JOHN STEINBECK: THE MAN AND THE ENVIRONMENT (INTERTEXTUALITY IN THE SOCIAL AWARENESS OF STEINBECK’S IN DUBIOUS BATTLE, OF MICE AND MEN, AND THE GRAPES OF WRATH)

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AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra

in English Letters

By

RINI HANDAYANI

Student Number: 984214162

ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS

FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would express my gratitude to my advisor, Drs. Hirmawan Widjanarka, M.Hum. for his valuable advice and guidance. I also express my gratitude to my co-advisor Dra. Th. Enny Anggraini, M.A., for her advice and suggestion in revising my thesis. I also would like to thank to all of the lecturers and staffs, especially Dr. Fr. Alip, M.Pd., M.A., Dr. Novita Dewi, M.A.,M.S., Hons. Drs.

F.X. Siswadi, M.A., Arti Wulandari, S.S, M.A., Tatang Iskarna, S.S, M.Hum, Dewi Widyastuti, SPd, M.Hum., and Mbak Nik.

Thanks to Medira Ferayanti in the University of London, Cik Irene Amelia in Amsterdam and Dra. Milda M.Si in Bandung for your lovely friendship. Good luck with your study! To my beloved friend, Peter Healey in Midland, West Australia, thank you for your sympathy when “The catastrophe of May, 2006” happened. You empowered me emotionally. To the family of Nora Robbers in Amsterdam and my parents who love me, I appreciate your valuable advice to face unpredictable life. I will never forget you, all.

My deepest gratitude is also addressed to my former colleagues in the following companies. First, it goes to all of the staffs in PT. Rekayasa Industry Construction and Engineering, Kalibata, Jakarta, PKT Bontang, and BNI 46 Bontang, Kal-Tim thank you for trusting me to work with you all.

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especially Dr. Sanggono, M.Sc. who is always humble lecturer. Thank you to teach my husband to know more about chemistry and dedication in work.

To all PRAMIS community in Bandung and Jakarta, thank you for accepting me to be the member of PRAMIS. To Drs. B. Rahmanto, M.Hum. thank you for the same hobby of reading Pram. To the family of the late P.A.T, thank you for your warm welcome in your nice house. To Egi, QB Bookshop Senayan Plaza, Jakarta, thank you for choosing me Steinbeck’s books. To Mrs. John Szot and all of the American citizens in Bontang, who did not want to discuss the American policy and the communism in America during 30’s with me, I’m so sorry if you think that talking about the American politics is “useless”. I just want to get the complete data for Steinbeck.

Lastly, I would like to thank my husband, Purwito and my daughter, Jasmine Purwitaningrum, for their constant love. I promise I will be home soon. I LOVE YOU.

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In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and Men, and The Grapes of, are related in the stories and written by the same writer, John Steinbeck. These novels reveal the social realism issues. The writer lives during the Great Depression in America in which people dream of the future land and the prosperity. In the Promised land, California, all their dreams are ruined and the poor remain poor. Every character tries to struggle and reach his or her dream. It is obvious that John Steinbeck uses his own research and interview with the migrant people to give the detail condition of the lower class people. Steinbeck sees the dominant ideologies neither communism nor capitalism actually bring a better hope for its participants. Therefore in this study on social awareness, there are two questions that should be answered to reveal the intertextuality in the social awareness of John Steinbeck’s novels. The questions are (1) How are the lower class’s sufferings described in Steinbeck’s In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and Men, and The Grapes of Wrath?, (2) What possible background may have influenced John Steinbeck’s tendency to vocalize the lower class’s sufferings and their struggle in the term of social issues?

There are two approaches of the study used in analyzing the problems. They are Marxist approach and History-biographical approach. Both approaches are used to have a deep understanding on John Steinbeck’s social awareness of the lower class people.

The discussion of problem one points out the characteristics of each character in Steinbeck’s novels as the part of the lower class people who often suffer and they can not control the holistic system. The ruling class people try to preserve their position and prosperity for themselves. During the Great Depression, most of depressed people, represented by the lower class people posses impossible dream.

The discussion of problem two is the possible background may have influenced John Steinbeck to vocalize the suffering and the way of the lower class people struggling. Steinbeck lives in the period of the Great Depression and settles in California. He himself is a poverty witness. He is obsessed with the ideology of communism. Then, he changes his mind after realizing that communism also exploits its participants. He is still on the side of the poor, but he is not a member of communist party.

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Letters, Faculty of Letters, Sanata Dharma University.

In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and Men, dan The Grapes of Wrath adalah novel-novel yang saling berhubungan dikarenakan ditulis pengarang yang sama, yaitu John Steinbeck. Kita bisa mengetahui isu-isu realism sosial. Hidup di masa Depresi tahun 1930an, orang-orang cenderung memiliki impian yang tidak dapat terwujud, yaitu tentang kemakmuran. Orang-orang bermigrasi ke California yang dipercaya sebagai “Tanah yang dijanjikan”, sayang, seluruh mimpi orang-orang kelas bawah hancur di negeri yang korup ini. Dalam karya-karya Steinbeck, In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and Men, dan The Grapes of Wrath terlihat gambran penderitaan orang murba.Ia sadar bahwa apapun itu ideologinya, komunis ataupun kapitalis merugikan bagi yang mengikutinya.

Karenanya dalam studi kesadaran sosial, ada dua pertanyaan mendasar yang dijawab untuk menyingkap studi dalam karya-karya Steinbeck. Pertanyaannya adalah (1) Bagaimana penderitaan kaum bawah dalam tiga novel tersebut digambarkan? (2) Kemungkinan apa saja yang melatarbelakangi Steinbeck untuk menyuarakan penderitaan kaum kelas bawah dan daya juang mereka selama masa Depresi?

