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The Grapes Of Wrath Chapter 4 Analysis

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“The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck
The novel “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck is about an Oklahoma farm family, the Joads, who are forced to travel west to California in hope for a better future. Where they face the harsh reality of America. The setting of the novel is during the Dust Bowl migration of 1930s. American writer John Steinbeck wrote this book, so his readers can experience and understand the life during the Dust Bowl migrants and can understand each other. Two lessons that can be pulled from this novel are “Highway 66” in chapter twelve and “the turtle” in chapter three. “The Grapes of Wrath” teaches the reader that to get to the goal they are after they will have to fight for it no matter how hard it is.
At the beginning of the novel, the Joads were on a transport truck and as they were riding in the truck on the highway there was this turtle who was trying to make its …show more content…

Growing up I always knew that life isn’t fair, but that never was a reason to give up. There are setbacks and certain events in a person’s life that changes them and that is okay, but I look up to people who have been through hell and back and are still themselves and that’s what John Steinbeck showed me through his novel. Sometimes growing up I thought I had it rough, but lately I understand that I’m still living better than others and should be grateful for that. John Steinbeck showed his readers that there are people in worst situations than others and always find a way to overcome it and they never loose hope then why is it different for anyone else? And I thought about that and I understood that people only focus on themselves and that impacts them only they never try to put themselves in other people’s shoes and see how hard things are for them and how they deal with them. After realizing this my thoughts on this expanded even

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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.

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Steinbeck’s somber yet passionate tone is his most powerful tool, as by writing The Grapes of Wrath this way, he emphasizes how much of a victim the migrants are to their circumstances and the extent of the landowners’ greed. Early on, Steinbeck inflicts his passion into an account of a pawnbroker taking advantage of a migrant farmer. “We could have saved you, but you cut us down, and soon you will be cut down and there’ll be none of us to save you.” (94) This statement by the farmer has somewhat somber connotations, as he refers to both having misfortune, but the intensity in which he threatens the pawnbroker is unmistakable.

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The Grapes of Wrath portrays contemporary people 's actions during the long journey from Oklahoma to California. As Joad 's family travels from Oklahoma to California, their dreams and hopes are slowly crushed. When Joads struggle while facing difficulties, Ma plays a significant role: the citadel holding family all together in this hectic migration. Regardless of gender rules, Steinbeck demonstrates Ma as the real head of the household instead of Pa, driven by the responsibility and leadership within motherhood. Ma plays both mother and father figure which consequently might make Pa Joad as a useless character.

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Family, Home, and Community in The Grapes of Wrath In the novel The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, a major theme is that of changing home, family, and community. Throughout the book, the characters' experiences change their views on the varying importance of these things. From the very first chapter to the last, the importance of family is emphasized even as the concept of family changes. The meaning of home also changes over the course of the story.

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Taking place in a time of depression, The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck, follows the Joad family on their journey westward. Along with other migrants, they struggle with their forced silence. Crucial to their journey is their ex-preacher, Jim Casy. The relationship between Jim Casy and Jesus Christ is essential to The Grapes of Wrath, adding an element of guidance to the novel to show the importance of a quality leader.

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Chris DiRienzi Mr. Belluscio Ap Lang 15 Feb 2024. Theme, Symbolism, and the Continuity of Motif In Chapter 23 of Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath This chapter of Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath dives into the culture that the migrants make for themselves, which directly contrasts their old way of living they possessed when living their lives as farmers. While they used to be more separated from each other and were only focused on themselves and their farms, the hike to California forced them to make small groups to survive with what little each person had. They keep themselves amused in these little groups through various activities such as storytelling and dancing.

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Intercalary Chapter Literary Analysis During the Great Depression, the nation as a whole was stripped of financial security and forced into a survivalist way of living. This changed the ways that people interacted with one another and the overall mentality of society. In the Grapes of Wrath, the Joad family is torn from their land and find themselves with nothing, a common story for migrant farmers of that time, derogatorily called “Okies” by Californians. But this is not the only group that is struggling, the entire county was in a state of panic and bruteness, no matter how “well off” they seemed to be.

