Teacher’s Study Guide - The Grapes of Wrath

THE GRAPES OF WRATH TEACHER’S STUDY GUIDE

ALIVE & ALOUDAUDIO THEATRE FOR LEARNING IN THE CLASSROOM

Based on the Novel by John Steinbeck, Adapted by Frank Galati

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THE GRAPES OF WRATH AUDIO PLAY

Richard Masur, DirectorSusan Loewenberg, Executive Producer

An L.A. Theatre Works Production©2002 L.A. Theatre Works

TEACHER’S STUDY GUIDE by Dianne CookeSharon Davis, Joel Rafael, ContributorsNataki Garrett, National Outreach CoordinatorDepartment of Graphic Sciences, GraphicDesign

ALIVE & ALOUD TEACHER’S STUDY GUIDE

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

5 JOHN STEINBECK

6 TIMELINE

9 CAST OF CHARACTERS

10 MAIN CHARACTERS

11 JOHN STEINBECK, WOODY GUTHRIE, AND THE MUSIC FOR THE GRAPES OF WRATHby Joel Rafael

13 EXCERPT FROM THEIR BLOOD IS STRONGby John Steinbeck

16 THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF DOROTHEA LANGE

21 SUGGESTED VOCABULARY

22 DIALECT AND IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS

23 ACTING OUT

24 ENGLISH STUDY QUESTIONS

26 HISTORY STUDY QUESTIONS

28 RESOURCES ON THE INTERNET

29 BIBLIOGRAPHY

THE GRAPES OF WRATH

ALIVE & ALOUD TEACHER’S STUDY GUIDE

John Steinbeck was born in Salinas, California, on February 27, 1902 to John Ernst Steinbeckand Olivia Hamilton Steinbeck. He learned a love and respect for the environment of hischildhood, an appreciation that appears in much of his work. Working at various times as a farmlaborer, ranch hand, and factory worker, he developed sympathy for working people, which heportrays to great effect in his best novels.

Steinbeck enrolled at Stanford University in 1919 and attended off and on until 1925, when heleft before graduating. He was always passionate about writing and worked briefly as ajournalist in New York City before returning to California.

His first novel, Cup of Gold, was published in 1929, and during the 1930’s he wrote most of his bestCalifornia fiction: The Pastures of Heaven (1932), To a God Unknown (1933), The Long Valley (1938),Tortilla Flat (1935) which brought him his first commercial success, In Dubious Battle (1936), OfMice and Men (1937), and The Grapes of Wrath (1939) for which he won the Pulitzer Prize in 1940.

The Grapes of Wrath was inspired by a series of articles he wrote for the San Francisco Newsabout the plight of the migrant farmers in California’s Central Valley. His series, which he calledTheir Blood Is Strong, reveals the dire poverty, oppression of the migrants by callous landowners,and the labor unrest he witnessed. He even visited the camp built by the federal governmentcalled Weedpatch, where he met Tom Collins, the director, on whom he modeled the campdirector in the novel. The articles brought him death threats, an FBI investigation, and chargesof Communist sympathy, never proven. In 1940 the book was adapted into a film directed byJohn Ford and starring Henry Fonda as Tom Joad.

The Grapes of Wrath sold out an advance edition of 19,804 by mid-April, 1939 and was selling10,000 a week by early May. It was praised by many critics as a masterpiece but criticized byothers for its sentimentality and lack of complexity. An Oklahoma Congressman called the storya “dirty, lying, filthy manuscript” because of the depiction of the Joads and the book’s languageand its characters’ earthy behavior. In addition, Californians were indignant over their portrayalas oppressors, and Kern County banned the book well into the 1940’s. Nevertheless, the novelcontinues to sell well (about 200,000 copies a year by some estimates), and it has been estimatedto have been translated into between 40 and 60 languages.

Steinbeck wrote other well-known works of fiction, including Cannery Row, The Pearl, East ofEden, and The Winter of Our Discontent. In addition, he produced travel narratives; Travels withCharley, a book celebrating American individuals; short stories, plays and film scripts. He washonored with the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962, and in his acceptance speech, Steinbecksaid, “The ancient commission of the writer has not changed. He is charged with exposing ourmany grievous faults and failures, with dredging up to the light our dark and dangerous dreamsfor the purpose of improvement.” Steinbeck died in New York in 1968 at the age of 66.

In 2002, the centennial of Steinbeck’s birth, the California Council for the Humanities embarkedon a campaign of celebration of his life and works and encouraged every Californian to read TheGrapes of Wrath. Other states joined in the tributes, including New York, where Steinbeck livedfor the last 18 years of his life. In all, more than 175 tributes were held in 39 states. Togetherthey are thought to be the largest-scale homage ever paid to an American author.

JOHN STEINBECK

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ALIVE & ALOUD TEACHER’S STUDY GUIDE THE GRAPES OF WRATH

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1902 On February 27, John Steinbeck was born in Salinas, California. He was the third of fourchildren and the only son of John Ernst II and Olive Hamilton Steinbeck. He spent hischildhood and adolescence in the Salinas Valley, later called “the salad bowl of the nation.”