Pendekatan yang digunakan untuk menganalisis permasalahan tersebut adalah pendekatan secara Marxis dan pendekatan sejarah-biografi tentang Steinbeck. Pendekatan-pendekatan ini digunakan untuk mendapatkan pengertian kesadaran sosial bagi kaum marginal, dan berdasarkan biograpi sang pengarang, penulis bisa berasumsi bahwa Steinbeck dipengaruhi lingkungannya untuk membela kaum lemah ini.

Dalam diskusi pada permasalahan pertama menghasilkan gambaran penderitaan kaum murba.Kaum kapitalis berusaha mempertahankan kemapanan dan kenyamanan hidup serta menolak berbagi dengan kaum murba. Bagi kaum murba, hidup dalam masa Depresi memungkinkan mereka memiliki impian yang tak pernah terwujud.

Pada diskusi bagian kedua adalah kemungkinan yang melatarbelakangi Steinbeck untuk membela kaum murba . Pada awalnya, ia terobsesi dengan komunis di Amerika lalu berubah pikiran setelah ia menyadari bahwa sistem komunis juga memperdaya pengikutnya.Ia terus berpihak pada kaum murba, namun bukan berarti ia adalah pengarang yang beraliran komunis. Kesimpulan dari diskusi tentang karakteristik setiap tokoh dalam karya Steinbeck dan latar belakang Steinbeck untuk memihak kaum murba adalah mencerminkan

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CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Study

Among the Communist revolutionary activities, one which played an

important role is artistic activity, whose style of creation is called socialist

realism.

Lenin says that art should stand on the side of the working class and grow

with them. He believes that it is a must for a writer to be a partisan and especially

literature is an obligation to be part of the proletariat or the working class.

In www.tparents.com, one of the articles of Maxim Gorky, the founder of

socialist realism (1868-1936), states that it is necessary for the writers to stand on

the high viewpoint to see the filthy crimes of capitalism, and all of the greatness

of the heroic activities of the proletariat.

One of the American writers, who concerns with the suffering of the lower

class is John Steinbeck. His writings often make the government and Associated

Farmers, Inc.in California inflamed. Detractors accuse the author of everything

from harboring communist sympathies to exaggerating the conditions in migrant

camps. The uproar draws the attention of Eleanor Roosevelt, who came to

Steinbeck's defense, and eventually led to congressional hearings on migrant

camp conditions and changes in labor laws.

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Eleanor Roosevelt in Warren French’s syndicate column in May Day,

states that The Grapes of Wrath was exaggerated by Steinbeck. Gratefully,

Steinbeck responds and says if Eleanor Roosevelt constantly calls him a liar.

In Kern County, meanwhile, the president of the Associated Farmers of

Kern County asserts that a book obscene in the extreme sense attacks them.

John Steinbeck states that The Associated Farmers, which presumes to

speak for the farms of California, failed. He, in his book America and Americans

(2003:83), shows us the wage cut for the tenants and Associated Farmers’

contribution to make people hungry.

Born in Salinas, California, in 1902, John Steinbeck grows up in fertile

agricultural valley about twenty-five miles from the Pacific Coast. He is the

witness of the poverty, injustice, and the suffering of the lower class. California,

supposed to be the “Promised Land,” is a corrupt land. He has written three

powerful novels of the late1930s, focusing on the California laboring class: In

Dubious Battle (1938), Of Mice and Men (1936 ), and The Grapes of Wrath

(1939).

In this study, In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and Men, and The Grapes of

Wrath are intertextualized as the main objects of this analysis by revealing the

suffering of the lower class to see the continuum thematic structure and to see the

possible background that may influence Steinbeck’s tendency to shape his social

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B. Problem Formulation

Based on background above the problems of the thesis are formulated as

follows:

1. How are the lower class’s sufferings described in Steinbeck’s In Dubious

Battle, Of Mice and Men, and The Grapes of Wrath?

2. What possible background may have influenced John Steinbeck’s

tendency to shape his social consciousness by revealing the social issues in

the three novels above?

C. Objectives of Study

The aim of this study is to answer the problems that have been formulated.

There are two objectives of this study. The first objective is to analyze the lower

class’s suffering and the second is to analyze the possible background which may

have influenced John Steinbeck’s tendency to shape his social consciousness by

revealing the social issues in the three novels above.

D. Definition of Terms

In order to understand the subject matter of this undergraduate thesis, to

avoid misunderstanding, some terms need to be defined clearly.

The first term is intertextuality. According to Julia Kristeva in The Harper

Dictionary of Modern Thought (1980: 436), intertextuality is the relationship

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necessary interdependence that any literary has with a mass of others, which

preceded it. A literary text is not an isolated phenomenon, it is “constructed from

a mosaic of quotations; any text is the absorption and transformation of another.”

In Phenomenona, Journal of Language and Literature Vol.4

No.3-February 2001 page 22 Novita Dewi in her article “Intertextuality in John Koch’s

Living Dangerously”, says that intertextuality is concerned with the production of

new texts out of others in order to create meaning.

The second term is social awareness. In www.campwest.org according to

Daniel Goleman, social awareness refers to a spectrum that runs form

instantaneously sensing another’s inner state, to understanding his or her feelings

and thoughts, and complicated social institutions. It includes:

1. Primary empathy: feeling with others; sensing nonverbal emotional

signals

2. Attunement: listening with full receptivity; attuning to a person.

3. Empathetic accuracy: understanding another person’s thoughts,

feelings and intentions.

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CHAPTER II

THEORETICAL REVIEW

A. Review of Related Studies

Tim Morris, in www.uta.edu/english/tim/lection/index/html, says that the

characters as seen in In Dubious Battle are not notable for depth of

characterization. The rural setting does not offer much good place writing because

the place is too generic. It is a novel of action, but the action is conveyed mostly

through talk. Much of the novel takes place in the tents of the strikers where their

leaders discuss the day's action and the plan for the next strike.