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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.

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In The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck follows the Joad family as they suffer the hardships caused by the Dust Bowl in the 1930’s. The most important lesson people can learn from the novel is the value of a human life. Although the 1930’s was a low point in American society, the ill-treatment of human beings is still relevant today. Just like Jim Casy’s philosophy, it is important to fight for the rights of the people and their dignity. There are several examples of oppression in The Grapes of wrath.

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In The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, the chapters alternate between two perspectives of a story. One chapter focuses on the tenants as a whole, while the other chapter focuses specifically of a family of tenants, the Joads, and their journey to California. Chapter 5 is the former and Steinbeck does an excellent job of omniscient third person point of view to describe the situation. Chapter 5’s main idea is to set the conflict and let the readers make connections between Steinbeck’s alternating chapters with foreshadowing. Steinbeck is effectual in letting readers make connections both to the world and the text itself with the use of exposition, and symbolism.

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John Steinbeck wrote The Grapes of Wrath and had it published in 1939. Tom Joad, the main character, and his family lost their farm and sold all of their belongings to move to California. Before they reached west the family and Jim Casy encountered many hardships just to come to many more and also bad weather. The Joads finally settle into a nearby cottonfield where the pay was better and save a near-dead man with Rose of Sharon’s, a cow that just gave birth to a stillborn baby, milk. The story takes place during the Great Depression on a trip from Oklahoma to California.

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Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, depicts the hardships of many farmers during the Dust Bowl era as thousands of families in Oklahoma and other “tractored off” states moved west towards California, in search of work and opportunity. Our protagonist, Tom Joad, is first introduced after being released from prison for murder four years ago, only to find that his family has moved and their house has been foreclosed. Readers join along in the Joad family’s difficult journey to restart their lives, search for work, attempt to fulfill their own dreams, and to provide a better life for future generations. This timeless novel exemplifies the destitute and suffering experienced during this time in America and the hard truths of the American Dream.

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This social philosophy preserves that human survival is dependent upon the banding together of humans to find strength in group unity and action. Now, if we elaborate a conclusion based in this scene then we can relate this topic to an economic disaster. Because, the elaboration of this theory in the film is seen in the education of the troubled (tom) and disadvantaged (Joad’s family) with the organization of unions and strikes as vehicles of group protest and change. In final consideration, “The Grapes of Wrath” emphasizes the unfair treatments that the migrants receive and how this doesn’t apply to their hardship; it diminishes them as human

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The Grapes of Wrath, one of his most well-known works is exemplary of Steinbeck’s pursuit to bring attention to the lower class and their struggles during the Great Depression, and to hold those who caused the Depression accountable, as seen in his quote “I want to put a tag of shame on the greedy bastards who are responsible for this [the Great Depression and its effects]. I’ve done my damnedest to rip a reader’s nerves to rags” (“The Grapes of Wrath”]. Published in 1939, the novel follows a family of tenant farmers who are forced to turn their land over to the banks and journey across the Dust Bowl to the ‘promised land’ of California (“John Ernst Steinbeck”). The Grapes of Wrath became highly debated and criticized, and many accused Steinbeck of dramatizing the conditions portrayed in the novel to prove a point; however, he had actually underplayed the conditions, feeling that “exact descriptions would have gotten in the way of his story.” Though embraced by the working class, critics condemned the novel as a ‘pack of lies’ and ‘Communist propaganda,’ and the book was banned from 1939 to 1941.

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Through John Steinbeck's plot in The Grapes of Wrath,  the struggle of the typical American dreamer is depicted in the Joad’s attempt to move to California for a better life. While attempting this dream, the Joad family had to make multiple sacrifices. The first sacrifice occurs early on in their journey, the abandoning of their property (Steinbeck 59). This was extremely difficult for the Joads because they had lived on this land for a long time and they had many memories that had been created there.

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