Top-Rated Free Essay
Preview

Grapes of Wrath

Best Essays
359 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Grapes of Wrath
Akash Kumar
Mr. Wilson
Exposition and Argumentation
9 April 2013
Annotated Bibliography
Donelson, Ken. “The Front Line: ‘ You Can’t Have That Book in My Kid’s School Library:’ Books Under Attack in the ‘Newsletter on Intellectual Freedom.’” The High School Journal 74.1
(Oct.- Nov. 1990): 1-7. Web. JSTOR. 9 April 2013.
The novel, The Grapes of Wrath, was banned from many public libraries and public and private schools. It has a list of a lot of the schools. Also, it listed what parents had to stay and their complaints.
Kappel, Tim. “Trampling out the Vineyards: Kern County’s Ban on The Grapes of Wrath.”
California History 61.3 (Fall 1982): 210-221. Web. JSTOR. 9 April 2013.
In Kern County, California, the County Board of Supervisors requested on August 12, 1939, that the use, possession, and circulation of The Grapes of Wrath be banned from the county’s libraries and schools. Literally, less than two months after the book was published it was banned from the public systems of this county.The book was attacked more as a social document rather than praised as a novel. Many farmers were burning copies of the book.
Shockley, Martin S. “The Reception of The Grapes of Wrath in Oklahoma.” American Literature
15.4 ( Jan. 1944): 351-361. Web. JSTOR. 9 April 2013.
Even though there was conflict in many other places over The Grapes of Wrath, in Oklahoma, the book had blown up. Other than Gone With the Wind it was the most sold book in Oklahoma. They fancied this book because it stood up for the poor people and “Okies”.
Zirakzadeh, Cyrus E. “John Steinbeck on the Political Capacities of Everyday Folk:
Moms, Reds, and Ma Joad’s Revolt.” Polity 36.4 (2004): 595- 618. Web. JSTOR. 9 April 2013.
One conclusion is that Steinbeck’s political position, although obviously anti-big business, is not “communist”, despite some of his conservative critics’ comments. Steinbeck’s book instead warns readers about the power of interest groups in government, predicts widespread, spontaneous, and small- scale social experimentation by impoverished and recently dispossessed Americans, and encourages women to embrace their traditional roles as family and community caretakers.

Bibliography: (Oct.- Nov. 1990): 1-7. Web. JSTOR. 9 April 2013. Kappel, Tim. “Trampling out the Vineyards: Kern County’s Ban on The Grapes of Wrath.” California History 61.3 (Fall 1982): 210-221 Zirakzadeh, Cyrus E. “John Steinbeck on the Political Capacities of Everyday Folk: Moms, Reds, and Ma Joad’s Revolt.” Polity 36.4 (2004): 595- 618

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Grapes of Wrath remains one of the greatest angry books. Its dominating idea is that of imminent, overwhelming anger. Steinbeck, as a responsible writer, was concerned with exposing a problem in all its complexity instead of arguing a single solution. In writing his novel, he decided to depict for the readers the insult and deprivation suffered by people like the Joads. To present the story of simple human beings while providing at the same time the social documentation. Steibeck's anger of the whole situation turns into a book to show an example of the fate of Joads and their problems while moving with the mass to…

    • 108 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The Grapes of Wrath is the story of a family that has embarked on a mythical…

    • 196 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Steinbeck’s novel, The Grapes of Wrath, Jim Casy is faced with the challenge of choosing right vs. wrong. Seeking a new philosophy, Casy finds himself displaced from his normal preaching life into an alienating and enriching experience that reveals his true character.…

    • 843 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    What distinguishes this one novel is not only its greater authenticity of detail but also the genius of its author, who, avoiding mere propaganda, was able to raise those details and themes to the level of lasting art, while muting none of the passionate human cry against injustice.... In fact, the response of students leaves no doubt that as literature The Grapes of Wrath is generally experienced more completely today than it was in 1939, when it was much more difficult to dissociate the novel from current events or to see Steinbeck's bold technical experiments as something more than what one critic called "calculated…

    • 1702 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck is a novel depicting the struggle and distraught brought towards migrant workers during the Great Depression. The Grapes of Wrath follows one Oklahoma family, the Joads, as they journey down Route 66 towards the earthly paradise of California. While on route to California, the Joads interact with fellow besieged families, non-hospitable farmers, and common struggles due to the Depression. Steinbeck uses these events to show strong brotherhood through biblical allusion, character development, and inter chapters.…

    • 781 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the 1970s many public schools in Ohio, Maine, New York, Idaho, and Oklahoma were required to ban the book from their required reading list after receiving numerous complaints. In the 1980s, several schools in New Hampshire and Washington were also challenged and brought to the school board, but the attempt unsuccessful in banning the book. The latest challenge was in 2000, parents with children in a California public school district filed complaints with the school board, calling the book “garbage”, however, the department of education believed that the book was a great learning resource and were not required to ban the book. The negativity stemmed from the racist remarks, violence, sexual remarks, unsavory themes, and foul language. (L.A. Times) (ALA,…