Erica Frank, in www.gradesaver.com Problem vs. Picaresque states that In

Dubious Battle is a picaresque novel that portrays the rascal people. Jim and Mac

could be described as rascals in In Dubious Battle. In this novel, Mac asks Jim if

he has blue jeans and Jim's response is no. Mac insists, "Well, we'll have to go out

and buy you some in a second-hand store, then" (39). However, Mac and Jim

were not dressed as migrant workers because they were migrant workers, but

because they wanted to look as if they were. Failing in this characteristic would

not be as bad, but In Dubious Battle also fails to be episodic in nature.

The events leading up to the death of Jim are not interchangeable. The

novel has a set structure that needs to be followed to maintain the given plotline.

A writer could not place the arrival of strikebreakers before the strike and you

could not put the arrest of Dakin before the gathering of the strikers in Mr.

Anderson's field. Steinbeck designed a set development for Jim's character that

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takes a certain path to accomplish. As seen in the movie The Grapes of Wrath, its

sub-stories are interchangeable. The episodes still make sense for the plotline to

move, add, or delete.

In www.creighton.edu, Michael Levant, “A struggle to achieve identity:

the story of Curley’s wife “, states on the surface. The character of Curley's wife

in John Steinbeck's classic novel Of Mice and Men seems insignificant and

one-dimensional. She appears briefly in only three scenes and often repeats the same

questions or statements. Critics consequently disregard her as "characterless,

nameless”.

Mark Spilka claims that Steinbeck himself has given this woman no other

name but 'Curley's wife,' as if she had no personal identity for him.

Charlotte Hadella concurs in her criticism of the novel, "The fiction does

not offer an authoritative or absolute statement on the woman's character". She

believes Steinbeck even has "difficulty in finding his own words to describe the

character once he has taken her out of the context of the story" in a letter he wrote

to Claire Luce, the actress who portrayed her in the 1930s play version of the

novel.

These comments seem to suggest that John Steinbeck is careless or lax

throughout the novel in his development of Curley's wife. However, neither

Steinbeck nor his fiction is truly to blame for Curley's wife's lack of identity.

Charlotte Hadella helps illuminate the reason why Steinbeck creates

Curley's wife without a distinct identity when she says, "neither the context of the

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her portrait is incomplete". A psychological analysis of Curley's wife reveals what

Hadella touches upon in the latter part of her statement: Curley's wife has yet to

establish an identity for herself. The "context" of her life has left her deprived of

many of the established means necessary for the development of an identity.

Therefore, it is essential that Steinbeck omits both a name and a definite identity

in his creation of Curley's wife in order to accurately portray her character's

psychological state.

In www.Bookrags.com, Attell, a doctoral candidate at the University of

California, Berkeley, explains that Steinbeck departs from the depiction of a

woman in Of Mice and Men. Curley’s wife functions almost as a force of nature.

She leaves only shattered dreams in her wake. The ending appears to be at odds

Steinbeck’s explicit exhortation for social change. He seems to appeal a higher

form of wisdom in the character of Slim, who does not aspire to anything beyond

the sphere occupies.

There is a criticism from Rod W. Horton and Herbert W. Edwards in their

book Backgrounds of American Literary Thought (1952: 242) criticizes the

tendency of John Steinbeck to be an opportunist in the “leftist” eye. The writer

who has being the most effective person in portraying the plight of the disposed

farmers is John Steinbeck, whose Grapes of Wrath (1939) has often been called

the Uncle Tom’s Cabin of the Depression. However, Steinbeck does not always

present the poor and outcast as objects of pity or as in need of social reformation.

Steinbeck’s treatments for the happy poor are, of course, the labor novel In

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all pleased with the former, because the methods of the labor organization in the

novel were portrayed as being frankly opportunistic, and the author refuses to take

sides, leaving the issue in doubt.

In www.home.pacific.net.au./greg.hub/BattleHymnTwain.html.com, an

article of G. Smith states that, Steinbeck is fully aroused and unequivocally on the

side of his disposed farmers. His treatment of entrepreneurs and businessmen of

all types is scathing in the extreme, and the chapter on the sales methods used by

the second hand-car dealers is a minor classic of savage irony and satire.

Steinbeck still hardly conforms to the rest of the Marxian doctrine

although he openly expressed his dislike to the system of capitalism. His

description of the caterpillar tractor tilling the fields and his implied solution of

everyman on his own forty acres of the good earth is the opposite of the Marxian

call for the creation of a vast industrial proletariat. In short, to Marxist Steinbeck

is merely a sentimental reactionary.

Wilfred L. Guerin et al. in their book A Handbook of Critical Approaches

to Literature (1999: 329) state that the Marxist critic wishes to go beyond mere

concern with literature’s inevitable disclosure of tensions and contradictions

within a society. He or she may espouse the production theory of Louis

Althusser. According to his theory, through the ideology that capitalism has

degenerated-the structures of thought, feelings, and behavior that maintain its

control over society-ideology. Thus, we get fictions that gloss over the

contradictions in order to justify capitalism. A writer who is fully committed to

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or her work would show the transformation of social relationships. The ideal

Marxist work would present not just a powerful story but also a workable solution

to socioeconomic ills. Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath might have the first part;

the second remains to be found.

In www.filmcritic.com/misc/emporum/nsf, Christopher Null states that

John Ford's adaptation of the John Steinbeck novel is moving and heartfelt, beside

its random structure and rambling, as well as overwrought (and overly political)

narrative. Henry Fonda owns the show as Tom Joad, a greedy corporation has

ousted a prison parolee in the 1930s that returns to his Oklahoma home to

discover his family from their farm when the infamous "dust bowl" hits. The

family packs it up for California to try to make a go of it as migrant farm workers,

which doesn't necessarily pan out for the best, thanks to Tom's penchant for

getting into fights with "Okies go home" types. The Grapes of Wrath pours on the

populist and neo-Communist schmaltz, but Fonda's portrayal of the

permanently-down-on-his-luck Tom really makes us feel sorry for him.

