Revised essay

2) Explore why reactions to the novel The Grapes of Wrath have been so wide ranging.

When a book makes a harsh statement about society there will always be controversy. The Grapes of Wrath is no exception. Upon its release it was banned in school districts across the United States. Yet John Steinbeck received the Pulitzer Prize for his book.

The reason the book was banned was because it contained obscenities. The 1930’s was a more conservative time and swearing in movies and books was very rare. Along with the profanities, the book contained a few sexual references, which was also offensive to the public.

Ranchers in California claimed that the book was full of lies. They also contended that the plight of migrants was not as bad as Steinbeck portrayed. However life was miserable for the Okies, hundreds of thousands of people migrated to California and many of them starved. The ranch owners were cruel; most of the migrant workers were paid about one dollar a day for hard labor. The characters in the novel were fictional people but John Steinbeck based their experiences on research he had done in migrant camps. The book claimed to expose the ranchers for what they really were so they called The Grapes of Wrath obscene and even Communist propaganda.

A congressman from Oklahoma defamed the book calling it despicable and profane. He could not accept that fellow Oklahomans could suffer so greatly and he simply chose not to believe it. Willful ignorance and denial are common reactions to shocking problems.

The book was obviously praised by many. The fact that the Steinbeck won the Pulitzer Prize for the novel shows that many people saw merit in Steinbeck’s work. They were able to see that the book offered much more than profanity and inappropriate situations. They saw the book’s true value as a powerful portrayal of the endurance of the human spirit, the bond of family, and the plight of society’s oppressed and down-trodden.

John Steinbeck in the Grapes of Wrath stirred up a lot of controversy. It said a lot of negative things about ranch owners in California. The ranchers in turn denigrated the book by saying that it was full of lies. The story was brutally honest about the situation that the Okies faced. Some found this profane and others outright denied the facts of the book because it was too much for them to accept. There were those who saw beyond the controversy. They saw that the book was about life and the human condition.