1915-19 Attended Salinas High School.

1919-25 Attended classes at Stanford University, leaving without a degree. During these years Steinbeckdropped out for several months, and was employed intermittently as a sales clerk, farm laborer,ranch hand, and factory worker.

1925 November, traveled by freighter from Los Angeles to New York City; worked as a constructionlaborer and, briefly, for the New York American.

1926-28 Lived in Lake Tahoe, California and worked as a caretaker for a summer home.

1929 August, publication of first novel, Cup of Gold, by McBride (New York).

1930 January 14, marries Carol Henning. October, meets Edward F. Ricketts, marine biologist,philosopher, longtime friend.

1932 October, The Pastures of Heaven, published by Brewer, Warren, and Putnam (New York).

1933 September, novel To A God Unknown published by Ballou (New York).

1934 Winter, gathers information on farm labor unions. Interviews labor organizer in Seaside.

1935 May 28, first popular success, novel Tortilla Flat about Monterey’s paisanos. Published byCovici-Friede (New York); beginning of lifelong friendship with editor Pascal Covici.

1936 October, novel In Dubious Battle, about striking workers. Published by Covici-Friede.

1937 February 6, novella Of Mice and Men published by Covici-Friede; Summer, first trip to Europeand Russia; September, The Red Pony, three connected stories, published by Covici-Friede;November 23, New York opening of the play Of Mice and Men (207 performances).

1938 April, Their Blood Is Strong, a nonfiction account of the migrant labor problem in California,published by the Simon J. Lubin Society (San Francisco); May, receives the New York DramaCritics Award for the play Of Mice and Men; September, short story collection, The Long Valley,incorporating The Red Pony (1937), published by Viking (New York), where Pascal Covicibecame an editor after the bankruptcy of his own firm.

1939 April, The Grapes of Wrath, his greatest critical success, published by Viking, provoking bothgreat popular acclaim and violent political condemnation for its depiction of Oklahomamigrants and California growers, as well as for its alleged “vulgar” language and socialist bias.

1940 January, films of Of Mice and Men and The Grapes of Wrath released; March 11–April 20, marineexpedition in the Gulf of California with Ricketts; Spring, receives the National Book Awardand the Pulitzer Prize for The Grapes of Wrath; Summer, documentary film about livingconditions in rural Mexico, The Forgotten Village.

TIMELINE

1941 Spring, separated from Carol; fall, moves to New York City with singer Gwyndolyn Conger;December 5, Sea of Cortez, written with Edward Ricketts, published by Viking.

1942 March, sued for divorce by Carol; March 6, novel The Moon Is Down published by Viking; April8, New York opening of the play The Moon Is Down; May, film of Tortilla Flat released;November 27, Bombs Away published by Viking.

1943 March, film of The Moon Is Down released; March 29, marries Gwyn Conger in New Orleans; June–October, in Europe and North Africa as war correspondent for New YorkHerald Tribune.

1944 August 2, birth of first son, Thom.

1945 January 2, publication of novel Cannery Row by Viking.

1946 June 12, birth of second son, John IV.

1947 February, novel The Wayward Bus published by Viking; August-September, tour of Russia withphotographer Robert Capa, for the New York Herald Tribune; November, novella The Pearlpublished by Viking.

1948 April, A Russian Journal, an account of his 1947 tour of Russia, published by Viking; May, EdRicketts killed in automobile accident; August, divorced by Gwyn; December, elected toAmerican Academy of Arts and Letters.

1950 October, novella Burning Bright published by Viking; October 18, New York City opening ofthe play Burning Bright; December 28, marries third wife, Elaine Anderson Scott.

1951 September, The Log from the Sea of Cortez, the narrative part of the Sea of Cortez (1941) includingan original essay “About Ed Ricketts,” published by Viking.

1952 March, film Viva Zapata! released (screenplay published in Rome by Edizoni Filmcritica in1953; first published in America, edited by Robert Morsberger, by Viking in 1975); September, novel East of Eden published by Viking.

1954 June, novel Sweet Thursday published by Viking (a sequel to Cannery Row).

1955 March, purchases a summer home in Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York; November 3, NewYork City opening of Pipe Dream, a Richard Rogers and Oscar Hammerstein III musical basedon Sweet Thursday.

1957 April, novel The Short Reign of Pippin IV published by Viking; film of The Wayward Bus released.

1958 September, Once There Was a War, a collection of his 1943 wartime dispatches, published by Viking.

1959 February-October, travels in England and Wales, researching background for a modern Englishversion of Malory’s Morte d’Arthur (1485).

1960 September-November, tours United States with poodle, Charley.

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1961 April, twelfth novel, The Winter of Our Discontent, published by Viking.

1962 July, Travels with Charley, the journal of his 1960 tour, published by Viking;October 25, awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1963 October-December, travels to Scandinavia, Eastern Europe, and Russia on UnitedStates Information Agency cultural tour, with dramatist Edward Albee.

