(Summary courtesy of NEABIGREAD.ORG)
John Steinbeck, c. 1939 (Bettmann/Corbis)
John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath is not merely a great American novel. It is also a significant event in our national history. Capturing the plight of millions of Americans whose lives had been crushed by the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression, Steinbeck awakened the nation’s comprehension and compassion.
Written in a style of peculiarly democratic majesty, The Grapes of Wrath evokes quintessentially American themes of hard work, self-determination, and reasoned dissent. It speaks from assumptions common to most Americans whether their ancestors came over on the Mayflower, in steerage, or in a truck.
Major Characters in the Novel
The novel begins with young Tom Joad’s return home from a prison term to find his family’s Oklahoma farmstead in ruins and deserted. He soon locates his relatives nearby, preparing to leave their land for the promise of a new life in California. We follow their travails and partake of their hopes, only to share in their disappointment when California’s agricultural bounty makes no provision for them except as occasional day laborers. Under the strain, the Joad family gradually comes apart until only a struggling remnant survives. In an unforgettable conclusion, we leave these few bereft of everything except their imperishable humanity.
Farmhouse in Oklahoma Dust Bowl
Along the way, we meet a cast of characters as overstuffed as the Joad family’s panel truck. From the indomitable matriarch Ma Joad to the starving old man in the book’s final scene, Steinbeck gives them the individuality that an unforgiving economy threatens to cost them. In a remarkable balancing act, they represent those displaced by the Depression without ever subsiding into mere symbols. Tom Joad, just released from prison as the novel begins, Tom is quick to fight but fundamentally decent. He loves his family and finds himself gradually radicalized by its slow disintegration. Ma Joad, blessed with the ability to improvise a meal or a bed from the barest of provisions, Ma’s strength and resilience ultimately prove her the true bulwark of the family.
Jim Casy
A defrocked preacher turned itinerant philosopher, Jim gives voice to much of Steinbeck’s own mistrust of organized religion and belief in social justice.
Rosasharn Joad Rivers
Under Ma’s influence, Tom’s sister matures from a fairly insufferable expectant mother into a woman capable of one of the most memorable sacrifices in American literature.
Uncle John
Uncle John is a sometime drunk who holds himself responsible for his late wife’s death. His most memorable scene comes when he sets the youngest Joad adrift in the river to bear mute witness against the suffering of all the Dust Bowl migrants.
Al Joad
Al becomes suddenly indispensable to his family, since he’s the only one who can keep their precious truck running. Unfortunately, some things are even more gripping to a teenage boy like Al than an automobile–for example, teenage girls.
The “man who lay on his back”
Never named, this minor but indelible character shares the novel’s final, unforgettable tableau with Rosasharn. Like the prostrate underclass he represents, he needs help to survive but is too proud to beg.
NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS BIG READ
The Big Read is an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts designed to revitalize the role of literary reading in American popular culture. Reading at Risk: A Survey of Literary Reading in America, a 2004 NEA report, identified a critical decline in reading for pleasure among American adults. The Big Read addresses this issue by bringing communities together to read, discuss, and celebrate books and writers from American and world literature.
A great book combines enlightenment with enchantment. It awakens our imagination and enlarges our humanity. It can even offer harrowing insights that somehow console and comfort us. Whether you’re a regular reader already or making up for lost time, thank you for joining The Big Read.
