American Literature books summary

Henry gets a good night's sleep.

They drive out slowly through the town, in an endless line of soldiers

and vehicles. Henry takes a turn sleeping, and shortly after he wakes, the

column stalls. He finds that Bonello has given two engineer sergeants a

ride, and Aymo has two girls in his car. Exhausted, Henry falls asleep

again, and dreams of Catherine.That night, columns of peasants join the

retreating army. In the early morning Henry and his men stop briefly at a

farmhouse, eating a large breakfast. Soon, they continue slowly on their

way, rejoining the line of trucks and soldiers.

Book III, Chapters 29-32

Aymo's car gets stuck in the soft ground; the men are forced to cut

brush hurriedly to place under the tires for traction. Henry orders the two

engineer sergeants riding with Bonello to help; afraid of being overtaken

by the enemy, they refuse, and try to leave. Henry draws his gun and shoots

one of them, but the other escapes. Bonello takes Henry's pistol and kills

the wounded sergeant.

They begin to cut branches and twigs; in the end, they are unable to

save the car. Henry gives some money to the two girls travelling with Aymo

and encourages them to go down to a nearby village, Aymo gets in Henry's

vehicle, and they set out, now cut off from the main column.

Crossing a bridge, Henry sees a nearby car full of German soldiers. As

they travel, they begin to notice more and more signs of German occupation,

and they worry that they have been completely cut off from Italian-

controlled land. They proceed with caution; a sudden burst of gunfire kills

Aymo. They realize he was shot by the Italian rear guard--the Italians are

ahead, but because the rear guard is afraid, they are almost as dangerous

as the Germans.

Fearing death, Bonello leaves in hopes of being taken prisoner. The men

hide in a barn that night, and in the morning they rejoin the Italians. The

enlisted men become furious with the officers, and Piani is afraid they

will try to kill Henry. Suddenly, two men (battle police) seize hold of

Henry. They seize Henry because he is a foreigner, and in the chaos of the

retreat they intend to shoot him for a spy. When they look away for a

moment, Henry dives into the river and swims away.

After floating in the river for what seems like a very long time, Henry

climbs out, removes the stars from his shirt, and counts his money. He

crosses the Venetian plain that day, then jumps aboard a military train

that evening, hiding under a canvas with guns.

Lying under the canvas, Henry thinks about the army, about the war, and

about Catherine. He realizes that he will be pronounced dead, and assumes

he will never see Rinaldi again. Rinaldi has been concerned he will die of

syphilis, and Henry worries for him. Exhausted and hungry, he imagines

finding Catherine and going away with her to a safe place.

Book V, Chapters 38-41

That fall, Henry and Catherine live in a brown wooden house on the side

of a mountain. They enjoy the company of Mr. and Mrs. Guttingen, who live

downstairs, and they remain very happy together; sometimes they walk down

the mountain path in Montreux. One day Catherine gets her hair done in

Montreux, and afterwards they go to have a beer--Catherine thinks beer is

good for the baby, because it will keep it small; she is worried about the

baby's size because the doctor has said she has a narrow pelvis. They talk

again about getting married, but Catherine wants to wait until after the

baby is born when she will be thin again.

Three days before Christmas, the snow comes. Catherine asks Henry if he

feels restless, and he says no, though he does wonder about his friends on

the front, such as Rinaldi and the priest.

Henry decides to grow a beard and by mid-January, he has one. Through

January and February he and Catherine remain very happy; in March they move

into town to be near the hospital. They stay in a hotel there for three

weeks; Catherine buys baby clothes, Henry works out in the gym, and they

both feel that the baby will arrive soon.

Finally, around three o'clock one morning, Catherine goes into labor.

They go to the hospital, where Catherine is given a nightgown and a room.

She encourages Henry to go out for breakfast, and he does, talking to the

old man who serves him. When he returns to the hospital, he finds that

Catherine has been taken to the delivery room. He goes in to see her; the

doctor stands by, and Catherine takes an anaesthetic gas when her

contractions become very painful. At two o'clock in the afternoon, Henry

goes out for lunch.

He goes back to the hospital; Catherine is now intoxicated from the

gas. The doctor thinks her pelvis is too narrow to allow the baby to pass

through, and advises a Caesarian section. Catherine suffers unbearable pain

and pleads for more gas. Finally they wheel her out on a stretcher to

perform the operation. Henry watches the rain outside.

