Chrissie's Books

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 ends, it is moving and engaging every bit of the way. Talk about resilient, generous, warm and wonderful people! The book is filled with humor.

I personally do not understand how this book could in any way be a criticism of Okies! The contrary is true. It is if anything the Californians that are to be criticized, and the government for not adequately helping the migrants. On this issue the following two links are interesting. I want to thank my GR friend Kim for leading me to both.

Banning of “Grapes of Wrath” in California: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95190615

Dislike of “Grapes of Wrath” in Oklahoma:
http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/g/gr010.html


I think this book by Steinbeck is fabulous, but the audiobook narrated by John Chancer is still better. When you listen to this you think you are at the movies. Each character has a special voice. This is an impressive performance which could in no way be improved upon. I strongly recommend that you listen to this book rather than read it.
You don't listen to books? OK, then read it, but do it soon. I am not kidding, this is a MUST read!!!


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I just listened to chapter 15, another one of those chapters that some call boring! (Please see my previous entry "through chapter 13". I adored it. It is about a little "joint", a café on Route 66, the road that the Joad family is traveling from Oklahoma to California where there will be work and well-paid jobs and oranges to pick off the trees. Being one of those so-called "boring" chapters it wasn't about the Joads, but about Al and his wife and the truckers. As explained below some readers say these chapters are boring. Some also say this book is depressing, and I don't agree with that either. I define "not depressing" books as those that show how people who have nothing are still generous and kind. You should read this book just for this chapter. Not only do I like Al and his wife, but within this chapter is found the following line, a sign on their Route 66 café wall: "Ladies may smoke, but be careful where you put your butts." So are you crying or laughing? Is this depressing? Note, you have only read one line of this marvelous chapter.

Well, what IS depressing is that I am sure some bad stuff will be happening. I am scared to death what may happen to these people. They aren't just anybody any more. I care for them, all of them!

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Through chapter 13: I am head over heels in love with this! Although the plight of Okies is movingly portrayed, life's small beauties and charms are ever present too. Everybody says this book is depressing. I do not find that so. For example, there is an « “ex-preacher” that says such wise things. This is about a family that is forced to move to California. The drought and the Depression have ruined them and all others. The land is emptied. The banks force the tenants off their land. But NEVERTHELESS, there is strength in these people. There is humor in the small things. Dogs in heat and a grandfather that is all bluster and cannot button up his fly, pajamas or underwear. These small things are in fact very amusing.

Steinbeck builds the feeling of the time by interspersing the chapters about the family with chapters about what is happening around them. These chapters create a mood that makes you better see the total picture. For example, one of these diversionary chapters depicts a used car dealer. "Oh, if he only had more jalopies to sell...." then he would make some profit. Of course his mark-up is outrageously high. Yep, that truck he purchased for $10 and sold it for $50 AND the buyer additionally agreed to $10 payment for another 4 months. "Even if the family doesn't pay the monthly installments he has certainly hit the jackpot with that sucker," he raucously explains to us. "Everybody has to make a living somehow!" Right? By whatever means possible. It is eat or be eaten. That is the gist of this chapter. My words, not Steinbeck’s, except for that first quote. The chapter is filled with the owner's sales cries to his assistant and customers. Another is about a land-turtle crossing a road, his slow plodding passage forward. One is about the cornfields and how they are drying up. You see them shrivel. You see the blazing hot, red sun. Steinbeck can certainly string his words with the touch of an artist, a magician, a conjurer. Some might find these chapters unnecessary or distracting....or even boring. Me, I like them; they create a mood of that time and place. This is really how the Depression was for those living it.