1964 September 14, presented with United States Medal of Freedom by President Lyndon B. Johnson.

1966 October 12, America and Americans, reflections on contemporary America, publishedby Viking.

1968 December 20, dies of arteriosclerosis in New York.

1969 Publication of Journal of a Novel: The “East of Eden” Letters, journal kept duringcomposition of East of Eden, by Viking.

1975 Steinbeck: A Life in Letters (selected correspondence) edited by Elaine Steinbeck andRobert Wallsten published by Viking.

1976 Publication of The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights (edited by ChaseHorton), an unfinished translation of Morte d’Arthur.

1979 U.S. commemorative stamp issued on what would have been his seventy-seventhbirthday.

1984 The True Adventures of John Steinbeck, Writer (biography), by Jackson J. Benson ispublished by Viking; Steinbeck is pictured on half-ounce gold medal issued by theU.S. Government.

1989 Working Days: The Journal of “The Grapes of Wrath,” edited by Robert DeMott (journalkept during writing of the novel in 1938, published on the novel’s fiftieth anniversary).

1991 Frank Gallati’s Steppenwolf Theater dramatization of The Grapes of Wrath wins NewYork Drama Critics’ Circle Award for best play of the season.

1992 Gary Sinise directs and stars in (with John Malkovich), in another film version of Of Mice and Men; Nantucket conference on “Steinbeck and the Environment,” co-sponsored by the Steinbeck Research Center and University of Massachusetts.

1994 Biography by Jay Parini, John Steinbeck: A Biography is published in England byHeinemann.

1995 A revised version of Parini’s biography is published in the United States by HenryHolt and Company in New York


TIMELINE (CONTINUED)

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Tom Joad Jeffrey Donovan

Ma Joad Shirley Knight

Pa Joad Bob Pescovitz

Al Joad Daniel Chacon

Noah Joad/Boy Michael Weston

Grampa/Mayor of Hooverville/Camp Guard Fredd Wayne

Gramma/3rd Narrator Kate Williamson

Rose of Sharon Emily Bergl

Connie 20-25/Officer/2nd Man Mike Buie

Jim Casy Francis Guinan

Uncle John Rod McLachlan

Car Salesman #1/Deputy Sheriff/Man in the Barn Maurice Chasse

Mrs. Wainwright/Elizabeth Sandry Shannon Cochran

2nd Narrator/Al’s Girl Trista Delamere

Willy/Car Salesman 4/Young Man Charlie MathesGas Station Attendant/ Hooper Ranch Guard

Car Salesman #2/Man with Guitar Joel Rafael

1st Narrator/Muley Graves/Man Going Back/ Steve Ramsey2nd Man w/Club/2nd Man

3rd Man/Man/Agricultural Officer #1 Nick SadlerContractor/4th Narrator1st Man/3rd Man

Car Salesman #5/Gas Station Owner Andy TaylorFloyd Knowles/Weedpatch Camp Director

Car Salesman 3/Camp Proprietor/1st Man w/Club Todd WaringHooper Ranch Bookkeeper/Agricultural Officer 2

CAST OF CHARACTERS

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TOM JOAD Tom is the oldest child of Ma and Pa Joad and arrives home after being releasedfrom MacAlester Prison to find that his family has been pushed off their farm. Heaccompanies them to California, learning from Jim Casey and maturing during theirjourney.

JIM CASEY Jim is a former itinerant preacher who befriends the Joad family and goes withthem to California. He listens to the people and thinks deeply and philosophicallyabout what is happening to them. He becomes a role model for Tom.

PA JOAD Pa is the head of the family and the father of Tom, Noah, Al, Rose of Sharon,Ruthie and Winfield. He becomes less and less able to make decisions as life getsmore difficult on the journey.

MA JOAD Ma is the wife of Pa Joad and the matriarch of the family. Ma is truly the strengthand backbone for all of them and is especially close to Tom. She guides Rose ofSharon in the ways of becoming a woman.

GRANPA AND They are the elders and have a hard time leaving the land that has been home forGRANMA JOAD so long. They represent a generation who cannot make it to the “Promised Land”

of California.

ROSE OF SHARON Rose is married to Connie Rivers and is pregnant with their first child. Her name, a Biblical reference, means “flower of the desert.” Her final act may besymbolic of her name.

NOAH JOAD Noah is one of the brothers and is quiet and a little strange. He decides to stay bythe river and not go on with the family into California.

AL JOAD Al is young and a bit full of himself but is a loving brother and hard worker. Heloves cars and girls and really knows how to fix cars, a valuable skill on the journey.

RUTHIE AND WINFIELD Ruthie and Winfield are the youngest Joads and, as Tom says when they cross intoCalifornia for the first time, “Who’s really seein’ it is Rughie an’ Winfiel’.” Theyrepresent the future.

CONNIE RIVERS Connie is married to Rose of Sharon and is a dreamer but not a doer. He desertsRose of Sharon and the family because he cannot deal with the reality of the family’s difficulties.