The reviews of those critics can be used to develop this thesis as a new

study which scrutinizes three novels The Dubious Battle, The Mice and Men, and

The Grapes of Wrath in social realism issue revealed from the characters and the

suffering of lower class. Most previous critics discuss the failure of John

Steinbeck to be a leftist. However, this thesis will defense that Steinbeck is still a

proletarian writer with the spirit of individualism and libertarian by revealing the

continuum of three novels from the social context to reach the thematic relation.

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B. Review of Related Theories

1.Theory of Character and Characterization

In An Introduction to Literary Studies (1999:17-21), Mario Klarer states

that the character can be differentiated into two method of presentation. First,

explanatory characterization is the character, which is presented with selective,

and judging narrator; in short, it is a kind of telling characterization. Second,

dramatic characterization where the character can be analyzed from the way he or

she acts. There is no direct judge to recognize the character, but our perception is

needed.

M.H. Abrams, in his book A Glossary of Literary Terms (1981:20-21)

divides characters in fiction into flat characters and round characters. Flat

characters are “a single idea of quality”. Flat characters also has few characteristic

and even has no desires, motivations, or conflicts such as man against man, man

against his society, or man against himself. Therefore, a flat character does not

change from the beginning to the end of the story making the character is easy to

remember. Since the character is a simple or static character, it is presented

without much individualizing detail and can be described in single phase or

sentence. On the other hand, round character is more complex than a flat

character. Flat character has many characteristic and complex desires, motivations

and conflicts. Because of the characteristics, he must be changing his character

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M.J. Murphy, in his book Understanding Unseen (1972: 161-173),

explains another theory of characterization. The first way is from personal

description. He states that the reader from a person’s appearance in many sides

can describe a character. The author can tell the details of a character, such as the

face, the eyes, the skin, or the clothes. The second way is character as seen by

another, besides describing the character directly. The character can be described

from another opinion. The third way is from the speech. The reader can

understand the character’s way of saying. It can be the clue to the character when

she/he speaks, in conversation with the other, give opinion. The forth way is from

character’s past life. The character shapes the clue of character’s past life. The

reader can understand the character’s past from direct comment of the author,

through person’s thought, through the conversation or through the medium of

another person. The fifth way is from the conversation with others. The sixth way

of the characterization is from the reaction of the character about various events.

The seventh way is from the direct comment from author. The eighth way is from

the thought of the character. The last way is mannerism, which author describes

from the character’s habits.

2.Theory of Socialist Realism

Pramoedya Ananta Toer explains to us that the socialist realism is an

official doctrine governing the authors to write the governmental propaganda in

the former Soviet Union. It reveals the hypocrisy of the church and all events

accord with the Marxism view that the struggle among economic classes is the

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through the literature, which is hoped to bring the victory of the communism. The

authors must depict the life of the working classes, who are oppressed by the cruel

system of the capitalism.

Maxim Gorky, the founder of the socialist realism, in Pramoedya Ananta

Toer’s Realism-Sosialis Satra Indonesia (2003: 20) states that literature must be

part of the proletarian people. This method brings the triumph of the socialism and

the integral part of the human beings to vanish the exploitation and the oppression

for the working classes; the peasants and the farmer. Gorky thinks that the

bourgeoisies are promoting fascism and discarding their humanism like an out

worn mask, which can no longer conceal the fangs of the beast of pray, is

discarding. They have come to understand for their personalities and decays.

This theory places the reality as the global ingredient to make the dialectic

thought perfect. On the contrary, the bourgeoisie realism or humanism realism

only does emphasize on the materialism. It is obvious that humanism realism is

just for the rich people who have already in the established position and living in

luxury, include their education system for their children.

Socialist realism emphasizes on the lower class’ sufferings. First, the

militancy because they have no compromise with the foe is the main feature for

class sufferings. Second, the efficiency by making his foes surrender. As stated by

Maxim Gorky if the foe does not surrender, he must be destroyed. This system

tries to abolish the social stratification, abolishment all the possibilities the rising

of minority class who exploits the majority who is productive and creative. This

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With this militancy, the social realism author who has controlled the

reality tries to change it based on the social justice. The spirit of the changing is

completely revolutionary because social realism does not teach people to accept

the reality and give up easily. This condition demands the continuum revolution in

his thought.

Literature as the device of the struggle must be on the side of the

proletarian. Literature and arts, like all other activities, can not be taken apart from

the economic and political fields, but they must be included in them.

The social realism authors do not have to be afraid to conjoin with politics.

They must bring the patriotic spirit and the triumph of the socialism. Using the

dialectic philosophy or the dichotomous way sees the social contradiction and the

division between the exploit and exploited class.

Generally, the Marxian thinks that bourgeoisies and capitalists are the

prime enemy for the working class people. The capitalists have succeeded to make

a significant gap between the capitalist and the labor because they tend to

appreciate everything from the parameter of materialism. They are profit-oriented

persons and no matter what they do include exploiting the working class and

brainwashing for people to think of the suffering of the lower class. It is obvious

for the upper class to preserve his position. He has strong position and can get

profit from what the lower class. For the lower class, he has to work to get food

and salary because he has no other choice. If he does not want to work, other will

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The upper class exploits the lower class continually. This state seems to

maintain and support the upper class. Here the bound between the upper class and

the state is clearly defined as a fact. They are not undeniable. The minority whose

power to rule people with his economical power dominates the structure of the

state. The state firstly makes a policy to preserve the ruling class or the upper

class. There is always a tendency for the state to maintain the ruling class’

position. No wonder if the state’s policy gives much advantage for the upper

class.

3. Theory of Capitalism

Capitalism has something to do with religious point of view, especially

that of Calvinist. Heibroner in his book The Making of Economic Society (1962:

54) states that according to the theories of the German sociologist Max Weber and

the English economic historian, R.H. Tawney, the underlying cause lay in the rise

of a new theological point of view contained in the teachings of the Protestant

reformer, John Calvin (1509-1564).