Soon the doctor comes out and takes Henry to see the baby, a boy. Henry

has no feeling for the child. He then goes to see Catherine, and at first

worries that she is dead. When she asks him about their son, he tells her

he was fine, and the nurse gives him a quizzical look. Ushering him

outside, the nurse tells him that the boy is not fine--he strangled on the

umbilical cord, and never began to breathe.

He goes out for dinner, and when he returns the nurse tells him that

Catherine is hemorrhaging. He is filled with terror that she will die. When

he is allowed to see her, she tells him she will die, and asks him not to

say the same things to other girls. Henry goes into the hallway while they

try to treat Catherine, but nothing works; finally, he goes back into the

room and stays with her until she dies.

The doctor offers to drive him back to the hotel, but Henry declines.

He goes back into the room and tries to say good-bye to Catherine, but says

that it was like saying good-bye to a statue. He leaves the hospital and

walks back to his hotel in the rain

CHARACTERS’ PROFILE

Frederic Henry - The novel's protagonist. A young American ambulance

driver in the Italian army during the First World War, Henry is disciplined

and courageous, but feels detached from life. When introduced to Catherine

Barkley, Henry discovers a capacity for love he had not known he possessed,

and begins a process of development that culminates with his desertion of

the Italian army. Throughout the novel, the Italian soldiers under Henry's

command call him "Tenente"--the Italian word for "lieutenant."

Catherine Barkley - An English nurse who falls in love with Frederic Henry.

Catherine's fiancee was killed in the battle of the Somme before she met

Henry. Catherine has cast aside conventional social values, and lives

according to her own values, devoting herself wholly to her love for Henry.

Her long, beautiful hair is her most distinctive physical feature.

Rinaldi - Frederic's friend, an Italian surgeon. Mischievous and wry,

Rinaldi is nevertheless a passionate and skilled doctor. Rinaldi makes a

practice of always being in love with a beautiful woman, and at the

beginning of the novel is attracted to Catherine Barkley; Rinaldi's

infatuation causes him to introduce Frederic and Catherine to one another.

Helen Ferguson - A friend of Catherine's. Though she remains fond of the

lovers and helps them, Helen is much more committed to social convention

than Henry and Catherine; she vocally disapproves of their "immoral" love

affair.

Miss Gage - An American nurse. Miss Gage becomes a friend to both Catherine

and Henry--in fact, she may be in love with Henry. Unlike Helen Ferguson,

she sets aside conventional social values to support their love affair.

Miss Van Campen - The superintendent of nurses at the American hospital

where Catherine works. Miss Van Campen is strict, cold, and unlikable; she

is obsessed with rules and regulations and has no patience for or interest

in individual feelings.

Dr. Valentini - An Italian surgeon who comes to the American hospital. Self-

assured and confident, Dr. Valentini is also a highly talented surgeon.

Frederic Henry takes an immediate liking to him.

Count Greffi - A spry ninety-four year old nobleman. Henry knows Count

Greffi from his time in Stresa, and the two play billiards together toward

the end of the novel. Despite his advanced age, the count is intelligent,

disciplined, and fully committed to life.

The Grapes of Wrath

Full Summary

Chapter One: Steinbeck begins the novel with a description of the dust bowl

climate of Oklahoma. The dust was so thick that men and women had to remain

in their houses, and when they had to leave they tied handkerchiefs over

their faces and wore goggles to protect their eyes. After the wind had

stopped, an even blanket of dust covered the earth. The corn crop was

ruined. Everybody wondered what they would do. The women and children knew

that no misfortune was too great to bear if their men were whole, but the

men had not yet figured out what to do.

Chapter Two: A man approaches a small diner where a large red transport

truck is parked. The man is under thirty, with dark brown eyes and high

cheekbones. He wore new clothes that don't quite fit. The truck driver

exits from the diner and the man asks him for a ride, despite the "No

Riders" sticker on the truck. The man claims that sometimes a guy will do a

good thing even when a rich bastard makes him carry a sticker, and the

driver, feeling trapped by the statement, lets the man have a ride. While

driving, the truck driver asks questions, and the man finally gives his

name, Tom Joad. The truck driver claims that guys do strange things when

they drive trucks, such as make up poetry, because of the loneliness of the

job. The truck driver claims that his experience driving has trained his

memory and that he can remember everything about a person he passes.

