1012 steinbeck, John
Thus, while it is not as overtly political as some
of Steinbeck’s other novels (especially his famous
1939 tale of migrant workers, The graPeS of
Wrath), Cannery Row nevertheless offers a telling
critique of American society. In particular, Steinbeck
uses seemingly unsuccessful characters such as Mack
and his friends, and socially aware business owners,
such as Lee Chong and Dora, to present a vision of
success that contrasts sharply with postdepression
American values.
Sarah Perrault
STEiNbECk, JoHN The Grapes of
Wrath^ (1939)
John Steinbeck (1902–68) initially began to write
about the Great Depression’s effects in his native
California after composing a series of newspaper
articles chronicling the mass migration of disaffected
families across the United States. The Grapes of Wrath,
for which Steinbeck won the 1940 Pulitzer Prize
and later the Nobel Prize in literature (1962), grew
directly from those articles and is widely lauded as his
finest work. The novel follows the Joad family after
they lose their farm in Oklahoma and journey west-
ward through many hardships to arrive in California.
They believe they will find a land of plenty with jobs
for everyone, but instead they are openly despised
and cheated by large corporations that maltreat them
in order to make more profits. The people begin to
organize, and it becomes clear by the end of the novel
that if something does not soon change, there will be
an armed struggle precipitated by the migrants’ anger
toward the injustice of the powerful who callously
ignore the starving children of the poor.
The Grapes of Wrath had a tumultuous reception
when it was published in 1939. It was banned as
communist propaganda in many cities, there were
plots against Steinbeck, and it was not until First
Lady Eleanor Roosevelt publicly stated that the
misery of the migrants portrayed in the book was
accurate that the controversy subsided and steps
were taken to help families like the Joads. Soon
after, the Great Depression ended when the onset
of World War II created countless jobs in America’s
manufacturing industry.
Kelly MacPhail
commodIFIcatIon/commercIaLIzatIon
in The Grapes of Wrath
In The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck argues that
in the economic system of the modern industrial
age, evil has reached new depths when it is per-
petrated by huge companies or organizations or
countries. These institutions are faceless, they are
relentless, and they have the ability to cause damage
to millions of people and to our planet on a truly
massive scale. This raw evil sidesteps all account-
ability because it is not a person, and hence, as
Oklahoma farmers like the Joads find out, it is a
monster that cannot be forced to leave them alone
at the point of a shotgun. In every case, the evil is
said to have originated somewhere else: not with the
messenger but with the bank, and beyond that with
the company, and beyond that with a corporation
somewhere back East. In order to put a name to the
evil institutional framework that allows these deeds
to occur, Steinbeck pictures the system as an uncon-
trollable monster that enslaves the men who run the
banks and corporations.
Embodied in the banks and companies, the
monster increases its grasp on humans the richer
and more hollow they become. As an example of
the detrimental effects of this greed to accumulate
wealth, Steinbeck invokes the famous millionaire
William Randolph Hearst in a discussion between
Jim Casy and some other migrants. Although
unnamed, Hearst is the crazy, rich newspaper man
mentioned in chapter 18; afraid to die, he accumu-
lates material goods while hundreds of thousands
have nothing and are starving. Casy concludes that
Hearst was lonely and old and disappointed and
was busy collecting things to make himself feel less
poor on the inside. He contrasts Hearst with Mrs.
Wilson, who found fulfillment in lending the Joads
her tent when they knew Grampa was about to die
and then giving them her quilt to wrap up his body.
A similar perception of the immensity of cor-
porate evil is seen when Casy speaks with the man
at the gas station who hopes the tribulations affect-
ing everyone else will pass him by. Casy responds
by characterizing this evil as a fierce Gila monster
and claims that as a preacher, he used to fight the
devil, but he now knows that the greed of human
beings is far worse. It is this monster that forecloses