Steinbeck as a potential subversive. I am not surprised. The book throws down the gauntlet and assigns blame. It showed that American poverty wasn’t accidental or simply a matter of fate. Instead, it was engineered and welcomed in some circles and seen as a natural circumstance- the haves and have nots controlled their own destiny.
The debates of today were foreshadowed by The Grapes of Wrath. The hostility the Joad’s encountered in California, being called “Okies” and treated as invaders and diseased criminals threatening “real” Californians rings true today. Yes, we are a country led by an individual who describes poor immigrants as “vermin”, "hostile invaders” who are “poisoning the blood of the nation.” It seems the dehumanising vocabulary changes very little- only the targets shift. Shameful! His depiction of the Dust Bowl environmental disaster leading to economic exploitation was predictive of the climate migration and refugee reality that exists in contemporary society. Steinbeck showed how ecological catastrophe combined with a rigid economic system could punish those with the least power to resist. His vivid treatment of human rights abuses has salience now. There are recurring patterns on how power responds to the disenfranchised and the weak.
Steinbeck’s reputation as a novelist has followed a volatile trajectory. After his initial triumphs, his stature declined in the post war decades. Critics dismissed him as sentimental and provincial. The Nobel Prize revived interest in his work and the book now regularly appears on lists of the great American novels. The Modern Library ranked it tenth on its list of the 100 best English language novels of the 20th Century. He is now praised for his emotional honesty, his sophisticated understanding of systemic injustice and his bold prose. I join in the recognition of his strengths as a writer and chronicler of culture and American complexity. He taught me that literature could be dangerous, disturbing and thought provoking. He challenged comfortable assumptions and challenged the reader to search for the truth— a truth that is often in plain sight. We just need to make the effort to see it.