Realizing that the truck driver is pressing for information, Tom finally

admits that he had just been released from McAlester prison for homicide.

He had been sentenced to seven years and was released after only four, for

good behavior.

Chapter Three: At the side of the roadside, a turtle crawled, dragging his

shell over the grass. He came to the embankment at the road and, with great

effort, climbed onto the road. As the turtle attempts to cross the road, it

is nearby hit by a sedan. A truck swerves to hit the turtle, but its wheel

only strikes the edge of its shell and spins it back off the highway. The

turtle lays on its back, but finally pulls itself over.

Chapter Four: After getting out of the truck, Tom Joad begins walking home.

He sees the turtle of the previous chapter and picks it up. He stops in the

shade of a tree to rest and meets a man who sits there, singing "Jesus is

My Savior." The man, Jim Casy, had a long, bony frame and sharp features. A

former minister, he recognizes Tom immediately. He was a "Burning Busher"

who used to "howl out the name of Jesus to glory," but he lost the calling

because he has too many sinful ideas that seem sensible. Tom tells Casy

that he took the turtle for his little brother, and he replies that nobody

can keep a turtle, for they eventually just go off on their own. Casy

claims that he doesn't know where he's going now, and Tom tells him to lead

people, even if he doesn't know where to lead them. Casy tells Tom that

part of the reason he quit preaching was that he too often succumbed to

temptation, having sex with many of the girls he Њsaved.' Finally he

realized that perhaps what he was doing wasn't a sin, and there isn't

really sin or virtue there are simply things people do.

He realized he didn't Њknow Jesus,' he merely knew the stories of the

Bible. Tom tells Casy why he was in jail: he was at a dance drunk, and got

in a fight with a man. The man cut Tom with a knife, so he hit him over the

head with a shovel. Tom tells him that he was treated relatively well in

McAlester. He ate regularly, got clean clothes and bathed. He even tells

about how someone broke his parole to go back. Tom tells how his father

Њstole' their house. There was a family living there that moved away, so

his father, uncle and grandfather cut the house in two and dragged part of

it first, only to find that Wink Manley took the other half. They get to

the boundary fence of their property, and Tom tells him that they didn't

need a fence, but it gave Pa a feeling that their forty acres was forty

acres. Tom and Casy get to the house: something has happened nobody is

there.

Chapter Five: This chapter describes the coming of the bank representatives

to evict the farmers. Some of the men were kind because they knew how cruel

their job was, while some were angry because they hated to be cruel, and

others were merely cold and hardened by their job. They are mostly pawns of

a system that they can merely obey. The tenant system has become untenable

for the banks, for one man on a tractor can take the place of a dozen

families. The farmers raise the possibility of armed insurrection, but what

would they fight against? They will be murderers if they stay, fighting

against the wrong targets.

Steinbeck describes the arrival of the tractors. They crawled over the

ground, cutting the earth like surgery and violating it like rape. The

tractor driver does his job simply out of necessity: he has to feed his

kids, even if it comes at the expense of dozens of families. Steinbeck

dramatizes a conversation between a truck driver and an evicted tenant

farmer. The farmer threatens to kill the driver, but even if he does so, he

will not stop the bank. Another driver will come. Even if the farmer

murders the president of the bank and board of directors, the bank is

controlled by the East. There is no effective target which could prevent

the evictions.

Chapter Six: Casy and Tom approached the Joad home. The house was mashed at

one corner and appeared deserted. Casy says that it looks like the arm of

the Lord had struck. Tom can tell that Ma isn't there, for she would have

never left the gate unhooked. They only see one resident (the cat), but Tom

wonders why the cat didn't go to find another family if his family had

moved, or why the neighbors hadn't taken the rest of the belongings in the

house. Muley Graves approaches, a short, lean old man with the truculent

look of an ornery child. Muley tells Tom that his mother was worrying about

him. His family was evicted, and had to move in with his Uncle John. They

were forced to chop cotton to make enough money to go west. Casy suggests

going west to pick grapes in California. Muley tells Tom and Casy that the

loss of the farm broke up his family his wife and kids went off to

California, while Muley chose to stay. He has been forced to eat wild game.