UNCLE JOHN Uncle John is Pa Joad’s brother and is a sad man who feels guilty about the death of his young wife years earlier. He drinks too much on occasion to release his sorrow,but he is kind to the younger children. His act at the end of the story with Rose of Sharon’s baby reveals Steinbeck’s anger at what is happening to all thesemigrant workers.

MAIN CHARACTERS

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“There was a feller that knew us Okies, and he knew what it was like in Oklahoma, and he knew aboutthe dust and the debts that covered us up, and he knew why we blowed out to California, because early inthe deal, he throwed a pack on his back and traipsed around amongst us, and lived with us, and talked tous, and et with us, and slept with us, and he felt in his heart and knew in his head that us Oakies was alookin’ for ‘A Living with Labor’—that man was John Steinbeck.” Woody Guthrie

“Woody is just Woody. Thousands of people do not know he has any other name. He is just a voice and aguitar. He sings the songs of a people and I suspect he is, in a way, that people. Harsh voiced and nasal, hisguitar hanging like a tire iron on a rusty rim, there is nothing sweet about Woody, and there is nothingsweet about the songs he sings. But there is something more important for those who will listen. There is thewill of the people to endure and fight against oppression. I think we call this the American spirit.”

John Steinbeck

When I was asked to play the part of “man with a guitar,” and write original music for theFrank Galati adaptation of The Grapes of Wrath for the L A Theatre Work’s celebration ofSteinbeck’s 100th birthday, I knew the part was probably modeled after Woody Guthrie. JohnSteinbeck and Woody Guthrie were mutual fans of each other’s work. I had seen pictures ofWoody in the Shafter Farm Community Camp near Bakersfield, and I knew that John Steinbeckhad used that camp as the background for some of the Joad family struggles in his greatAmerican novel.

Similarly, I felt the music should be based on Woody Guthrie’s musical style. I had just finishedrecording “Woodeye,” an album of all Woody Guthrie songs that included an opportunity towrite music to one of Woody’s unpublished lyrics. I had been immersed in Woody Guthriematerials for over a year, and the album was probably the reason I had been asked to participatein the Steinbeck centennial performance. Now I would have the opportunity to write Guthrie-styled songs and instrumental themes as well as original music to some of Steinbeck’s words forthe production.

Woody was from rural Oklahoma. When he saw the movie version of The Grapes of Wrath he wasso inspired that he wrote several songs about the struggles of his own people during theDustbowl migration. The collection included the 17 verse “Ballad of Tom Joad” which ispractically the whole story of Grapes in one song.

Woody’s Dust Bowl Ballads were eventually recognized as a landmark, and some of the mostinfluential American recordings of the twentieth century. But when they were first released, inthe summer of 1940, Victor Records only pressed about a thousand copies. With the exceptionof a few good reviews, the project was considered a commercial failure. Some even saw Dust BowlBallads as nothing more than a spin off of The Grapes of Wrath.

JOHN STEINBECK, WOODY GUTHRIE, AND THE MUSIC FOR THE GRAPES OF WRATH

Even if The Grapes of Wrath had never been written, Woody would have written a couple ofnovels, countless essays, letters, poems, and over a thousand songs. It was his nature and hiscourse was set. He must have somehow known that the Huntington’s Disease that tragicallytook his life at age 55 would finish him before his work was finished.

I’m told that if he came to your house he would write on anything that could be written on,nailed down or otherwise. Anything that could be fit into a typewriter would be typed on, andmost of it would be in the trash bucket when you woke up the next morning. Thankfully, manyof these treasures were saved by the family and friends Woody wrote to and stayed with over theyears, and have been sent in to, and collected by the Woody Guthrie Archives, now, under thedirection of Woody’s daughter, Nora.

But the Grapes of Wrath was written, and on March 3, 1940, an actor named Will Geer (one ofthe stars of Tobacco Road, but better known later in his career as Grandpa on The Waltons)organized a “Grapes of Wrath Evening” to benefit the “John Steinbeck Committee forAgricultural Workers.” It was held at the Forrest Theater in New York and featured a long listof folk artists including one of Will Geer’s friends, Woody Guthrie. The show had a majorimpact on Woody’s career, and some say the event actually signaled the beginning of themodern folk-music movement.

It was that night at the Forrest Theater that the assistant director of the Archive of Folk Song atthe Library of Congress, a young man named Alan Lomax, first saw and heard Woody Guthrieperform. Lomax documented Woody Guthrie’s life and work when he decided to record Woody’sstories and songs for the Library of Congress, and the rest is, as they say, history.

There are strong historical and musical connections between Oklahoma and California, as thelives of the common people and the constant struggles of the homeless and working poor arewoven throughout the works of Californian, John Steinbeck and Oklahoman, Woody Guthrie.

Thanks to them and those like them, for their courage to write and talk about the things they see.

—Joel RafaelA “man with aguitar”


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Originally published by the Simon J. Lubin society (San Francisco) in April, 1938.Also Printed as “The Harvest Gypsies” originally published in seven parts in The San Francisco News, between October 5–12 1938.

