Themes in The Grapes of Wrath
There are several different themes in The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck. Here I will go into depth on those. The three main themes in the story are free will versus necessity, the holiness of every man, and the kinship of all man.
The main theme (and the most important, in my opinion) is free will versus necessity. All throughout the story, the characters are forced to do something either because they want to or they have to. A good example would be Ma's burning her old souvenirs when they leave for California. She doesn't want to do it (free will), but she knows she must (necessity), as they don't have enough room to take them with her. Another example of this would be Jim Casy's sacrifice of himself in place of Tom for tripping the police officer. He had been thinking of how he could repay the Joads for their kindness (he was willing, that is the free will part). When he sees the opportunity present himself, he feels compelled to do help (necessity) by accepting the blame.
Another important theme in the story is the holiness of every man. This is what Casy came to believe after he had spent a great amount of time thinking about it. He came to believe that every man was holy, and so, he didn't need to be preached to, since he was already holy. He began to think of everyone's soul coming from the Oversoul when they were born, and their soul going back to the Oversoul when they died. This is one of the reasons that Jim Casy was so generous; his soul was already a part of the Oversoul, so he might as well go ahead and do good deeds (although, I'm not sure that that was exactly what he thought).
All throughout the book, the theme of kinship of all man is reenforced. The journey to California is supposed to be just the family. Then, they are joined by Jim Casy. After a while, they join the Wilson family.
When times get tough, many people turn away from everyone and everything. It must be part of human nature to adopt an independent attitude when faced with troubles. It is understandable because most people do not want to trouble their loved ones when they are going through problems, so it is easier to turn away than stick together. Maybe their family is going through a rough patch and they reason they would be better off on their own. This path of independence and solitude may not always be the best option for them or their family, though. Often times it is more beneficial for everyone to work through the problem together. It is not always the easiest or most desirable option, but most times it is the most efficient and it will get results in the long run. In The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck makes this point very clear through several characters. Many characters throughout
People just don’t seem to give up, they continue fighting till the very end rather than lay down and succumb to the challenge faced. In “The Grapes of Wrath”, John Steinbeck uses symbolism and religious allusions as unifying devices to illustrate the indomitable nature of the human spirit.
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck had many comparisons from the movie and the book. In 1939, this story was to have some of the readers against the ones that kept the American people in poverty held responsible for their actions. This unique story was about the Joad’s family, who were migrant workers looking for a good decent job. They were also farmers from Oklahoma that are now striving to find some good work and success for their family in California. This novel was one of Steinbeck’s best work he has ever done. It was in fact an Academy Award movie in 1940. Both the movie and the novel are one of Steinbeck’s greatest masterpieces on both the filmmaking and the novel writing. Both the novel and film are mainly the same in the beginning of the story and towards the end. There were some few main points that Steinbeck took out from the book and didn’t mention them in the movie. “The Grapes of Wrath is a
drop their life and move to a different state. When they arrived in California they were not
John Steinbeck’s novel, The Grapes of Wrath is one of the most influential books in American History, and is considered to be his best work by many. It tells the story of one family’s hardship during the Depression and the Dust Bowl of the 1930’s. The Joads were a hard-working family with a strong sense of togetherness and morals; they farmed their land and went about their business without bothering anyone. When the big drought came it forced them to sell the land they had lived on since before anyone can remember. Their oldest son, Tom, has been in jail the past four years and returns to find his childhood home abandoned. He learns his family has moved in with his uncle John and decides to travel a short distance to see them. He arrives only to learn they are packing up their belongings and moving to California, someplace where there is a promise of work and food. This sets the Joad family off on a long and arduous journey with one goal: to survive.
As a result of accepting the forfeit, Skull decides that Michele explores an abandoned farmhouse in a remote location. Michele unaware of what he is about to get himself into, rather carefully climbs and crosses the farmhouse. Realizing that he was lucky to land on soft material after his jump from the house, he discovers a hole. As he uncovers it, he finds out that a boy occupies it. Due to the limited time he had to investigate the situation as the gang was closing down on him, he decides to keep it a secret. Michele knows that Skull would declare himself responsible for finding the boy and therefore he decides to keep it a secret. After all it's finder's keepers. He feels threatened by Skull and doesn't want such a big discovery to be taken away from him. I mean we all want to be appreciated for our good deeds but telling the others will make it only worse.