He muses about how angry he was when he was told he had to get off the

land. First he wanted to kill people, but then his family left and Muley

was left alone and wandering. He realized that he is used to the place,

even if he has to wander the land like a ghost. Tom tells them that he

can't go to California, for it would mean breaking parole. According to

Tom, prison has not changed him significantly. He thinks that if he saw

Herb Turnbull, the man he killed, coming after him with a knife again, he

would still hit him with the shovel. Tom tells them that there was a man in

McAlester that read a great deal about prisons and told him that they

started a long time ago and now cannot be stopped, despite the fact that

they do not actually rehabilitate people. Muley tells them that they have

to hide, for they are trespassing on the land. They have to hide in a cave

for the night.

Chapter Seven: The car dealership owners look at their customers. They

watch for weaknesses, such as a woman who wants an expensive car and can

push her husband into buying one. They attempt to make the customers feel

obliged. The proffts come from selling jalopies, not from new and

dependable cars. There are no guarantees, hidden costs and obvious flaws.

Chapter Eight: Tom and Casy reach Uncle John's farm. They remark that

Muley's lonely and covert lifestyle has obviously driven him insane.

According to Tom, his Uncle John is equally crazy, and wasn't expected to

live long, yet is older than his father. Still, he is tougher and meaner

than even Grampa, hardened by losing his young wife years ago. They see Pa

Joad fixing the truck. When he sees Tom, he assumes that he broke out of

jail. They go in the house and see Ma Joad, a heavy woman thick with child-

bearing and work. Her face was controlled and kindly. She worries that Tom

went mad in prison. This chapter also introduces Grampa and Granma Joad.

She is as tough as he is, once shooting her husband while she was speaking

in tongues. Noah Joad, Tom's older brother, is a strange man, slow and

withdrawn, with little pride and few urges. He may have been brain damaged

at childbirth. The family has dinner, and Casy says grace. He talks about

how Jesus went off into the wilderness alone, and how he did the same. Yet

what Casy concluded was that mankind was holy. Pa tells Tom about Al, his

sixteen-year old brother, who is concerned with little more than girls and

cars. He hasn't been at home at night for a week. His sister Rosasharn has

married Connie Rivers, and is several months pregnant. They have two

hundred dollars for their journey.

Chapter Nine: This chapter describes the process of selling belongings. The

items pile up in the yard, selling for ridiculously low prices. Whatever is

not sold must be burned, even items of sentimental value that simply cannot

be taken on the journey for lack of space.

Chapter Ten: Ma Joad tells Tom that she is concerned about going to

California, worried that it won't turn out well, for the only information

they have is from flyers they read. Casy asks to accompany them to

California. He wants to work in the fields, where he can listen to people

rather than preach to them. Tom says that preaching is a tone of voice and

a style, being good to people when they don't respond to it. Pa and Uncle

John return with the truck, and prepare to leave. The two children, twelve-

year old Ruthie and ten-year old Winfield are there with their older

sister, Rose of Sharon (Rosasharn) and her husband. They discuss how Tom

can't leave the state because of his parole. They have a family conference

that night and discuss a number of issues: they decide to allow Casy to go

with them, since it's the only right thing for them to do. They continue

with preparations, killing the pigs to have food to take with them. While

Casy helps out Ma Joad with food preparation, he remarks to Tom that she

looks tired, as if she is sick. Ma Joad looks through her belongings, going

through old letters and clippings she had saved. She has to place them in

the fire. Before they leave, Muley Graves stops to say goodbye. Noah tells

him that he's going to die out in the field if he stays, but Muley accepts

his fate. Grampa refuses to leave, so they decide to give him medicine that

will knock him out and take him with them.

Chapter Eleven: The houses were left vacant. Only the tractor sheds of

gleaming iron and silver were alive. Yet when the tractors are at rest the

life goes out of them. The work is easy and efficient, so easy that the

wonder goes out of the work and so efficient that the wonder goes out of

the land and the working of it. In the tractor man there grows the contempt

that comes to a stranger who has little understanding and no relation to

the land. The abandoned houses slowly fall apart.

Chapter Twelve: Highway 66 is the main migrant road stretching from the

Mississippi to Bakersfield, California. It is a road of flight for refugees

from the dust and shrinking land. The people streamed out on 66, possibly

breaking down in their undependable cars on the way. Yet the travelers face

obstacles. California is a big state, but not big enough to support all of

the workers who are coming. The border patrol can turn people back. The

high wages that are promised may be false.

