Allusions In The Grapes Of Wrath

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 excerpt in which the turtle attempts to cross the road is far from the last time a car deliberately swerves to hit an animal on the highway. This constant motif of roadkill does serve a purpose in that they symbolize the helpless migrant workers being targeted when all they are trying to do is get by and survive. It is also important to remember that they are being purposely harmed by the ones that are most capable of helping them. The animals not

only symbolize this, but also hold biblical allusion seen the time Tom swerved for a rattlesnake while entering California which did not turn out to be the Eden the Joad family imagined it to be. The roadkill showed that through struggle the human spirit endures, but commonly becomes bitter towards others and has a need to spread its wrath.
The last scene at the end of the novel when Rose of Sharon breast feeds a dying man is much more than controversial. It was seen as an obvious thing to do for both of the Joad women at the time and necessary for survival. Truly this shows Rose of Sharon making the best of a bad situation in that the milk was once meant for her baby which died, yet she did not let the milk go to waste and gave life back to the world by strengthening the dying man. This shows that through hardships the human spirit does not only become bitter but can also still hold hope for the future and others. It is also clear that this scene was an allusion to the Bible of when Jesus died in Mary’s arms, this is important to note because it gives an image of hope and desperation at the end. Proving the endurance of the human spirit to go on in even the hardest conditions an individual and or group is in.
The author wants the reader to understand that the human spirit is fierce, unrelenting, and a hard entity to beat down. John Steinbeck’s skillful use of symbolism and religious allusion perfectly portrays how the human spirit endures and changes through struggle, either coping with it by gaining spite or optimism.