Social Injustices In Of Mice And Men And The Grapes Of Wrath

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By the 1930’s, bankruptcies, foreclosures, and poverty ravaged American Society in which writers started to think of themselves as activists as many of them contained economic crises and social injustices of their time in their political fiction. During this time of political differences, John Steinbeck arose to become “the voice of American conscience,” in which he focused on “the enduring human capacity for survival” (Verde 112). Throughout all of his contemporary literary works, Steinbeck piled “detail upon detail until a picture and an experience emerged” (Shillinglaw 31). Two of Steinbeck’s most famous works were Of Mice and Men and The Grapes of Wrath, in which each focused on economic crisis and social injustices. However, by including …show more content…
Throughout the novel, George and Lennie cut barley, load wagons, and take care of livestock at various ranches. It is not until the reader becomes familiar with George and Lennie that Candy, an African American tenant farmer, is introduced. The reader is made aware of a tenant worker’s struggles when Candy states, “I planted crops for damn near ever’body in this state, but they wasn’t my crops, and when I harvested ‘em, it wasn’t non of my harvest” (Steinbeck 2, 76). Candy states that he in unable to make any money off his own crops because the banks own them. Steinbeck carefully depicts Candy as a hard working farmer to show that his financial suffering is similar to many other migrant farmers. Similar to the characters in The Grapes of Wrath “Roosevelt’s New Deal did not often help men like George and Lennie” (Williams 33). By showing how even hard working individuals are suffering economically, Steinbeck is able to bring the reader aware to another dimension of American …show more content…
When Crooks (an African American field worker) is introduced, he sadly states to George and Lennie “S’pose you couldn’t go into the bunkerhouse and play rummy ‘cause you was black” (Steinbeck 2 72). Since Crooks is African American, he is unable to participate in many of the activities a white person can do, even though they are both in the same socioeconomic class. Even Richard Hart, a well-known literary critic states, “ the description of Crook’s separate living quarters, complete with a manure pile right under the window, is one of the most vivid, powerful, and succinct depictions of racism’s effects in American literature” (Hart 40). It is Steinbeck’s constant, yet effective depiction of racism that allows the reader to become aware of these domestic social and economic crises, making him the quintessential

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