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“//And so I will tell them one of the greatest, perhaps the greatest story of all- the story of good and evil, of strength and weakness, of love and hate, of beauty and ugliness. I shall try to demonstrate to them how these doubles are inseparable, how neither can exist without to other how out of their groupings creativeness is born//.” – John Steinbeck (pg. 4, Journal of a Novel) The novels of John Steinbeck can all be classified as social novels dealing with the economic problems of rural labor. After the humor of //Tortilla Flat//, he moved on to more serious fiction, aggressive in its social criticism. In 1939 he published what is considered his best work, //The Grapes of Wrath// (Frenz, pg online). Throughout his controversial career, Steinbeck extolled the virtues of the American dream while he warned against what he believes were the evils of the materialistic American society that was increasing during his time. With his subject and style varying in each book, the themes of human dignity and compassion, and sense of his vision of America, remained constant. He was an American author, whose distrust and anger towards American society was thrown off by his faith and love for the beloved land and its’ people. Nonetheless, his hatred of Communism and his love of American began to confuse citizen’s picture of Steinbeck. F.W. Watt commented: “//The paradise in front of them is a fallen word… the place they have reached is filled with suffering as the place from which they have//.” Of his seventeen novels written, //The Grapes of Wrath// is the best example of Steinbeck’s philosophy, perception, and effect he had set on future literature. Being the fist protest novel of the thirties, the book was publicly banned and burned by citizens who did not agree. It was even debated on radio channels, but above all, it was read by many citizens; which is what classified his novel to be his best example of the literature impact he left on writers today (Peter Lisca). His novels in the thirties gained for him the dubious and unwanted reputation, which stuck with him for decades. One of the most prevalent themes in //The Grapes of Wrath// is the misuse and waste of lives and the land. The book was based on Steinbeck’s study of farmers’ lives during a time of economic collapse and massive agriculture, which only became a meaning of profit. Steinbeck was charged with obscenity from different protesting groups. Steinbeck’s reputation still ran like the stock markets. While Steinbeck criticized his own beliefs of evil and immoral institutions, he offered what critics contended an optimistic picture of the American ideal. With this novel, Steinbeck took a biological view towards man. He did not look for the causes or motives behind a given situation, but only sought to objectively observe the reality and actuality of a situation. Instead of looking at what could have or should have been of that situation (John Steinbeck Biography). Steinbeck was always primarily an observer and report of those parts of the human condition that happen to fall within his experience. “//Emotion which falls by accident into edged words swings the whole brain and shakes it like a rug//.” – Steinbeck (pg. 11, Journal of a Novel) In spite of all the negative feedback of his literature during his time, there is a major amount of events held in honor of Steinbeck. Even though living with a negative reputation for an amount of time, Steinbeck has left writers of today and our future an impact as a se to glasses towards society. Towards the behaviors of humans, and the changes acted out, Steinbeck has shown us how to observe situations rather than just protest through feeling, but report through actuality.

-Fay J.