John Steinbeck's In Dubious Battle

356 Words2 Pages
The novel In Dubious Battle, written by John Steinbeck, describes the strike of workers caused by shortages in wages on the apple plantations. However, even though the basic plot is about how reds, represented by Max, Jim and others, lead the strike, the novel has a much deeper meaning. One of the main themes of the novel is the psychology of the group of men and how it can be manipulated, which is mainly done by Max. First of all, Max uses the anger of the workers towards the owners of the orchards in order to manipulate them. Even though he knows that the strike is going to fail, he doesn’t mention it to no one except for a small group of people including Jim and London. Instead, he gives ambitious speeches about the future in which workers