Confession: I never read “Grapes of Wrath.” Not until now. Most people are forced to read it in high school. It was taught in American Tradition, “AmTrad” we called it. I scorned the plebe English course, and took Honors AP Literature. We read “Great Expectations.”
I might have never read “Grapes of Wrath”— something about migrant farm workers in the 1930s; sounded dreary — without a prod from technology. I signed up for Audible, years ago, because I wanted to read all 21 volumes of Patrick O’Brian’s “Master and Commander” seafaring series. Listening to books is easy, especially when you walk a dog.
But Audible is a stern taskmaster. You pay your $14.99 a month, permitting you to download one book. Those months snap by, particularly when you’re signing up for bricks like “Don Quixote.”
Desperate to knock back a credit, I grabbed “Grapes of Wrath” just because it seems like one of those books that a person such as myself ought to have read. Honestly, I came to it so unfamiliar, I thought William Faulkner had written it, until I saw that no, it was John Steinbeck. We all have voids.
The book is almost 500 pages long — 30 hours of listening. The plot is simple. The good though poor Joad family loses their Oklahoma farm and goes on the road to California, where they expect to pluck oranges off the trees and enjoy life. Complications ensue.
While lost in the midst of this, in one of those moments where the news becomes a sort of Greek chorus, the New York Times reported on a survey of 2,000 parents, teachers and students, whose findings were neatly summed up in the headline: “Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class.”
Instead they get snippets. Distillations. This is a shame because actually reading a great book is a journey, not unlike the Joads’ trek. A brief slice just won’t cut it. It’s like looking at a postcard of a national park versus spending time hiking there.
Does “Grapes of Wrath” get tiresome in places? Certainly. You are bouncing along in that balky Hudson truck forever. Part of me is still there, sitting on a mattress with Ma, worrying about Rose of Sharon — her 19-year-old daughter, pregnant through most of the book, who I feel comfortable declaring one of the great characters in literature. Or perhaps I just fell in love with her.
I was captivated by the way Steinbeck wrote it. His descriptions of the land. Some chapters are set pieces —truck drivers at a diner, salesmen bantering on a used car lot — that don’t advance the narrative in any way, except to establish the scene where this is taking place, 1930s America.
A very different country, in some regards. The New Deal social programs that Republicans so hate — like food stamps — have done much to eradicate true hunger.
In other ways, it’s the same. Californians despise the Okies for showing up, so needy, so willing to work for nearly nothing. Anyone puzzling over our nation’s ability to hate desperate immigrants who come here trying to forge new lives for themselves should realize that skin color and language just make doing so easier. Lacking those, we’ll hate our fellow white American citizens, for the crime of being poor, except when the peach crop needs picking.
Yes, nothing is more tiresome than old people pining for their moribund technologies. The endless slideshow carnival of TikTok and Instagram are not without merit, I’m sure. But I can’t imagine the impact lingers more than a minute, never mind decades.
Books can stick with a person. I remember reading the end of “Catch-22” in high school. Not for any class. Just ’cause. I remember where I was sitting in the library when I finished the book, stunned.
Wanting to grab the lines that stuck with me —”You’ll have to jump” — I plugged the request into AI several ways just now and got nothing: bland assessments that were not what I was looking for. For something that’s going to take over the world, AI is still pretty dumb. Then again, that seems to be the current dynamic.
Then I realized — I have “Catch-22” on the shelf. I pulled it down.
“You’ll have to jump.”
“I’ll jump.”
“Jump!” Major Danby cried.
“Yossarian jumped.” — just as another character swings at him with a knife.
“The knife came down, missing him by inches, and he took off.”
In 50 years of jumping and running, “Catch-22” has been very handy to have in the back of one’s mind, just as “Grapes of Wrath” is a welcome addition to my mental landscape. Books are still vital. I can’t imagine young people being denied the chance to read them.