Steinbeck was a unique and notable writer among many Americans novelist during 1930’s. His novels are rich in variety and touched each and every aspects of life. That is why he is called as realistic, socialistic, naturalistic, regionalist, pragmatic, and mythic writer. These adjectives define him as a great writer and his writings are mostly based on Man and his Life. He was called as a social critique by the use of sociological approach in his writings. Sociologist C. Wright Mill (1959) in his book Essentials of sociology says “the sociological perspective enables us to grasp the connection between history and biography” (p 2). Mill defines both history and biography under society. He says by history “Each society is located I a broad stream …show more content…
As a social critique he got inspiration from his precursors Walt Whitman and Earnest Hemingway in particular. But Steinbeck who was always favour of man rather than society specifically for poor or migrant workers of California. Harold Bloom’s in his Critical Interpretation of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath sys, like Whitman and Hemingway “he studied the nostalgia, the aboriginal sources that were never available for American, and like them he retained a profound hope for the American as natural man and women” (Bloom 4). Like Bloom said Steinbeck portrayed actual incidents and realistic characters in his novels. His characters and incidents were naturally taken from era of 1930’s what he has seen and experienced during this period. 1930’s were one of the toughest periods for America and Americans because of the ‘Great Depression’. The period of mass unemployment and economic collapse this followed the stock-market “crash” of 1929. In the rich agricultural area of California, the depression created a situation which urgently in need of reform. Another situation strike American by 1935 as ‘dust Bowl’ in the areas of Great Plains, that vast region of the United States which begins at the western limit of the Mississippi Valley and raises gradually to the foot hills of the Rocky Mountains, occupying large sections of such states like North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. Cyrus Ernesto Zirakzadeh in John Steinbeck on the Political Capacities of Everyday Folk: Moms, Reds, and Ma Joad,
During the 1930’s thousands of Dust Bowl migrant workers made their way from the central plain into California seeking work. In their search for work and some form of income many of the migrants and their families ended up in Hoovervilles, which were makeshift roadside camps that were greatly impoverished. Steinbeck was able to travel through the labor camps and recorded the horrible living conditions of the migrant workers. The collection of these recordings was published as Harvest Gypsies. During the tours of the labor camps he saw the oppression of the workers first hand in addition to workers being demoralized by wealthy land owners.
The Grapes of Wrath follows Tom Joad and his family during the Dust Bowl and Great Depression. The family is forced to leave their home in Oklahoma and make the difficult journey to California, hoping for a better life. The family travels with thousands of other migrant families trying to find hope, land, jobs, and a dependable future. The author, John Steinbeck, was an American novelist who wrote other famous novels such as Of Mice and Men and East of Eden. In this novel, Ma’s character symbolizes a change in the original roles that women had during the time.
John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath elaborates on
The author, John Steinbeck grew up caring a lot about social problems that were going on within society and wants to be there to tell the world how cruel it really was. He wants to share how he perceived the world and he wants to make a difference in the
John Steinbeck is a globally known author who observes the aesthetic of the 1900s which includes the Dust Bowl and Great Depression. These tragic disasters influenced Steinbeck’s style and the content that is located in his novels. The new historicism approach appropriately explores John
In Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck uses the sociohistorical context in which the novel is set in order to elaborate on his philosophy of discrimination. Understanding what John Steinbeck 's life was like can help the reader comprehend why the novel was written. On February 27, 1902 in Salinas, California John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was born, ("John," Biography), his parents John Sr. and Olive had two other girls before John and one girl after him, making John the only boy in the family ("John," Novels). When John entered high school he was, “An average student in most subjects, and excelled in english. He began to write for the school newspaper, El Gabilan, and began to think seriously of becoming a writer” (Steffens 10).
John Steinbeck has been a pillar of American literature for decades. His work, especially Grapes of Wrath and The Harvest Gypsies, helped to shed light on some of the issues that plagued California, and the rest of the United States during the Great Depression. His works accentuate the theme of the importance of community, especially when those with the power to help don 't. These novels take place during the Great Depression, a time when there were very few jobs, little stability, widespread poverty, and diminished hopes for the future. This era sets the stage on which these stories take place. During these harsh times, many people turned to the government or banks for help, but they were turned down by the banks because they wanted a profit, or they bankrupted, and the government 's resources were stretched so low they could only help few people.
Steinbeck illustrates the hopefulness found in a harsh reality and
The Dust Bowl, a series of severe dust storms in the the 1930’s, left the the southern plains of the United States as a wasteland. The storms occurred due to the lack of use of dryland farming techniques to prevent wind erosion. Powerful winds would pick up loose soil and carry it around the country side. Called “black blizzard” or “black rollers”, these storms had the potential to black out the sky completely. Due to the inability to grow and sell crops, banks evicted families and foreclosed their properties, leaving them homeless and without an income.
John Steinbeck, in the novel, Grapes of Wrath, identifies the hardships and struggle to portray the positive aspects of the human spirit amongst the struggle of the migrant farmers and the devastation of the Dust Bowl. Steinbeck supports his defense by providing the reader with imagery, symbolism and intense biblical allusions. The author’s purpose is to illustrate the migrant farmers in order to fully exploit their positive aspects in the midst of hardships. Steinbeck writes in a passionate tone for an audience that requires further understanding of the situation.
The tone of chapter 11 in John Steinbeck's, “The Grapes of Wrath,” is sympathetic, sad and hopeless. His word choice and syntax show how the sad houses were left to decay in the weather. His use of descriptive words paints a picture in the reader's mind. As each paragraph unfolds, new details come to life and adds to the imagery. While it may seem unimportant, this intercalary chapter shows how the effects of the great depression affected common households.
Steinbeck is more of a fictional story writer but can get the readers attention in a way that if different from any other writer which is amazing. The way he writes is that he makes up a story but puts some type of life lesson into it. Most writers do this as well but the way Steinbeck puts it is in a completely different way. In his book, "The Pearl", Steinbeck writes a fictional story on poor people and their daily lives. The main character finds a Pearl and that material item becomes his life.
Character Analysis of Tom Joad in The Grapes of Wrath Tom Joad is portrayed as a character of multiple dimensions and roles. Despite being viewed as a cynical, convicted killer who responds to stimuli or from impulse at the beginning, he takes both literal and metaphorical journey from Oklahoma to the green land of California with the migrants. Accordingly, he reveals a philosophical transformation inspired by Jim Casy. Essentially, Tom is a character who displays different qualities and roles and is portrayed as a leader, philosopher, a natural man, a hero, a dispossessed migrant and a visionary man.
John Steinbeck has a style of writing unparalleled in history and in the modern world. In the same way, his philosophies are also unparalleled, with his focus in socialism not extending to communism or abnegation of spiritualism. His ideal world is utopian, holding the dust bowl migrant at the same level as the yeoman farmer was held in Jeffersonian times. In The Grapes of Wrath Steinbeck Steinbeck, who posses impregnable technique, conveys his message of a group working tirelessly for the betterment of the community.
Grapes of Wrath clearly illustrate the class struggle between workers and the upper class. Steinbeck displays the discrimination between the migrant people and landowners. Migrant workers are handled worse than animals, family’s or “Okies” are starving as food is wasted by the wealthy and the landowners maintain control through violence. “What do you want us to do? We can't take less share of the crop – we're half starved now.