The changing in religious matter based on the attitudes towards the

material world. Catholicism and Christianity in general before Calvin “tended to

look upon worldly activity as vanity”. In contrast, Calvinism provided a religious

atmosphere by encouraging people for wealth seeking and the temper of a

business-like world. Calvinists see the energetic merchant as a Godly man. The

meaning of work and worth is clearly defined as the arising notion that the more

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4. Theory of Marxism

Charles E. Bressler in his book Literary Criticism (1999: 213) explains the

thought of Marxism. According to Marx, history and therefore an understanding

of people and their actions and beliefs is determined by economic conditions.

Marx maintains that an intricate web of social relationships emerges when any

group of people engage in the production of goods. For example, a few will be the

employers, but many will be employees. It is the employers (the bourgeoisies)

who have the economic power and who readily gain social and political control of

their society. Eventually this upper class will articulate their beliefs, values, and

even art. Consciously and unconsciously they ill force these ideas, or what Max

calls their ideology, on the working class, otherwise known as the proletariat, or

the wage slaves. In effect, the bourgeoisies will develop and control the

superstructure. In such a system, the rich become richer while the poor become

poorer and more oppressed.

In such a system the bourgeoisies’ ideology effectively perpetuates the

system on which it is founded. Referred to as false consciousness, this ideology

also describes the way in which the dominant class shapes and controls

individual’s self-definition or class-consciousness.

In a capitalist society, Marx declares that such an ideology leads to

fragmentation and alienation of individuals, particularly those of the proletariat.

As a direct result of division labor within the capitalist society, workers no longer

have contact with the entire process of producing, distributing, and consuming

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as well as from each other; each performing discrete functional roles assigned t

him by the bourgeoisies. To rid society of this situation, Marx believes that the

government must own all industries and control the economic production of a

country to protect the people from the oppression of the bourgeoisie.

James William Coleman in his book Social Problems (1980:16-18) says

that class conflicts arise in part because people share the same values. If two

groups of people palace a high value on wealth and power and only one group

have access to them, conflict is likely to result. Such conflicts are usually class

conflict. Many sociologists believe that class conflict over wealth, power, and

status is the basic cause of most social problem.

A conflict theorist need not focus only on either class conflict or values

conflicts. Indeed, most sociologists recognize that conflict can arise both from

differences in values and from difference in the distribution of wealth, power, and

status. Class conflict, according to Marx, is a result of an inevitable historical

process. He thinks that the workers (proletariat) would develop a growing

awareness of their exploitation by the bourgeoisie and predicted that their growing

political organization would eventually lead to violent class conflict. A revolution

won by workers over their masters would, Marx contended, leads to a classless

society. Private property and inheritance would be abolished, steeply graduated

income taxes would be introduced; education and training would be free; and

production would be organized for use, not profit.

The division employer and employee is the binding system which shows

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regardless of the interests of the other. In other word, employer exploits the

employee. This case depersonalizes employee people relation by turning them into

simple economic transactions subject to market forces. The employers however

try creating loyalty among their employees by creating ties of a non-economic

nature.

For Marxian author, they are hoped to reveal the proletariat consciousness.

They become aware of its objective class position vis- á vis the bourgeoisie and

the historic role in the transformation of capitalism into socialism. The proletariat

would develop its own class. This consciousness would develop out of the

working class’s concrete experience of the contradiction between capitalist

relations of production based on individual private property and the emerging

collective forces of production, which created a proletariat whose power is

collectively based and experienced.

C. Review on the Historical-Biographical Background

In October 29, 1929, the stock market crashed, triggering the Great

Depression, the worst economic collapse in the history of the modern industrial

world. It spread from the United States to the rest of the world, lasting from the

end of 1929 until the early 1940s. With banks failing and businesses closing, more

than 15 million Americans (one-quarter of the workforce) became unemployed.

The rich people became poor because their money which they invested American

share market has got collapsed. They went bankrupt in 1930’s even some of them

(29)

By the 1930s money was scarce because of the depression, so people did

what they could to make their lives happy. In the Great Depression the American

dream had become a nightmare. The land once was the opportunity and now the

land of desperation. What was once the land of hope and optimism had become

the land of despair. The American people were questioning all the maxims on

which they had based their lives - democracy, capitalism, and individualism. The

best hope for a better life was California. Many Dust Bowl farmers packed their

families into cars, tied their few possessions on the back, and sought work in the

agricultural fields or cities of the West - their role as independent landowners

gone forever.

Steinbeck witnessed great social changes caused by high spirit of

capitalism and materialism. His characters in the three novels above are invested

fruitlessly in an effort to achieve social position. During the American experience,

the characters are written fully aware of what it suggested about his/her time and

place. They have something in common i.e. people intend to go to West America

to pursue their dream becomes rich.

Accompanying the flourishing capitalism and the technological

innovations they affected almost all of the social interactions of the American

society. To Wright et al. The Democratic Experience: A Short American History

(1963: 348), the decade was one of profound change in American history, a time

when motion picture, radio, automobiles, and electricity were changing the whole

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19

Writers of the 1920’s experienced a growing dissatisfaction with and

alienation from American society and twentieth century values. In particular, they

were disillusioned by the ease with which Woodrow Wilson had converted moral

idealism into a zeal for war; they were alienated by the triumph of materialism

and business values in the postwar period; and they were exasperated by the smug

self-satisfaction of the American upper classes.

Capitalism places individuals in their fullest capacity to achieve the most

possible expectation in human life. There is no chance for the working class

people represented in John Steinbeck’s three novels above to come out of their

economic pressures, both from the production and commercial sides will be left

aside during the Great Depression.

American government takes the greatest part in realizing the welfare of the

nation by emphasizing the expansion of the agriculture, manufacture, and

commerce. So that, since capitalism can operate on each of those fields of

economy as well as affect the life of the society in general. It was the business of

the government to achieve the balance of economy. From social point of view, the

balance must include the welfare state of the nation including the interests of both

upper and lower class.

In any case, the bad side of capitalism occurs when the accumulation of

wealth in certain hands represented by the landowners and Associated Farmers.

The accumulation of power is also in their hand. For the working class people,

they become the victims of others’ freedom. They have no access to get

(31)

In The Portable Steinbeck (1971: xix), Covici states that Steinbeck has

capacity to express his emotional truth, moral value, and social relevance all come

down to life upon the page, and the experience of being human. His works should

long give to his readers the delight in which all lasting art has its beginning and its

end.

Steinbeck’s heart goes out to these humble people. He tries not pitying

them; he empathizes. He himself knows how to work hard. In his boyhood, he

works as a fruit picker, ranch hand, bricklayer, and delivery boy. His own

experience gives him a genuine appreciation for labor. As an adult, Steinbeck

travels extensively through the West from Oklahoma to California, experiencing

first-hand the sad and frightening conditions of migrant workers. He lives in their

camps, listens to their authentic stories and collects material for his writing. The

author lives through the Great Depression of the 1930s. The economic collapse

grows severest in the center of the country after a prolonged drought turned

Oklahoma into a "Dust Bowl."

Parini, his biographer, reveals the painful experience of writing for

Steinbeck, who endures numerous ailments from the early days of his career. The

biographer In the case of Steinbeck's master work, The Grapes of Wrath, the

author carefully researches California migrant camps, a major element of the story

as Oklahomans fleeing the great dust bowl resides in them on the way to

establishing their own roots moving westward. Steinbeck has an excellent guide,

Tom Collins, who managed the Kern County Migrant Camp and became a friend

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21

wrote: "To Tom —who lived it." It is a simple dedication which meant so much,

so typically earthy, and so typically Steinbeck. Tom Collins, Steinbeck’s chief

source, guide, discussant and chronicle accurate migrant information. Collins not

only put Steinbeck in touch with the real life prototypes of the Joads and Jim

Casy, but also himself serves as Steinbeck’s real-life prototype for Jim Rawley,

the fictional manager of the Weedpatch government camp. Collins possesses a

genius for camp administration- he had the right mix of fanaticism, vision, and

tactfulness.

D. Theoretical Framework

The theory of characters and characterization, social realism, and

historical- biographical background will be useful in order to solve the problem

formulation that has been stated. The theory of character and characterization is

important to understand the pattern of a character and the making of a character.

Some experts explain about the theory of character and characterization. They are

Mario Klarer, Perrine, M.H. Abrams and M.J. Murphy. The theories help the

writer to analyze the kind of personality from the various characters of both

novels have and find the action they are doing in the novel in order to analyze the

social injustice issue.

The theory of Social Realism, Capitalism, and Marxism help to understand

the basic concept of the proletariat’s suffering and the contribution of author to

promote a social revolution. Lenin, Maxim Gorxy, Pramoedya A.T, Charles E.

Bressler, Heibroner, R.H. Tawney, James William Coleman, and Wright et al.

(33)

relation through the very significant for the analysis of the inequality issue of the

wage division and the background of the dichotomous system in labor place, and

the tendency for the capitalist to exploit the working class people. We will see the

accumulated money in the hands of the ruling class, represented by Associated

Farmers. The last, the review on the Historical-Biographical Background of John

Steinbeck is useful to understand the situation of politic, economy and social

(34)

CHAPTER III

METHODOLOGY

A. Objects of the Study

The Viking Press published In Dubious Battle in New York in 1938. The

central figure of the story is an activist for “the Party” (the American Communist

Party) who is organizing a major strike by the migratory workers. They rise up to

against the landowners.

Protagonist Jim and Mac are sent from the City as emissaries of the Party

the migrant workers of the fictional Torgas Valley. Mac, the veteran, wants

bloodshed, headlines, and celebrity. Jim wants to take revenge for his father. Mac

and Jim find allies among the fruit tramps.

Much of the novel takes place in the tents of the strikers in which the

leaders talk over the plan of strike. The jaded Doc Burton, an educated physician

who helps the Party without believing its rhetoric, represented the voice of John

Steinbeck himself.

Of Mice and Men was published in 1936 in London by Penguin Group.

The story is about two traveling farm workers trying to work up enough money to

buy their own farm. It encompasses themes of racism, prejudice against the

mentally ill, and the struggle for personal independence.

The story is all about the dreams of a pair of migrant laborers working the

California soil, is critically acclaimed, and is rapidly adapted into a 1939

Hollywood film, starring Lon Chaney Jr. as Lennie and Burgess Meredith as

George.

(35)

This novel has been filmed twice. In the story, George encourages Lennie

to pursue his dream by himself. They have ideals and that separates them from the

animals, they dream of their own promised land, but the dreams are always too far

away and cannot come true in real life. George and Lennie’s dreams of their own

little farm, the dream of Curley's wife for a happy marriage to a devoted husband

and Crooks on the other hand, dreams of a place where he will be equal to white

men. His play, Of Mice and Men, performed at the Savoy Theatre, nominated for

a 2004 Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for Best Revival of 2003.

The Viking Press published The Grapes of Wrath in 1939 in New York.

The story is all about the long saga of Joad family from their tenant farm in Dust

Bowl Oklahoma to the Promised Land, California and verdant fields. Hollywood

producer, Daryl F. Zanuck, purchases the film rights to John Steinbeck's novel

The Grapes of Wrath within a month of its publication in March 1939, paying

Steinbeck $75000.

The film is released less than one year later - an extremely short time for

such a major film, even by Hollywood assembly-line standards. Because

Steinbeck is concerned that his novel be left undiluted, he suggests that 20th

Century Fox should contact Tom Collins, the administrator of the Weedpatch

Camp, and makes him act as an advisor.