Chapter Thirteen: The Joads continue on their travels. Al remarks that they

may have trouble getting over mountains in their car, which can barely

support its weight. Grampa Joad wakes up and insists that he's not going

with them. They stop at a gas station where the owner automatically assumes

they are broke, and tells them that people often stop, begging for gas. The

owner claims that fifty cars per day go west, but wonders what they expect

when they reach their destination. He tells how one family traded their

daughter's doll for some gas. Casy wonders what the nation is coming to,

since people seem unable to make a decent living. Casy says that he used to

use his energy to fight against the devil, believing that the devil was the

enemy. However, now he believes that there's something worse. The Joad's

dog wanders from the car and is run over in the road. They continue on

their journey and begin to worry when they reach the state line. However,

Tom reassures them that he is only in danger if he commits a crime.

Otherwise, nobody will know that he has broken his parole by leaving the

state. On their next stop for the night, the Joads meet the Wilsons, a

family from Kansas that is going to California. Grampa complains of

illness, and weeps. The family thinks that he may suffer a stroke. Granma

tells Casy to pray for Grampa, even if he is no longer a preacher. Suddenly

Grampa starts twitching and slumps. He dies. The Joads face a choice: they

can pay fifty dollars for a proper burial for him or have him buried a

pauper. They decide to bury Grampa themselves and leave a note so that

people don't assume he was murdered. The Wilsons help them bury Grampa.

They write a verse from scripture on the note on his grave. After burying

Grampa, they have Casy say a few words. The reactions to the death are

varied. Rose of Sharon comforts Granma, while Uncle John is curiously

unmoved by the turn of events. Casy admits that he knew Grampa was dying,

but didn't say anything because he couldn't have helped. He blames the

separation from the land for Grampa's death. The Joads and the Sairy Wilson

decide to help each other on the journey by spreading out the load between

their two cars so that both families will make it to California.

Chapter Fourteen: The Western States are nervous about the impending

changes, including the widening government, growing labor unity, and

strikes. However, they do not realize that these are results of change and

not causes of it. The cause is the hunger of the multitude. The danger that

they face is that the people's problems have moved from "I" to "we."

Chapter Fifteen: This chapter begins with a description of the hamburger

stands and diners on Route 66. The typical diner is run by a usually

irritated woman who nevertheless becomes friendly when truck drivers

consistent customers who can always pay enter. The more wealthy travelers

drop names and buy vanity products. The owners of the diners complain about

the migrating workers, who can't pay and often steal. A family comes in,

wanting to buy a loaf of bread. The one owner, Mae, tells them that they're

not a grocery store, but Al, the other, tells them to just sell the bread.

Mae sells the family candy for reduced prices. Mae and Al wonder what such

families will do once they reach California.

Chapter Sixteen: The Joads and the Wilsons continue on their travels. Rose

of Sharon discusses with her mother what they will do when they reach

California. She and Connie want to live in a town, where he can get a job

in a store or a factory. He wants to study at home, possibly taking a radio

correspondence course. There is a rattling in the Wilson's car, so Al is

forced to pull over. There are problems with the motor. Sairy Wilson tells

them that they should go on ahead without them, but Ma Joad refuses,

telling them that they are like family now and they won't desert them. Tom

says that he and Casy will stay with the truck if everyone goes on ahead.

They'll fix the car and then move on. Only Ma objects. She refuses to go,

for the only thing that they have left is each other and she will not break

up the family even momentarily. When everyone else objects to her, she even

picks up a jack handle and threatens them. Tom and Casy try to fix the car,

and Casy remarks about how he has seen so many cars moving west, but no

cars going east. Casy predicts that all of the movement and collection of

people in California will change the country. The two of them stay with the

car while the family goes ahead. Before they leave, Al tells Tom that Ma is

worried that he will do something that might break his parole. Granma has

been going crazy, yelling and talking to herself.