Insanity is a blurred line in the eyes of Ken Kesey. He reveals a hidden microcosm of mental illness, debauchery, and tyranny in his novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. The remarkable account of a con man’s ill-fated journey inside a psychiatric hospital exposes the horrors of troubling malpractices and mistreatments. Through a sane man’s time within a crazy man’s definition of a madhouse, there is exploration and insight for the consequences of submission and aberration from societal norm. While some of the novel’s concerns are now anachronous, some are more vital today than before. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a compelling tale that brings a warning of the results of an overly conformist and repressive institution.
Waxler, Robert. “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” Changing Lives Through Literature. U of Massachusetts, 2003. Web. 9 Apr. 2014. .
In the early 1960’s, Ken Kesey worked in the psych ward in a veterans hospital as an aide. During the course of his job, Kesey realized the administrators were giving patients experimental LSD to cope with their mental illnesses. After seeing this being done, he started to wonder, who is mentally stable and what classifies a person as insane (Kesey)? With this in mind Ken Kesey wrote, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. This classic novel depicts the image of a psych ward under control by the manipulative, Nurse Ratched. The patients on the ward are lifeless; every waking moment is scheduled and controlled, until one day when a new patient, Patrick McMurphy arrives. Patrick McMurphy brings life back into the patients and helps them push the boundaries. With McMurphy on the ward there becomes a new normal. When answering the question of what normalcy is, Kesey uses character development, symbols, and motifs to give insight of the psychological well-being of others and how it shifts with positive and negative changes.
In Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, the author refers to the many struggles people individually face in life. Through the conflict between Nurse Ratched and McMurphy, the novel explores the themes of individuality and rebellion against conformity. With these themes, Kesey makes various points which help us understand which situations of repression can lead an individual to insanity. These points include: the effects of sexual repression, woman as castrators, and the pressures we face from society to conform. Through these points, Kesey encourages the reader to consider that people react differently in the face of repression, and makes the reader realize the value of alternative states of perception, rather than simply writing them off as "crazy."
In The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck uses both obvious references and subtle contrasts to emphasize the main theme of the novel: the sanctity of man's relationship to the natural world and to each other.
Dickinson 's poem uses poetic devices of personification to represent death, she represents death as if it were a living being. Dickinson 's capitalization of the word “DEATH”, causes us to see death as a name, in turn it becomes noun, a person, and a being, rather than what it truly is, which is the culminating even of human life. The most notable use of this, is seen in the very first few lines of the poem when Dickinson says “Because I could not stop for Death, He kindly stopped for me”. In her poem Dickinson makes death her companion, as it is the person who is accompanying her to her grave. She states that death kindly stopped for her and she even goes as far as to give death the human ability to stop and pick her up. The occasion of death through Dickinson use of personification makes it seem like an interaction between two living beings and as a result the poem takes on a thoughtful and light hearted tone. The humanization of death makes the experience more acceptable and less strange, death takes on a known, familiar, recognizable form which in turn makes the experience more relatable. As the poem
The Grapes of Wrath combines Steinbeck adoration of the land, his simple hatred of corruption resulting from materialism (money) and his abiding faith in the common people to overcome the hostile environment. The novel opens with a retaining picture of nature on rampage. The novel shows the men and women that are unbroken by nature. The theme is one of man verses a hostile environment. His body destroyed but his spirit is not broken. The method used to develop the theme of the novel is through the use of symbolism. There are several uses of symbols in the novel from the turtle at the beginning to the rain at the end. As each symbol is presented through the novel they show examples of the good and the bad things that exist within the novel.
Writers of all genres uses symbolism as a way to introduce objects or ideas that will expand and deepen the meaning of their writings. The title of Alice Walker’s novel “The Color Purple” could be considered a symbolism. Purple is the color that is said to represent imagination and spirituality. It helps the individual to get in touch with their deeper thoughts, feelings and inspires them to have high standards about themselves. Purple is said to be associated with the transformation of the soul. The main character of Walker’s novel was struggling with finding love and finding her purpose in life. The reader experience the transformation of Celie from a weak submissive young woman to an independent, businesswoman. The title was the perfect match for the context of the novel. Furthermore, the pants that Celie made, sold and eventually wore was a sign of liberation for
Many people fear death due to the fact that they will leave their loved ones and descent from the face of the earth, however, Dickinson did not show any signs of fear while talking and writing about death. “A close reading of Dickinson’s poems indicates that the best of her poems revolve round the theme of death” (Antony & Dewan 2). Many of Dickinson’s poems have the central theme of death, as to no one know why, however, it is proclaimed welcoming. One of Dickinson’s famous poems “Because I could not stop for Death” displays how death can occur so naturally, and it could be a gentleman who takes you to your final destination. Dickinson’s talk about death in the story could be viewed as a prince charming or a gentleman who has arrived at the doorstep with a