The Grapes of Wrath读后感

The Grapes of Wrath

The narrative begins just after Tom Joad is paroled from Oklahoma state prison after serving four years for homicide. On his journey home, Oklahoma, he meets former preacher Jim Casy whom he remembers from his childhood and the two travel together.

When they arrive at their home, only to find it—all the surrounding farms are deserted. Disconcerted and confused, Tom and Casy meet their old neighbor, Muley Graves, who tells them that landowners kick tenant farmers off their land and that Tom’s family have stayed at Uncle John Joad's home nearby, so Tom and Casy get up the next morning to go to Uncle John's home. There, Tom finds his family loading a converted Hudson truck with what remains of their possessions; the crops were destroyed by a drought and rampant dust storms in the Dust Bowl. As a result, the family have to default on their loans. Having seen handbills advertising fruit-picking jobs in California, they envision the trip to California as their only hope of getting their lives back on track. Therefore, they invest what they have into the journey.

Along the road, the Joads discovers that it is saturated with other families making the same trek, ensnared by the same promise. In makeshift camps, they hear many stories from others—some coming back from California, and are forced to confront the possibility that their prospects may not be what they hoped. Although the Joads press on, their first day in California prove tragic, as Grandma Joad dies and is buried in the camp. The remaining family members move from one squalid camp to the next, looking in vain for job, struggling to find food, and trying desperately to hold their family together. Noah, the oldest of the Joad’s children, soon abandons the family, so does Connie, a young dreamer who is married to Tom’s pregnant sister, Rose of Sharon. The remaining members realize that they have no choice but to go on due to the fact that there is nothing remaining for them in Oklahoma.

Upon arrival, they find little hope of making a decent wage because there is an oversupply of labor and a lack of rights. Besides, the camp is also off-limits to California deputies who constantly harass and provoke the newcomers. In response to the exploitation of laborers, there are people who attempt for the workers to join unions, including Casy, who had gone to jail after attacking a rogue deputy. The remaining Joads work as strikebreakers on a peach orchard where Casy is involved in a strike that eventually turns violent. Tom Joad witnesses the killing of Casy and kills the attacker, becoming a fugitive. They later leave the orchard for a cotton farm where Tom is at risk of being identified for the murder he committed. In order not to drag his family into his crime, Tom runs away for good. At the end of the story, as the floodwater continues to rise, Rose of Sharon's baby is stillborn, and the Joads move to higher and dryer ground. Rose of Sharon breast feeds a man who is too hungry to eat solid food, still trying to show hope in humanity after her own negative experience.