Al asks Tom about what he felt when he killed a man. Tom admits that prison

has a tendency to drive a man insane. Tom and Al find a junkyard where they

find a part to replace the broken con-rod in the Wilson's car. The one-eyed

man working at the junkyard complains about his boss, and says that he

might kill him. Tom tells off the one-eyed man for blaming all of his

problems on his eye, and then criticizes Al for his constant worry that

people will blame him for the car breaking down. Tom, Casy and Al rejoin

the rest of the family at a campground not far away. To stay at the

campground, the three would have to pay an additional charge, for they

would be charged with vagrancy if they slept out in the open. Tom, Casy and

Uncle John eventually decide to go on ahead and meet up with everyone else

in the morning. A ragged man at the camp, when he hears that the Joads are

going to pick oranges in California, laughs. The man, who is returning from

California, tells how the handbills are a fraud. They ask for eight hundred

people, but get several thousand people who want to work. This drives down

wages. The proprietor of the campground suspects that the ragged man is

trying to stir up trouble for labor.

Chapter Seventeen: A strange thing happened for the migrant laborers.

During the day, as they traveled, the cars were separate and lonely, yet in

the evening a strange thing happened: at the campgrounds where they stayed

the twenty or so families became one. Their losses and their concerns

became communal. The families were at first timid, but they gradually built

small societies within the campgrounds, with codes of behavior and rights

that must be observed. For transgressions, there were only two punishments:

violence or ostracism. Leaders emerged, generally the wise elders. The

various families found connections to one another

Chapter Eighteen: When the Joads reach Arizona, a border guard stops them

and nearly turns them back, but does let them continue. They eventually

reach the desert of California. The terrain is barren and desolate. While

washing themselves during a stop, the Joads encounter migrant workers who

want to turn back. They tell them that the Californians hate the migrant

workers. A good deal of the land is owned by the Land and Cattle Company

that leaves the land largely untouched. Sheriffs push around migrant

workers, whom they derisively call "Okies." Noah tells Tom that he is going

to leave everyone, for they don't care about him. Although Tom protests,

Noah leaves them. Granma remains ill, suffering from delusions. She

believes that she sees Grampa. A Jehovite woman visits their tent to help

Granma, and tells Ma that she will die soon. The woman wants to organize a

prayer meeting, but Ma orders them not to do so. Nevertheless, soon she can

hear from a distance chanting and singing that eventually descends into

crying. Granma whines with the whining, then eventually falls asleep. Rose

of Sharon wonders where Connie is. Deputies come to the tent and tell Ma

that they cannot stay there and that they don't want any Okies around. Tom

returns to the tent after the policeman leaves, and is glad that he wasn't

there; he admits that he would have hit the cop. He tells Ma about Noah.

The Wilsons decide to remain even if they face arrest, since Sairy is too

sick to leave without any rest. Sairy asks Casy to say a prayer for her.

The Joads move on, and at a stop a boy remarks how hard-looking Okies are

and how they are less than human. Uncle John speaks with Casy, worried that

he brings bad luck to people. Connie and Rose of Sharon need privacy. Yet

again the Joads are pulled over for inspection, but Ma Joad insists that

they must continue because Granma needs medical attention. The next morning

when they reach the orange groves, Ma tells them that Granma is dead. She

died before they were pulled over for inspection.

Chapter Nineteen: California once belonged to Mexico and its land to the

Mexicans. But a horde of tattered feverish American poured in, with such

great hunger for the land that they took it. Farming became an industry as

the Americans took over. They imported Chinese, Japanese, Mexican and

Filipino workers who became essentially slaves. The owners of the farms

ceased to be farmers and became businessmen. They hated the Okies who came

because they could not profft from them. Other laborers hated the Okies

because they pushed down wages. While the Californians had aspirations of

social success and luxury, the barbarous Okies only wanted land and food.

Hoovervilles arose at the edge of every town. The Okies were forced to

secretly plant gardens in the evenings. The deputies overreacted to the

Okies, spurred by stories that an eleven year old Okie shot a deputy. The

great owners realized that when property accumulates in too few hands it is

taken away and that when a majority of the people are hungry and cold they

will take by force what they need.

Chapter Twenty: The Joads take Granma to the Bakersfield coroner's office.

They can't afford a funeral for her. They go to a camp to stay and ask

about work. They ask a bearded man if he owns the camp and whether they can

stay, and he replies with the same question to them. A younger man tells

them that the crazy old man is called the Mayor. According to the man, the

Mayor has likely been pushed by the police around so much that he's been

made bull-simple (crazy). The police don't want them to settle down, for

then they could draw relief, organize and vote. The younger man tells them

about the handbill fraud, and Tom suggests that everybody organize so that

they could guarantee higher wages. The man warns Tom about the blacklist.

