I think The Grapes of Wrath accomplished exactly what Steinbeck wanted it to. It is supposed to show the struggle of farmers during the Dust Bowl migration. This is exactly what it does too. In the beginning it really shows how things are changing. People are being kicked off their land. The Joads have been living on their land in Oklahoma for several generations, and now they are being kicked off. This is enough to upset anybody, and it is happening to a large number of people. Muley Graves is probably one of the only people who stay on their land. It just means too much to him to leave it even if he has to live like some sort of animal. He says his family has been there for fifty years, and he is not going down without a fight. He says “I’ll take a couple—three of the sons-a-bitches along for company” (Steinbeck, 47.) If they try to take him off of his land he is just going to kill them. This story also shows the tragedy of the Dust Bowl by following the Joads. The banks have kicked them off of their land, so they go to California. When they get there they find that jobs are not easy to come by. Everyone is looking for work, and people that have jobs work for next to nothing. Everybody in California is has a deep hatred for the people migrating because the Californians are looking for work too. The way they see it is these migrants are coming and making things more difficult for them. But the migrants need work, and there is nowhere else for them to go. Steinbeck does a great job of showing how everybody is having a rough time during the Depression. Work is scarce, but everybody is after a job because everyone needs money to buy food to eat. Steinbeck definitely did a great job expressing the difficulties that were happening during this time period.
Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath. New York: Penguin, 2006. Print.
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