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The Grapes Of Wrath Chapter 5 Analysis

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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. Chapter 5 is about the unfair hand the farmers get because property owners that took their land and essentially told them to get out. The farmers are left with no choice because they can’t fight the bank. Since there are no actual characters, unlike the other chapters, Steinbeck organizes the chapter to be told third-person omniscient. Rather than focus on the characters, Steinbeck directs the reader’s attention to the situation and the events that take place. It’s his excellent use of exposition that adds to the true story of the Grapes of Wrath: the Joad …show more content…

Steinbeck makes a peculiar description of the tractors, “ The tractors came over the roads and into the fields, great crawlers moving like insects, having the incredible strength of insects.” (Pg. 47) By describing the tractors as pests or insects, Steinbeck makes a subtle allusion to the biblical story where God lashes his wrath and might on the Egyptians for not freeing the Jews. God plagues the Egyptians with an infestation that destroyed their crops and starved them. Moreover, God, himself, is also an important use of symbolism. The farmers acknowledge that God cursed them with tragedies. This could be tied to Casy’s turmoil with his

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