The Grapes of Wrath

The Grapes of Wrath

3.85 of 5 stars 3.85  ·  rating details  ·  268,377 ratings  ·  7,716 reviews
John Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize-winning epic of the Great Depression follows the western movement of one family and a nation in search of work and human dignity. Perhaps the most American of American classics.

The novel focuses on the Joads, a poor family of sharecroppers driven from their Oklahoma home by drought, economic hardship, and changes in financial and agricultura...more
Paperback, 455 pages
Published January 8th 2002 by Penguin Books (first published 1939)
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Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 3,000)
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Stephanie
If you are an American you need to read The Grapes of Wrath. It scares the poop out of me because, my fellow Americans, we are repeating history. If live anywhere else read it as well as a guide for what not to do.

In the Grapes of Wrath Mr. Steinbeck tells the tale of the first great depression through the Joad family from Oklahoma, who has been displaced from their family farm through no fault of their own. You see, there was a big bad drought which made farming impossible. In those days the fa...more
Jason
In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.

This book really gets my goat. Those poor, dirty Joads. So poor and so, so dirty. After being displaced from their Oklahoma farm following the Dust Bowl storms that wreck their crops and cause them to default on their loans, the Joads find themselves a family of migrants in search of work and food. They join a stream of hundreds of thousands of other migrant families across the United Stat...more
Malcolm David Logan
Dec 15, 2007 Malcolm David Logan rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people over the age of 30
Whenever I revisit a classic I'm struck by how much more I get out of it now than I did when I was 24 or 19 or, God forbid, 15. Giving a book like the Grapes of Wrath to a 15 year old serves largely to put them off fine literature for the rest of their lives. The depth of understanding and compassion for the human condition as communicated by a book like this is simply unfathomable to those who haven't lived much life yet, but after you've gotten a healthy dose of living, it comes across like fi...more
Kim

The Pulitzer Prize winning novel of 1940, this is the story of the Joad family, Oklahoma tenant farmers displaced from their land by the combined effects of ecological disaster, rampant capitalism and the Great Depression. The narrative follows the family as they travel from Oklahoma to California in search of work, along with hundreds of thousands of others in the same situation. Woven into the story of the Joads are chapters dealing with issues such as the attitude of Californians to the influ...more
Clif Hostetler
REVIEW FOR Celebrity Death Match Review Elimination Tournament ONLY

My real (normal) review is at this link.

Grapes of Wrath (10) (a.k.a trampling vintage)
versus
Sound and the Fury (23) (a.k.a. soliloquy signifying nothing)

Over in this corner we have Grapes of Wrath (GW) with its clearly defined and understood message: workers unite, blessed are the poor, viva the revolution, his truth is marching on.

Over in the other corner is The Sound and the Fury (SF) in its smoky shadowy form: stream of con...more
Drew
May 03, 2007 Drew rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Everyone
Shelves: fiction, favorites
This is by far my favorite book of all time for several reasons. Steinbeck always creates some of the deepest characters I've ever read. Tom Joad is my favorite character in any piece of literature. His growth from a self-serving ex-con to a Christ-like hero is an embodiment of the entire Joad family. Every time I read his lines to Ma when he says "Every time there is a cop beatin' a guy...look in their eyes Ma, You'll see me" or something like that, I think of that Rage Against the Machine song...more
Chris
My dad told me that reading this book when he was a young man made him a socialist. Of course, by the time he told me this the old man had shed many of those earlier convictions, as least as far as I could tell, but it gave me a good idea of what to expect when I finally got around to reading it at some point in the late nineties—a portrayal of the inhumane and selfish response of the capitalist minority to the widespread misery and desperation of the laboring majority during those terrible year...more
Chrissie
Anybody wanting to understand what life was like during the Depression should read this book. My maternal grandmother survived it. They lived in Kansas. They ate grass. Those years changed my grandmother forever. I think I finally understand why she was who she. Steinbeck's novel is based on solid and extensive research, even if it is a book of fiction.

I am in a pickle. I cannot tell you whether by the end I found it to be depressing. That would be a spoiler. I will say instead that how ever it...more
Tom
Mr Stienbec has writ a remarkable tale His story leaves a feller and a gal sad and disheartened anda appreciaten oftha dtermnation, courage n stenth of da dus bowl Okies. I fel a conect to dare struggles wit what life sometime dishes out to folk. I growed to like tha Joad family like day was my own. Grandma, Grandpa, Tom, Al, Pa, Ma, Rose ASharon, Ruthie, Wimfiel, Connie,preacher became like kin. I kepta wishin and hopin for the famly through all thiere difculties and setbacks I would give this...more
Angus
Original post at Book Rhapsody.

***

The Jalopy of the Joads

Let me tell you why this book is important to me. Let me tell you first how I came upon my copy. When I first attended the meetings of our book club, I brought an Anais Nin book with me for the book exchange. One of them, the moderator Jzhun, expressed interest in it. He showed me the little stack of books that he brought for the exchange, then I chose this.