    • 752 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Dust Bowl Odyssey

    • 921 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The Grapes of Wrath recounts the story of the Great Depression in Southwest America. By the mid-1930s, the drought had destroyed multitudes of farm families, and America had fallen into the Great Depression. Unable to pay their mortgages or invest in the kinds of industrial equipment now required, many Dust Bowl farmers were forced to leave their land. Without employment, thousands of families traveled to California in hopes of finding new means of survival. But the farm country of California quickly became overcrowded with the migrant workers.…

    • 921 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Grapes of Wrath

    • 481 Words
    • 2 Pages

    As the stock market crashed down the American economy at the beginning of the 20th century, it created a tidal wave of destruction that engulfed the entire country. Eventually the storm subsided into heavy clouds that passed, leaving behind a ferocious sun that revealed America's upheaval into the Great Depression. John Steinbeck book, The Grapes of Wrath, illustrates a families journey as they are forced from their farm in Depression-era Oklahoma and set out for California along with thousands of others. Steinbeck portrays three main factors that represent the difficulties "Okies" experienced during the Depression era: oppression, dislocation, and discrimination.…

    • 481 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Imagine you’re in graduate school and you’re doing your doctorate on a controversial issue. You’ve done most of the research however there’s one book that has specific information that you need, and you can only find it in that particular book. You’ve looked on the online database and find out that the book is in your universities library. You go to the library and ask for some help finding the book you need, however the librarian informs you that the book was recently banned. How is it that in a country that prides itself in freedom of speech and self expression, a book on a controversial issue has been banned? Does it not contradict what the founding fathers fought so hard for in the Revolutionary war?…

    • 642 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Advice I have for future readers; I know we hear this saying a lot, and we do not heed by it ever, but its time we should- ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’. Really. Don’t. You’ll only end up tripping yourself up. For once I began to stop paying attention to the people around me, but rather focused my attention on my books, I began to realize that each one was special and relatable in its own way. Shockingly enough, I am glad I read these books. Not only am I able to say I have survived The Grapes of Wrath, but I would also recommend it to my fellow peers. Not that they would listen to me… but it’s worth a…

    • 1917 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    This book was banned due to racial tensions and so called “inappropriate content”. In 1960, school administrators fired an Ohio teacher for assigning the novel to an 11th grade student. The administration claimed the book was anti-white and more predominant white communities fought to have it banned completely. A library banned the novel for a so called violation of codes. The library claimed it had excessive sex scenes, violence ,and extreme foul…

    • 683 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Grapes of Wrath

    • 2467 Words
    • 10 Pages

    The Grapes of Wrath is an American allegory of human suffering that takes place in a dark period of the history of our nation, brought on by the Dust Bowl migration from Oklahoma, Texas, and Arkansas, during the 1930s and the depression. People experience this tragedy in different ways. The landowner who had to remove the families was torn in turmoil; Steinbeck writes, “ Some of the owner men were kind because they hated what they had to do and some of them were angry because they hated to be cruel, and some of them were cold because they had long ago found that…

    • 2467 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Grapes Of Wrath

    • 962 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The Grapes of Wrath, describes the difficulty of migrant labors during the Great Depression. Written by, John Steinbeck, this novel went on to receive many awards. Generally viewed as Steinbeck's best and most striving novel, The Grapes of Wrath was published in 1939. Stating the story of an expelled Oklahoma family and their fight to form a reestablished life in California at the peak of the Great Depression, the book captures the sorrow and anguish of the land throughout this time-period. The bank forecloses on the Joads land, so they decide to move west in search of new jobs. Though the Joads travel west in expectations of creating a restored life, the American Dream avoids them, their journey to California proves to be sorrowful and disappointing.…

    • 962 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Certain cases of banned books include a case in August of 1939 where the Board of Supervisors of Kern County, California passed a resolution to ban or censor the book The Grapes of Wrath from schools and county libraries. The ban is said to have been a product infrastructure of a county whose economy relied heavily upon agriculture, and Knief’s compliance, a contemporary lack of official support from the field of librarianship. The ban was rescinded in…

    • 306 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The Catcher in the Rye. The Scarlet Letter. Huckleberry Finn. Harry Potter. The Diary of Anne Frank. Animal Farm. To Kill a Mockingbird. The Da Vinci Code. The Grapes of Wrath. These literary classics have been vital to the education of many, especially children and adolescents (Banned Books). These great novels both teach important values and educate children about world affairs and classic themes. Unfortunately, each of these novels has been banned at one point in time. In a country where freedom is so adamantly advocated, it is a wonder that an issue like censorship would even come up, that such a controversy would sink its claws into the minds of states’ boards of education across the nation. Censorship is a needless restriction placed on developing minds that need the morals and values that banned books can give.…

    • 1208 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays