The Great Depression In John Steinbeck's The Grapes Of Wrath

During the roaring twenties, the economy of America rose rapidly. The total wealth of the nation nearly doubled between 1920 and 1929. With Wall Street in New York and many Americans pouring their savings into the stock market, the stock market expanded rapidly up until 1929. Stock markets began to rise to prices much higher than they were actually worth, and banks began to have large loans that couldn’t be dealt with. Unemployment grew in America, banks were closing down, and a hard drought hit the nation, thus creating the fall of the roaring twenties and the entrance of an economic crash known as the Great Depression. The Great Depression was a worldwide catastrophe that originated in the United States and rippled throughout the rest of the world due to a huge economic crash. This economic depression had repercussions on many countries and its citizens throughout the 1930’s. According to History.com, in just America alone …show more content…
In this, the Joad Family is taking shelter from a huge flood in a box car, where they later move to an old barn, along with a young boy and a sick man. Many of the people in the car are hungry and sick, especially for the older man, who hadn’t eaten for six days. The ending of the book leaves off with Rose of Sharon, who had just lost a stillborn child not too long before, breastfeeding the dying man, with a very distant smile. Despite the negative critiques, the ending that Steinbeck composed is thoughtfully written, yet can be interpreted in several ways. Still, in The Grapes of Wrath (Grapes), Steinbeck is able to brilliantly show through symbolism in the end of his book how the American Dream is failing the people, that the American people are finding a substitute for what their dreams should be, and the fact that they are happy with them lying to themselves, thus successfully making a statement about the ruins of what was left of America during the