John Ford’s greatest films, documents an American social tragedy, which

gives the victims a voice through art. Based on the classic John Steinbeck novel,

the film recounts the painful, poignant odyssey of the Joad family, Steinbeck’s

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25

to represent the plight of the "Okies" for generations of readers—and, through

Ford’s masterpiece, generations of moviegoers too. Indeed, viewing Ford’s film

today, more than fifty years after the Depression and the catastrophe of the Dust

Bowl, one realizes just how flawless and wonderful The Grapes of Wrath is, its

characters and drama just as moving and sympathetic as when it was first

released.

B. Approach of the Study

There are two approaches used here. First is Mimesis approach. This

approach sees a literary work as a reflection of its author’s life and times of the

characters in the work or in another word according to M.H. Abrams, in The

Mirror and the Lamp (1976: 6) mimesis means the explanation of art as

essentially an imitation of aspects of the universe.

Wellek, in Theory of Literature (1956: 102-103) states that literature is a

social institution, using as its medium language, a social creation. And, it is only

in society that “conventions and norms” in the forms of traditional literary devices

as “symbolism and matter” can arise. He finds out that much work has been done

upon political and social views of individual writers. So that, literature occurs

only in a social context, as part of culture, in a milieu. Therefore, it is

understandable that he comes to the opinion that the most common approach to

the relation of literature and society is the study of literature as social documents,

as assumed pictures of social reality by which literature can be made to yield the

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The second approach is Marxist approach. It sees the problem of the poor

and the effects of capitalism. The capitalist exploits the working classes, by

determining their salaries and their working conditions. This approach sees the

relation of a literary product to the actual economic and social reality of its time

and place.

As an approach to literary analysis, Marxism’s methodology is a dynamic

process declaring that a proper critique (proper being defined as one that agrees

with the socialist or Marxist beliefs) of a text cannot be isolated from the cultural

situation from which the text evolved. Necessarily, Marxists argue, the study of

literature and the study of society are intricately bound.

Such a relationship demands that a Marxist approach to a text deal with

more than the conventional literary themes, matters of style, plot, or

characterization, and the usual emphasis on figures of speech and other literary

devices. Marxism must move beyond these literary elements to uncover the

author’s world and his or her worldview. By placing the text in its historical

context and by analyzing the author’s view of life, Marxist critics arrive at one of

their chief concerns: ideology. It is the ideology expressed by the author, as

evidenced through his or her fictional world, and how this ideology interests with

the reader’s personal ideology that interests theses critics.

Such an ideological and obviously political investigation, assert Marxist

critics, will expose class conflict, with the dominant class and its accompanying

ideology being imposed either consciously or unconsciously on the proletariat.

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27

ideology and show how such a destructive ideology entraps the working classes

and oppresses them in every area of their lives. Through such an analysis the

Marxist critic wishes to reveal to the working classes how they may end their

oppression by the bourgeoisie through a commitment to socialism.

A Marxist approach seeks to expose the dominant class, to demonstrate

how the bourgeoisie’s ideology controls and oppresses the working class, and to

highlight the elements of society most affected by such oppression. The Marxist

critic will lead to action, social change, revolution, and the rise of socialism.

C. Method of the Study

Library research was employed to analyze the novels. There were some

steps taken to make this research appropriate. First step was reading the novels.

After reading the novels, the significant points were taken to find what to be

analyzed. After finding some significant points, formulating interesting topic was

done to find a good research.

The second step was about secondary sources to support the analysis.

Some secondary sources were collected, including the related studies, the related

theories, and possible approach. Those secondary sources were consulted to some

books, internet sites, thesis, and encyclopedia to extend the quality of this

research.

The third step was answering the problems formulated before. The first

was analyzing the sufferings of the lower class by using characters and their

characterization of In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and Men, and The Grapes of Wrath

(39)

theory of characters and characterization, it was useful to elaborate the next

problems. The last was analyzing the possible background may have influenced

John Steinbeck’s tendency to shape his social consciousness by revealing the

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CHAPTER IV

ANALYSIS

The analysis is divided into two parts. The first part is the analysis on the

lower class’s sufferings described in Steinbeck’s In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and

Men, and The Grapes of Wrath. The last part is the analysis of the possible

background may have influenced John Steinbeck’s tendency to shape his social

consciousness by revealing the social issues in the three novels above.

A. The Sufferings of the Lower Class: Weak in Bargaining Power, and

Poverty as seen in Steinbeck’s In Dubious Battle, Of Mice and Men, and

TheGrapes of Wrath

Most characters in the three novels above share something in common:

weak in bargaining power and poverty.

In Steinbeck’s In Dubious Battle Jim was in jail for thirty days for

vagrancy. Jim is enthusiastic to join the Party and obsessed with the new

ideology. He feels that the system of wage is not proper for the working class

because it always oppresses them. He has an obsession to make a revolution to

change the situation. He believes that for the ruling class represented by the

bourgeoisie, who possesses capital, is not deserved to exploit the working class.

Jim smiled. “I’ve read a lot. My old man didn’t want me to read. HE said I’d desert my own people. But I read anyway. One day I met a man in the park and he made me a list of things for me to read. Oh, I’ve read a hell a lot. He made me lists like Plato’s Republic, and the Utopia, and Bellamy, and like Herodotus and Gibbon and Macaulay and Carlyle and Prescott, and like Spinoza and Hegel and Kant and Nietzsche and Schopenhauer. He even made me read Das Kapital. He was a crank, he said. He said he

(41)

wanted to know things without believing them, He liked to group books that all aimed the same direction. (1938:6)

He protests the wage system where the labor has to be faithful to the

company where he works, if the worker wants to get higher wage, it means he is a

member of “Red” party. If he still wants to work, he has to be faithful to the

company. It is impossible for the working class to raise his wage.

Did you ever work at a job where, when you got enough skill to get a raise in pay, you were fired and a new man put in? Did you ever work in a place where they talked about loyalty to the firm, and loyalty meant spying on the people around you? Hell, I’ve got nothing to lose. (1938:7)

He insists to struggle through the violent way to get the triumph of

revolution and the prosperity for the working class. The checker in Anderson’s

apple orchard thinks that “Reds” is only trouble maker. What “Reds” doing is just

provoking the working class. “Reds’ in American history has a stigma and people

are scared for this new ideology.