If he is labeled an agitator he will be prevented from getting from

anybody. Tom talks to Casy, who has recently been relatively quiet. Casy

says that the people unorganized are like an army without a harness. Casy

says that he isn't helping out the family and should go off by himself. Tom

tries to convince him to stay at least until the next day, and he relents.

Connie regrets his decision to come with the Joads. He says that if he had

stayed in Oklahoma he could have worked as a tractor driver. When Ma is

fixing dinner, groups of small children approach, asking for food. The

children tell the Joads about Weedpatch, a government camp that is nearby

where no cops can push people around and there is good drinking water. Al

goes around looking for girls, and brags about how Tom killed a man. Al

meets a man named Floyd Knowles, who tells them that there was no steady

work. A woman reprimands Ma Joad for giving her children stew. Al brings

Floyd back to the family, where he says that there will be work up north

around Santa Clara Valley. He tells them to leave quietly, because everyone

else will follow after the work. Al wants to go with Floyd no matter what.

A man arrives in a Chevrolet coupe, wearing a business suit. He tells them

about work picking fruit around Tulare County. Floyd tells the man to show

his license -this is one of the tricks that the contractor uses. Floyd

points out some of the dirty tactics that the contractor is using, such as

bringing along a cop. The cop forces Floyd into the car and says that the

Board of Health might want to shut down their camp. Floyd punched the cop

and ran off. As the deputy chased after him, Tom tripped him. The deputy

raised his gun to shoot Floyd and fires indiscriminately, shooting a woman

in the hand. Suddenly Casy kicked the deputy in the back of the neck,

knocking him unconscious. Casy tells Tom to hide, for the contractor saw

him trip the deputy. More officers come to the scene, and they take away

Casy, who has a faint smile and a look of pride. Rose of Sharon wonders

where Connie has gone. She has not seen him recently. Uncle John admits

that he had five dollars. He kept it to get drunk. Uncle John gives them

the five in exchange for two, which is enough for him. Al tells Rose of

Sharon that he saw Connie, who was leaving. Pa claims that Connie was too

big for his overalls, but Ma scolds him, telling him to act respectfully,

as if Connie were dead. Because the cops are going to burn the camp

tonight, they have to leave. Tom goes to find Uncle John, who has gone off

to get drunk. Tom finds him by the river, singing morosely. He claims that

he wants to die. Tom has to hit him to make him come. Rose of Sharon wants

to wait for Connie to return. They leave the camp, heading north toward the

government camp.

Chapter Twenty-One: The hostility that the migrant workers faced changed

them. They were united as targets of hostility, and this unity made the

little towns of Hoovervilles defend themselves. There was panic when the

migrants multiplied on the highways. The California residents feared them,

thinking them dirty, ignorant degenerates and sexual maniacs. The number of

migrant workers caused the wages to go down. The owners invented a new

method: the great owners bought canneries, where they kept the price of

fruit down to force smaller farmers out. The owners did not know that the

line between hunger and anger is a thin one.

Chapter Twenty-Two: The Joads reach the government camp, where they are

surprised to find that there are toilets and showers and running water. The

watchman at the camp explains some of the other features of the camp: there

is a central committee elected by the camp residents that keeps order and

makes rules, and the camp even holds dance nights. The next morning, two

camp residents (Timothy and Wilkie Wallace) give Tom breakfast and tell him

about work. When they reach the fields where they are to work, Mr. Thomas,

the contractor, tells them that he is reducing wages from thirty to twenty-

five cents per hour. It is not his choice, but rather orders from the

Farmers' Association, which is owned by the Bank of the West. Thomas also

shows them a newspaper, which has a story about a band of citizens who burn

a squatters' camp, infuriated by presumed communist agitation, and warns

them about the dance at the government camp on Saturday night. There will

be a fight in the camp so that the deputies can go in. The Farmers'

Association dislikes the government camps because the people in the camps

become used to being treated humanely and are thus harder to handle. Tom

and the Wallaces vow to make sure that there won't be a fight.