Tina, now one of the moderators, heard my choice and said, oh, serious books. Well,...more
Jennifer
*Review contains a partial spoiler*

If you read enough reviews, you'll notice that most of the people who gave this book 1 or 2 stars had to read the book for a high school class. Most of the 4 and 5 star ratings came from those who read it as adults. I recommend listening to those who read it as adults.

Many people hate the ending, but I thought it was great. Creepy? Yes, but there was an immense amount of beauty and generosity in that creepy little ending. At one point in the story, Ma tol' Ros...more
[P]
The Prologue

A couple of years ago my best friend and I spent an entire evening, something like 7 hours, accumulating, and listening to, every single song by the band Guided By Voices [and associated side and solo projects]. GBV, for those who don’t know, were a band [still are, in fact, as they’ve recently reformed] who made a hell of a lot of records [we’re talking about thousands of songs] and whose output was extravagantly uneven in quality. We had decided, my friend and I, that we were goin...more
Alex
I was prepared to compare Steinbeck to Faulkner and Hemingway, because those three tend to get discussed together - but what he really reminds me of is Upton Sinclair. Same powerful expose of the conditions of the poor and exploited, but you know how the problem with The Jungle is that the story itself is pretty awkward? Well, this is better.

So I hadn't realized what a screaming Commie Steinbeck was. That was a fun revelation. And he's sadly prophetic here. He describes how small farmers get pus...more
Jonathan

This novel was at first only a four star read for the following reasons. However it is after reading earlier in the year that now I realise how powerful this book was.

1. The way of speaking was frustrating reading. With all the conjunctions and the shortening of Rose of Sharon to Roseasharn and with the characters all jumpin' around and being part of a fambly. That was slightly annoying to my grammar sentiments...

2. The book made me angry (okay this is a good thing this time about the book and...more
Gary
Isn't THE GRAPES OF WRATH just wonderful!!!!???? You've not read it??? Shit!!!! You don't know what you're missing!!!!!!!! If you've read it, then you will know exactly what I am talking about.

I have lived on, or close to old route 66 for over 20 years of my life. I love the history of THE MOTHER ROAD. However, believe it or not, it was only in the past few years that I finally read this book! I had read other Steinbeck,and loved it,and for some reason, after owning a copy of the book since the...more
Jeff
This book was quite a read. It follows a fictional family, the Joads, through some of the darkest days of the depression. The Joads are a family of sharecroppers who have been in Oklahoma for three generations. But now the bank owns the land and due to years of dust storms which caused repeated crop failure the bank has taken possession of the land and the family now has no way to make a living or even a home. They decide to move to California following a handbill that has promised jobs and fort...more
Sanfranannie
Jan 13, 2008 Sanfranannie rated it 5 of 5 stars
Recommended to Sanfranannie by: Deborah Valentine
This book deserves all the praise it's been given.
My mom, a former english teacher, discovered that I hadn't read it and mailed me a copy. Let me say that I'm SO thankful I didn't read it in high school as many have. I can't imagine that I would've appreciated it half as much back then and it's too bad that so many folks have experienced it from that adolescent standpoint (although I do think it should be required reading when learning about the history of the U.S.).

The writing is beautiful &...more
Needleroozer
Jul 05, 2009 Needleroozer rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: kids in elementary school who want to look sophisticated carrying around a big book
Shelves: fiction
I read this book in 5th grade. I am not kidding! My teacher asked if any of us had ever read this book (what in the hell was she thinking?), so I went home and said I wanted to read it.

My parents dutifully took me to Waldenbooks in the Acadiana Mall and bought me a copy. For some reason, the copy they bought me included a lot of critical writing about the novel, so the book was HUGE. It was one fat book. I carried it around like the geek that I was (at least I had given up carrying my schoolbook...more
Wesley
I really let this one soak into today. An absolute fantastic book from any point of view. It doesn’t matter if you connect with this book of or not because if you fully let it engulf you then you are forced to connect. It has nothing to do if you are poor, rich are some badass named Wesley this book is for everyone. It should be read by everyone.

I can honestly say I’d never read this or even had it as an assignment to read in any school. I guess this is uncommon. Maybe majority of teenagers wou...more
Simona Bartolotta
Il predicatore sospirò. "(...) Sento il dovere e il bisogno di andare dove va il popolo. Lavorerò la terra, e forse troverò pace."
"E predicare più niente?" domandò Tom.
"Predicare no."
"E battezzare?" domandò la mamma.
"Nemmeno. Vado a lavorare la terra, ho bisogno di sentirmi prossimo ai miei simili. Non voglio insegnare niente, voglio imparare da loro; ascoltare cosa dicono, ascoltarli, quando cantano e quando imprecano e quando fanno all'amore, e sentire la poesia di quel che fanno, e far come l
...more
Anne  (Booklady) Molinarolo
After writing Grapes of Wrath Steinbeck said that he was used up. He had spent years researching Grapes, and wrote this magnificent 1940 Pulitzer Prize Fiction Winner in a mere 100 days. He knew his subject well; he lived with the migrate workers and worked with Tom Collins, too. And the subject was so very unpopular and controversial in 1939 when it was published. And it still resonates today in 2012 as well as 1974 – the year I first read Grapes and Of Mice and Men.Many critics have said Grape...more
Vale
Mi sento davvero fortunata, perché ho letto questo libro nell'età giusta per poterlo apprezzare e, soprattutto, nel periodo storico più adatto. Il libro di Steinbeck è ambientato durante la Grande depressione americana e la famiglia Joad è costretta ad una emigrazione interna, verso le fertili terre della California. Le banche hanno requisito tutti i terreni dei poveri contadini e ognuno abbandona la propria casa in cerca di lavoro. Questo sradicamento è capillare perché il viaggio che questi di...more
Chiara Pagliochini
Non sarebbe mai venuta la fine finché la paura si fosse tramutata in furore.

