The Grapes of Wrath

The Joads lose their Oklahoma tenancy to dust and the banks and drive Route 66 to California, where the work turns out to be rigged and the welcome hostile. Steinbeck alternates the family’s story with short interchapters that generalise it, which is what makes the book an argument as much as a novel. It won the Pulitzer in 1940 and was central to the case for Steinbeck’s Nobel; it was also burned and banned on publication, notably in Kern County, California, where growers said it libelled them and critics called it communist propaganda.

Context: John Steinbeck (1902-1968) reported on migrant camps for the San Francisco News before writing the novel. It remains among the most frequently challenged books in American schools.

Connections

• A Library to Build Great Americans — the 468-title curriculum this card came from; listed in the Ages 13-99+ band under Fiction.
• John Steinbeck — the author.
• Agriculture — the work the book is about.
• Poverty — the condition the book refuses to soften.
• American Dream — the promise the book measures against what actually happened.