SPRING 1938The spring is rich and green in California this year. In the fields the wild grass is ten incheshigh, and in the orchards and vineyards the grass is deep and nearly ready to be plowed under toenrich the soil. Already the flowers are starting to bloom. Very shortly one of the oil companieswill be broadcasting the locations of the wild-flower masses. It is a beautiful spring.

There has been no war in California, no plague, no bombing of open towns and roads, noshelling of cities. It is a beautiful year. And thousands of families are starving in California. Inthe county seats the coroners are filling in “malnutrition” in the spaces left for “causes of death.”For some reason, a coroner shrinks from writing “starvation” when a thin child is dead in a tent.

For it’s in the tents you see along the roads and in the shacks built from dump heap materialsthat the hunger is, and it isn’t malnutrition. It is starvation. Malnutrition means you go withoutcertain food essentials and take a long time to die, but starvation means no food at all. Thegreen grass spreading right into the tent doorways and the orange trees are loaded. In the cottonfields, a few wisps of old crop cling to the black stems. But the people who picked the cotton,and cut the peaches and apricots, who crawled all day in the rows of lettuce and beans arehungry. The men who harvested the crops of California, the women and girls who stood all dayand half the night in the canneries, are starving.

It was so two years ago in Nipomo, it is so now, it will continue to be so until the rich produceof California can be grown and harvested on some other basis than that of stupidity and greed.

What is to be done about it? The Federal Government is trying to feed and give direct relief, butit is difficult to do quickly for there are forms to fill out, questions to ask, for fear someone whoisn’t actually starving may get something. The state relief organizations are trying to send thosewho haven’t been in the state for a year back to the states they came from. The AssociatedFarmers, which presumes to speak for the farms of California and which is made up of such earthstained toilers as chain banks, public utilities, railroad companies and those huge corporationscalled land companies, this financial organization in the face of the crisis is conductingAmericanism meetings and bawling about reds and foreign agitators. It has been invariably truein the past that when such a close knit financial group as the Associated Farmers becomes excitedabout our ancient liberties and foreign agitators, someone is about to lose something. A wage cuthas invariably followed such a campaign of pure Americanism. And of course any resentment ofsuch a wage cut is set down as the work of foreign agitators. Anyway that is the AssociatedFarmers’ contribution to the hunger of the men and women who harvest their crops. The smallfarmers, who do not belong to the Associated Farmers and cannot make use of the slop chest, arehelpless to do anything about it. The little storekeepers at cross roads and in small towns havecarried the accounts of the working people until they are near to bankruptcy.

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THEIR BLOOD IS STRONG BY JOHN STEINBECK


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And there are one thousand families in Tulare county, and two thousand families in Kingscounty, fifteen hundred families in Kern county and so on. The families average three persons,by the way. With the exception of a little pea picking, there isn’t going to be any work fornearly three months.

There is sickness in the tents, pneumonia and measles, tuberculosis. Measles in a tent, with noway to protect the eyes means a child with weakened eyes for life. And there are the variousdiseases attributable to hunger, rickets and the beginning of pellagra. The nurses in thecounties, and there aren’t one tenth enough of them, are working their heads off, doing amagnificent job and they can only begin to do the work. The corps includes nurses assigned bythe Federal and State Public Health services, school nurses and county health nurses and a fewnurses furnished by the Council of Women for Home Missions, a national church organization.I’ve seen them, red eyed, weary from far too many hours, and seeming to make no impression inthe illness about them.

It may be of interest to reiterate the reasons why these people are in the state and the reasonthey must go hungry. They are here because we need them. Before the white American migrantswere here, it was the custom in California to import great numbers of Mexicans, Filipinos,Japanese to keep them segregated, to herd them about like animals, and, if there were anycomplaints, to deport or imprison the leaders. This system of labor was a dream of heaven tosuch employers as those who no fear foreign agitators so much.

But then the dust and the tractors began displacing the sharecroppers of Oklahoma, Texas,Kansas and Arkansas. Families who had lived for many years on the little “croppers’ lands” weredispossessed because the land was in the hands of the banks and the finance companies andbecause these owners found that one man with a tractor could do the work of ten sharecroppers’families. Faced with the question of starving or moving, these dispossessed families came west.To a certain extent they were actuated by advertisements and handbills distributed by laborcontractors from California. It is to the advantage of the corporate farmer to have too muchlabor, for then wages can be cut. Then people who are hungry will fight each other for a jobrather than the employer for a living wage.

It is possible to make money for food and gasoline for at least nine months of the year if you arequick on the get away, if your wife and your children work in the fields. But then the dead threemonths strikes, and what can you do then? The migrant cannot save anything. It takeseverything he can make to feed his family and buy some gasoline to go to the next job. If youdon’t believe this, go out in the cotton fields next year. Work all day and see if you have madethirty-five cents. A good picker makes more, of course, but you can’t.

THEIR BLOOD IS STRONG (CONTINUED)

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The method for concentrating labor for one of the great crops, is this. Handbills are distributed,advertisements are printed. You’ve seen them. Cotton pickers wanted in Bakersfield or Fresno orImperial Valley. The all the available migrants rush to the scene. They arrive with no money andlittle food. The reserve has been spent getting there. If wages happen to drop a little, they musttake them anyway. The moment the crop is picked, the locals begin to try to get rid of thepeople who have harvested their crops. They want to run them out, move them on. The countyhospitals are closed to them. They are not eligible to relief. You must be eligible to eat. Thatparticular locality is through with them until another crop comes in.

It will be remembered that two years ago some so-called agitators were tarred and feathered. Thepopulation of migrants left the locality just as the hops were ripe. Then the howling of the localswas terrible to hear. They even tried to get the army and the C.C.C ordered to pick their crops.

About the fifteenth of January the dead time sets in. There is no work. First the gasoline givesout. And without gasoline a man cannot go to a job even if he could get one. Then the foodgoes. And then in the rains, with insufficient food, the children develop colds because theground in the tents is wet. I talked to a man last week who lost two children in ten days withpneumonia. His face was hard and fierce and he didn’t talk much. I talked to a girl with a babyand offered her a cigarette. She took two puffs and vomited in the street. She was ashamed. Sheshouldn’t have tried to smoke, she said, for she hadn’t eaten for two days. I heard a manwhimpering that the baby was sucking but nothing came out of the breast. I heard a manexplain very shyly that his little girl couldn’t go to school because she was too weak to walk toschool and besides the school lunches of the other children made her unhappy. I heard a man tellin a monotone how he couldn’t get a doctor while his oldest boy died of pneumonia but that adoctor came right away after it was dead. It is easy to get a doctor to look at a corpse, not soeasy to get one for a live person. It is easy to get a body buried. A truck comes right out andtakes it away. The state is much more interested in how you die than in how you live. The manwho was telling about it had just found that out. He didn’t want to believe it.

Next year the hunger will come again and the year after that and so on until we come out ofthis coma and realize that our agriculture for all its great produce is a failure. If you buy a farmhorse and only feed him when you work him, the horse will die. No one complains at thenecessity of feeding the horse when he is not working. But we complain about feeding the menand women who work our lands. Is it possible that this state is so stupid, so vicious and sogreedy that it cannot feed and clothe the men and women who help make it the richest area inthe world? Must the hunger become anger and the anger fury before anything will be done?


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THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF DOROTHEA LANGE

Top: Arkansas Family in California, February 1936.Above left: Motherless migrant children. They work in the cotton. June 1935.

Above right: Dispossessed Arkansas farmers. Bakersfield, California. 1935.

Photographer Dorothea Lange (1895-1965) is best known for her work documenting poor conditionsof the migrant workers who traveled in large numbers to California during the Great Depression of thelate 1920s and 1930s. Lange used photography to document the difficult period of the Depression andto motivate agencies and individuals to take action to improve the situation. With her photographsLange was able to capture the emotional and physical toll that the Depression and other events took onhuman beings across the country.

Bio: America’s Library, http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/aa/lange.

Photos: Farm Security Administration—Office of War Information Photograph Collection.

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, DC.http://lcweb.loc.gov/rr/print/catalog.html

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Above: Destitute Pea Pickers in California. Mother of 7 children. Age 32. Nipomo, CA. February 1936.


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THE PHOTOGRAPHY OF DOROTHEA LANGE (CONTINUED)

Top: “Tractored out.” Power farming displaces tenants from the land in the western dry cotton area. Childress County, Texas panhandle. June 1938.

Above left: “We got blowed out in Oklahoma.” Sharecropper family near Bakersfield. April 1935.Above right: More Oklahomans reach California via the cotton fields of Arizona. April 1935.

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Top: Arkansas family. Seven months in California. Washing dishes. February 1936.Above left: Eighteen-year-old mother from Oklahoma, now a California migrant. March 1937.Above right: Dust Bowl refugees living in camps. February 1936.


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Top: Migrant agricultural worker’s family. 7 hungry children. Father is native Californian.

Nipomo, CA. March 1936.Right: Freight car converted into house in

“Little Oklahoma,” California. February 1936.

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Baptized

Irrigation

Virtue

Trespassing

Parole

Tenants

Handbills

Roust

Tarp

Refugee

Pauper

Transgression

Vagrants

Sharecropping

Okie

Jalopy

Migrant

Agitating

Commotion

Picket

Vintage

Wrath

Strikebreaking

Fallow

SUGGESTED VOCABULARY


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Sometimes an author has his/her characters speak in a dialect that is particular to the region ofthe country they live in. Here is a list of words and phrases used by the Joads and other Okies.Why do you think Steinbeck has his characters use these words? Does it help them seem true tolife? Why or why not?

Meetin’ (as in a meetin’ held by a preacher)

Burning Busher

Sperit

Talkin’ in tongues

Mosey

Tractorin’

Touched (as “in the head”)

Jack (as in some jack in my pocket)

Sidemeat

Grace

Whole shebang

Get shut of this

Figger

Booted off

Somepin’

Shif’less

Pitchers (as in “go to the pitchers”)

Bull simple

Shoat

Yourn

Git sholt on yaself

Hug-dance

Crick

DIALECT AND IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS

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VIGNETTESAsk the students to come up with several descriptive words based on the themes in The Grapes ofWrath and have them create a series of vignettes based on these words. Write the words down onseparate sheets of paper and place them in a hat or bowl.

VIGNETTE EXERCISEDivide the class into groups of three to five each. Have each group draw five words from the hator bowl. Explain that the small groups must act out the vignette using up to five of thedescriptive words. Give the students 10 minutes to collaborate on their words to create thevignettes based on the words they choose.

There should be no talking during vignettes only movement, and each movement should have abeginning and an ending, culminating in a final movement in which the group freezes in atableau. Encourage the children to be creative in thinking of a final movement for theirvignette. After all the groups have presented their vignettes, reassign groups.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT Ask students to choose their favorite character and develop a personal history of the characterthat starts at birth and ends right before the character is introduced in the play. Be sure toencourage students to use historical, literary as well as imaginative insights as to the conditionsof the character’s life prior to the beginning of the play. Descriptions should be 1 page inlength.

IMPROVISATION FREEZE Pass out Photocopies of the Dorthea Lange images included in this guide. Choose two or threestudents to start. Using the Dorthea Lange photographs have students improv a scene based ontheir interpretation of the images.

Allow for the students to establish their ideas and then call freeze. Students should freeze wherethey are. Choose another student and have them choose which actor they would like to replacein the scene by tapping them.

Allow the new student to resume a new scene based on a new image with the remaining actors.Continue until every student has had his or her turn.

ACTING OUT


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In literature, a theme is a recurring, unifying idea that appears throughout a story and oftenreveals the author’s attitude about life in the action or words of the characters. A number ofthemes occur in The Grapes of Wrath.

1 The importance of the land to the peoplea Why are the Joads and thousands like them thrown off the land?b What chain of events creates this?c What does this action do to the people?d Why do the people have such a strong feeling for the land?e Who does Steinbeck think really “owns” the land?f What do Ma and Rose of Sharon hope for when they reach California?g How does the description of the land’s current condition help set the mood for the story?h What characters have a hard time leaving? Why?

2 The strength of the womena How does the reaction of the men to their misfortune differ from that of the women? b Why do the women watch the men so carefully and feel safe when the men do not break?c As the story progresses, Ma emerges more and more as the strength of the family. Find

examples (there are many) of her taking charge, getting the family to California, protectingthe family, helping others, counseling Tom, and guiding Rose of Sharon.

d Find examples of some of the men’s lessening ability to cope (Pa, Connie, Noah, Uncle John).

3 SymbolsA symbol is a literary device that uses a concrete image—a person or thing—to represent a moreabstract idea. Sometimes in literature an author will create religious symbols, not to try topromote a religious belief, but rather to relate a theme that many people can understand. In TheGrapes of Wrath John Steinbeck seems to employ some religious symbolism.

a Jim Casey is sometimes called a “Christ Figure.” Think about the initials of his name, histime in the wilderness, his feelings for the people, and his maturity as a philosopher while injail (“Maybe all men got one big soul ever’ body’s a part of”), and his acts of sacrifice andmartyrdom. Explain how these help create such a symbol of Casey. Why do you thinkSteinbeck may have portrayed him this way?

b Tom Joad learns from Casey and becomes like a disciple to him. What is a disciple? How dowe see him become more like Casey along the journey? How do his last words to Ma show thefull achievement of his carrying on where Casey left off?

c How is Rose of Sharon’s final act in the story reflective of her name? Describe how throughoutthe story she has learned from Ma. Does her feeding of the starving man provide a hopefulending? Why or why not?

ENGLISH STUDY QUESTIONS

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4 The importance of the familya Why does Ma feel so strongly that the family must stay together? Give examples.b Who leaves and why?c What does this break-up do to the family unit?d Give examples of how Ma manages to carry on despite this break-up.e Who represents hope for the future? Why?

5 Unity—We vs. IThe Grapes of Wrath is concerned throughout with the idea of the people’s necessity to become apart of a group larger then themselves, of a group “made up of many folks” working as a whole.

a What do the following characters say about this theme at various times in the story?(There may be several examples for each character.)

Ma JoadTom JoadJim Casey

b How is this theme developed at the Weed patch camp?c Why do the authorities at Hooper Ranch try to break up those who believe “we” is

stronger than “I?”

6 The anger of the peoplea Why do the women feel safe as long as their men are angry? What does that anger represent?b What happens when the men are no longer angry?c How do Uncle John’s angry words as he deals with Rose of Sharon’s dead baby perhaps reflect

Steinbeck’s own anger? What do you think the baby symbolizes?d Steinbeck says, ”. . . in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the

people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.”What does he think is going to happen because people are being allowed to starve? Whatmakes the image of full grapes of anger being harvested so effective here? How is this imageof grapes different from Granpa’s vision of grapes earlier in the story?

e Steinbeck took the expression “grapes of wrath” from the famous Civil War anthem TheBattle Hymn of the Republic. Find the words to the anthem and explain why you think heused this strong image as the title for his work.