Se vi dicono che Furore è un libro sulla Grande Depressione Americana, credeteci, ma non del tutto. Siamo dopo il tracollo finanziario del ’29, storico giovedì nero. Ci sono il Presidente Roosevelt e la sua politica per risollevare gli USA dal tracollo, il celebre New Deal. E c’è nel vostro libro di storia un minuscolo paragrafo che dice così: “la riduzione della produzione agricola prevista dall’Agricultural Adjustement...more
Hillary Straub
Oct 14, 2007 Hillary Straub rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: High school and up
Hillary Straub

Ms. Kuhn

English 3

15 October 2007

Timeline:

1. The main character, Tom Joad, is released from the McAlester State Penitentiary, where he served four years on a manslaughter conviction.

2. On his way home, Joad runs into Jim Casy, the old preacher. They talk for a while and then both head for the Joad farm. When they get there they find it deserted.

3. The Joad family moved in with Tom's uncle John because the family was unable to make a profit off of the farm

4. The entire family has go...more
Emily
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
Michelle
I find myself hesitant to give a rating to this book because my opinion on it has changed so much. My first encounter with this book was in high school. I remember being aware that I was reading a "classic" and recognizing the beauty of Steinbeck's use of language; however, I could not bring myself to get past how boring it all seemed. Intermixed with the story of the Joad family there are many lengthy descriptions of the land, the view from the road and animals. To a 16-yr old, these seemed to...more
K.D. Oliveros
A well-written classic novel! I could not put it down. People in 3rd world countries would always think that American is the land of milk and honey. This book opened my eyes that sometime in 1930's US of A had that depression that drove the people to famine. The Joads family really inspired me that no matter how difficult life becomes (with the on-going global depression), there will always be a better life waiting for all of us!
Teresa
This book probably deserves 5 stars. It could also rate the encomium of the (so-called) Great American Novel. But I'm giving it 4, because (in a nutshell) I just didn't like it as much as East of Eden.

And while I admired the lyrical chapters that were interspersed between the actual story of the Joad family, sometimes I felt they were a bit too heavy-handed, or superfluous, even interrupting the flow of the narrative -- with exceptions, of course. I understand that these chapters elevate the sto...more
Barbara
I still can't believe I didn't read Grapes of Wrath in American Lit but suspect I enjoyed it more at 52 than 19! I was drawn into this story immediately and especially liked the book's descriptive language, structure, and memorable characters. Casey, the reluctant, questioning preacher was my favorite. I admired the Joads' dignity, perseverance despite all odds, and willingness to share with others equally unfortunate. I was struck by how Steinbeck makes you feel like you're on that journey with...more
Mike W
Steinbeck's work offers a lovely and vivid account of a family forced by dust storms and poverty to move West during the Great Depression. At times Steinbeck's story-telling is superb. Indeed, when the main narrative is progressing the book is about as good as any novel I have read. The story is marred, however, by tediously didactic passages in which Steinbeck offers moral sermons rather than a good story.

It might be okay--or even praiseworthy--for a novel to be didactic if what it is teaching...more
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Mr. Householder's...: Turtle 5 14 May 15, 2013 08:13pm  
Mr. Householder's...: The Reverend Casey as Jesus Christ 10 15 May 14, 2013 06:24am  
On my 4th or 5th re-reading with students, and I'm starting to dislike this book. 142 879 Apr 26, 2013 11:07am  
The debate of the anticlimax 20 125 Apr 23, 2013 03:37pm  
Tom Joad Jr. 4 44 Apr 20, 2013 08:20pm  
John Gardner Misjudges John Steinbeck 5 69 Mar 21, 2013 11:27am  
The Grapes of Wrath (Paperback)
The Grapes of Wrath (Paperback)
The Grapes of Wrath (Paperback)
The Grapes of Wrath (Paperback)
The Grapes of Wrath (Paperback)

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John Steinbeck III was an American writer. He wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath, published in 1939 and the novella Of Mice and Men, published in 1937. In all, he wrote twenty-five books, including sixteen novels, six non-fiction books and several collections of short stories.

In 1962 Steinbeck received the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Steinbeck grew up in the Salinas Valley...more
More about John Steinbeck...
Of Mice and Men East of Eden The Pearl Cannery Row Travels with Charley: In Search of America

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“There ain't no sin and there ain't no virtue. There's just stuff people do.” 1,848 people liked it
“And the little screaming fact that sounds through all history: repression works only to strengthen and knit the repressed.” 1,201 people liked it
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