While they work, Wilkie tells Tom that the complaints about agitators are

false. According to the rich owners, any person who wants thirty cents an

hour instead of twenty-five is a red. Back at the camp, Ruthie and Winfield

explore the camp, and are fascinated by the toilets they are frightened by

the flushing sound. Ma Joad makes the rest of the family clean themselves

up before the Ladies Committee comes to visit her. Jim Rawley, the camp

manager, introduces himself to the Joads and tells them some of the

features of the camp. Rose of Sharon goes to take a bath, and learns that a

nurse visits the camp every week and can help her deliver the baby when it

is time. Ma remarks that she no longer feels ashamed, as she had when they

were constantly harassed by the police. Lisbeth Sandry, a religious zealot,

speaks with Rose of Sharon about the alleged sin that goes on during the

dances, and complains about people putting on stage plays, which she calls

Њsin and delusion and devil stuff.' The woman even blames playacting for a

mother dropping her child. Rose of Sharon becomes frightened upon hearing

this, fearing that she will drop her child. Jessie Bullitt, the head of the

Ladies Committee, gives Ma Joad a tour of the camp and explains some of the

problems. Jessie bickers with Ella Summers, the previous committee head.

The children play and bicker. Pa comforts Uncle John, who still wants to

leave, thinking that he will bring the family punishment. Ma Joad confronts

Lisbeth Sandry for frightening Rose and for preaching that every action is

sinful. Ma becomes depressed about all of the losses Granma and Grampa,

John and Connie because she now has leisure time to think about such

things.

Chapter Twenty-Three: The migrant workers looked for amusement wherever

they could find it, whether in jokes or stories for amusement. They told

stories of heroism in taming the land against the Indians, or about a rich

man who pretended to be poor and fell in love with a rich woman who was

also pretending to be poor. The workers took small pleasures in playing the

harmonica or a more precious guitar or fiddle, or even in getting drunk.

Chapter Twenty-Four: The rumors that the police were going to break up the

dance reached the camp. According to Ezra Huston, the chairman of the

Central Committee, this is a frequent tactic that the police use. Huston

tells Willie Eaton, the head of the entertainment committee, that if he

must hit a deputy, do so where they won't bleed. The camp members say that

the Californians hate them because the migrants might draw relief without

paying income tax, but they refute this, claiming that they pay sales tax

and tobacco tax. At the dance, Willie Eaton approaches Tom and tells him

where to watch for intruders. Ma comforts Rose of Sharon, who is depressed

about Connie. Tom finds the intruders at the dance, but the intruders begin

a fight and immediately the police enter the camp. Huston confronts the

police about the intruders, asking who paid them. They only admit that they

have to make money somehow. Once the problem is defused, the dance goes on

without any problems.

Chapter Twenty-Five: Spring is beautiful in California, for behind the

fruitfulness of the trees in the orchards are men of understanding who

experiment with the seeds and crops to defend them against insects and

disease. Yet the fruits become rotten and soft. The rotten grapes are still

used for wine, even if contaminated with mildew and formic acid. The

rationale is that it is good enough for the poor to get drunk. The decay of

the fruit spreads over the state. The men who have created the new fruits

cannot create a system whereby the fruits may be eaten. There is a crime

here that goes beyond denunciation, a sorrow that weeping cannot symbolize.

Children must die from pellagra because the profft cannot be taken from an

orange.

Chapter Twenty-Six: One evening, Ma Joad watches Winfield as he sleeps; he

writhes as he sleeps, and he seems discolored. In the month that the Joads

have been in Weedpatch, Tom has had only five days of work, and the rest of

the men have had none. Ma worries because Rose of Sharon is close to

delivering her baby. Ma reprimands them for becoming discouraged. She tells

them that in such circumstances they don't have the right. Pa fears that

they will have to leave Weedpatch. When Tom mentions work in Marysville, Ma

decides that they will go there, for despite the accommodations at

Weedpatch, they have no opportunity to make money. They plan to go north,

where the cotton will soon be ready for harvest. Regarding Ma Joad's

forceful control of the family, Pa remarks that women seem to be in

control, and it may be time to get out a stick. Ma hears this, and tells

him that she is doing her job as wife, but he certainly isn't doing his job

as husband. Rose of Sharon complains that if Connie hadn't left they would

have had a house by now. Ma pierces Rose of Sharon's ears so that she can

wear small gold earrings. Al parts ways with a blonde girl that he has been

seeing; she rejects his promises that they will eventually get married. He

promises her that he'll return soon, but she does not believe him. Pa

remarks that he only notices that he stinks now that he takes regular

Страницы: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14