ENGLISH STUDY QUESTIONS (CONTINUED)


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RESEARCH1 The Great Depression of the late 1920’s and 1930’s affected the entire country, indeed parts of

the world beyond the United States. It was particularly felt in the Southern Great Plains (partsof Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas). How did the Depression impact thisarea and add to the misery of those living there?

2 In 1935 an Associated Press writer names the region of the Southern Great Plains the “DustBowl.” What happened during the 30s in this area to create the Dust Bowl? Who or what wasto blame—or was it a combination of factors? Have you or your family or someone you knowhad similar experiences with natural disasters? What effect did it have on your family or com-munity?

3 Agriculture began to change, both in Oklahoma and California, from small farmers to mecha-nized agriculture. Explain how this change affected thousands of people like the Joads. Whatrole did the banks play in this tragedy?

4 Route 66 is a highway that has had a colorful, yet sad, history during this era of the migrationof people from places like Oklahoma to California. Find out what you can about the highway’shistory, including its use in song, television, movies, etc.

5 Migrant workers still toil in the fields of California and other states today. How similar are theirexperiences to those of the Joads? Who do you think are the Joads of today? Explain.

6 Why do the residents of California call the migrants “Okies”? What do the users of the termmean by it? Were these attitudes fair? Why or why not? What is the reaction of the Joads whenthey are called “Okies” for the first time? Are other names used today in a similar way? Whatdo you think about the use of such names?

7 Why were some of the roadside camps called “Hoovervilles”? Describe the conditions of thecamps and how these conditions made the Joads and other families feel. How were they treatedby the authorities in the camps? How did other people in the camp help each other?

HISTORY STUDY QUESTIONS

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8 The federal government during this terrible time had some programs like theWeedpatch Camp to try to help these poor farmers. Describe the conditions ofWeedpatch and its organizational structure. How was it different from theHoovervilles and the Hooper Ranch and how do the people respond to the way theyare treated in Weedpatch? What do these differences suggest to you about the effectof democracy and self-government on people?

9 Handbills play a big role in luring the migrant workers to California. What do theypromise? What does Floyd Knowles tell the Joads and others about the reality ofthe handbills? How does this add to their misery?

10 Why do the deputy sheriffs and other authorities call someone who questions themabout the handbills or tries to organize the workers a “red” or a “red agitator”?What does the term mean? Has it been used at other times in American History?Explain.

11 When Tom sees Jim Casey near the end of the story, Casey has become a strikeorganizer. What does it mean to strike? Why does Casey believe that striking is theonly way for the migrants to survive? What happens to him as a result of hisefforts?

HISTORY STUDY QUESTIONS (CONTINUED)

http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/afctshtml/tsme.htmlhistorical information on the migrant experience during the Dust Bowl

http://users.rcn.com/greg jonz/grapes/char.htmdescriptions of the main characters in The Grapes of Wrath

http://users.rcn.com/greg jonz/grapes/emersoni.htmEmersonian philosophy in The Grapes of Wrath

http://users.rcn.com/greg jonz/grapes/irony.htmdiscussion of “the poor helping the poor” in The Grapes of Wrath

http://users.rcn.com/greg jonz/steinbeck/steinbec.htmlbrief biographical information on John Steinbeck

http://users.rcn.com/greg jonz/dust/dustbowl.htmlbrief description of the Dust Bowl

http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~stephan/Steinbeck/grapes.htmlchapter summaries of The Grapes of Wrath with very brief descriptions of characters, places,Biblical links, etc.

http://???words of Battle Hymn of the Republic, from which the title came

http://www.californiastories.orgnotes on how to read The Grapes of Wrath, biography of John Steinbeck, time line of majorevents in Steinbeck’s life, discussion questions

http://[email protected]/static/rguides/us/grapes of wrath.htmlbiography of John Steinbeck, brief outline of some of Steinbeck’s major works, discussionquestions for those books

http://www.sfmuseum.org/hist8/ok.htmldiscussion of problems created in California counties from influx of thousands of migrants during Dust Bowl years

http://www.steinbeck100.org/resources.htmldiscussion of why and how to read Steinbeck today


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RESOURCES ON THE INTERNET

“So Influential, So California: The Grapes of Wrath,” by Tim Rutten; The Los Angeles Times;March 22, 2002.

“Statewide Reading of The Grapes of Wrath Planned,” by Charles Matthews; The San Jose MercuryNews; February 25, 2002.

“Steinbeck, the Pride of Salinas, at 100,” by Stephen Kinzer; The New York Times;March 19, 2002.

“The Dawn Came, but No Day,” by Brian McGinty; American History Illustrated; The NationalHistorical Society Publishers; November, 1976.

“Their Blood Is Strong,” by John Steinbeck; The San Francisco News; 1936.

“Welcome to California,” by Jim Quay, Executive Director California Council for theHumanities; The New Yorker; April 8, 2002.

“Why Read Steinbeck?” by Susan Shillinglaw; The Californian.

Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck; Robert DeMott, Editor; Penguin Books, 1989.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Documents

Teacher’s Study Guide - The Grapes of Wrath