Jim has converted his own religion and absorbed the spirit of atheism; he

hates everything related to religion matter. Doctor Burton can feel Jim’s spirit in

religious matter but Jim tries to deny it. Jim with the new spirit of communism

believes that a religion as a consolation for the oppressed, but believed that such

consolation is illusory; religion is the opium of the people. Doctor Burton advices

him that it is impossible for a group of men to be God but Jim insists that the

economic conditions that produced poverty are overturned, religion will become

obsolete. Oppression of the working class is the hallmark of a social and

economic system designated” capitalism and the established church are guilty of

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31

“Religion, hell!” Jim cried.” This is men, not God. This is something, you know.”

“Well, can’t a group of men be God, Jim?”

Jim wrenched himself around. “You make too damn many words, Doc. You build a trap of words and then you fall into it. You can’t catch me. Your words don’t mean anything to me. I know what I’m doing. Argument doesn’t have my effect on me. (1938:185)

London is a good guy whose power of authority. He has been alerted that

Jim and Mac is just a trouble-maker but he still keeps working with them. Even he

got an offer to work with sufficient wage but with one condition; getting rid of the

“Duo” Marxist but he rejects it.

“They’re reds. They’re getting a lot of good men into trouble. They don’t give a damn about your men if they can start trouble. Get rid of’ em and you can back to work.”

The ‘super’ stepped closer pressing his advantage.” Don’t be a fool, London. You know as well I do what the vagrancy laws are. You know vagrancy doesn’t want you to do. And if you don’t know it, the judge here’s named Hunter. Come on, now, London. Bring the men back to work. It’s a steady job for you, five dollar a day.” (1938:83)

Old Anderson is an owner of the small farm land. His ranch is burnt by the

Reds. The Reds manipulates him.He wants to get a better life but the communist

represented by Jim and Mac deceive him.

In Steinbeck’sOf Mice and Men, George Milton is a companion to Lennie.

They are separated from the normal life and ranked the lowest class because their

powerlessness. He has low wage and he can not get a better job but he still has a

dream for the land that means he can determine his life and no need to work with

other rich people. His dream seems a device to free himself from the exploitation

in the ranch.

(43)

‘For the rabbits,’ Lennie shouted. ‘For the rabbits,’ George repeated. “And I get to tend the rabbits.’ ‘An’ you get to tend the rabbits.’

Lennie giggled with happiness: ’An’live on the fatta the lan’.’ ‘Yes’ (1936: 93-94)

Lennie Small is an incapable man with monstrous body. George and

Lennie look after one another and live together. They have the same dream. They

dream of their future when they may have job and land. With George beside him,

he will safe.

Lennie broke in.’ But not us! An’ why? Because…because I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that’s why.’ He laughed delightedly. ’Go on now, George.’

“ An’ live off the fatta the lan’,’ Lennie shouted. (1937:18)

At the end of the story, his own friend George ends Lennie’s life

tragically. He has to kill Lennie. Lennie never gets what he wants: the barn with

the rabbits, and the further land. The tragic life is undeniable for him.

Crooks is a Negro who is treated prejudicially. He is isolated himself from

his surrounding because he is black and a cripple man.

‘Why ain’t you wanted?’ Lennie asked

“Cause I’m black. They play card in there, but I can’t play because I’m black. They say I stink. Well, I tell you, you all of you stink to me.’ (1936:62-63)

Curley’s wife treats him badly by calling him “Nigger” because she is his

master and he is a black slave. Here the obvious division of the rank: the master

and slave. Curley’s wife in her strong position may influence Curley to fire him

and no more place for him in the barn. Crooks can not do anything to stop her

(44)

33

. In Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath Tom Joad has killed a guy in a big

dance in Shawnee, Tulsa and tried to defense himself People assume him as an

outlaw since he did something horrible: homicide..

Joan leaned toward the driver.’ Homicide.” he said quickly.” That’s a big word-means I killed a guy. Seven years. I’m sprung in four for keepin’ my nose clean. (1939:11)

He just met Muley Graves who told him that the bank came to tractoring

off Joad’s house. His family wants to live and to work in the West work in the

ranch.

He is inspired by Jim Casey. He likes to join with Jim to bring the spirit of

communism. People who live in the same condition: being exploited will have

solidarity among them.

‘Hm-m, he said. “Lookie, Ma. I been all day an’ all night hidin’ alone. Guess who I been thinkin’ about? Casy! He talked a lot. Used ta bother me. But now I been thinkin’ what he said, an’ I can remember-all of it. Says one time he went out in the wilderness to find his own soul, an’ he foun’ he didn’ have no soul that was his’n. Says he foun’ he jus’ got a little piece of a great soul. Says a wilderness ain’t no good’ less it was with the rest, an ’was whole. Funny how I remember. Didn’ think I was even listenin’. But I know now a fella ain’t no good alone.” (1939: 373)

Tom thinks that the life of the working class is not proper at all; they live

in the worst situation. It is obvious the different life between the ruling class and

working class. As the part of minority, the ruling class makes a decision to

preserve his prosperity. On the other hand, the working class is starving

everywhere. His weak in bargaining power, he has no choice at all. The lower

class is always oppressed and no sufficient energy to take revenge. They have to

(45)

will continue Casy’s struggling to against the ruling class. He likes to be an

outlaw and keep searching for the social justice.

“Yeah,” said Tom. “He didn’ duck quick enough. He wasn’ doing nothin’ against the law, Ma. I been thinkin’ a hell of a lot, thinkin’ about our people livin’ like pigs an’ the good rich lan’ layin’ fallow, or maybe one fella with a million acres, while a hundred thousan’ good farmers is starvin’. An’ I been wonderin’ if all our folks got together an’ yelled, like them fellas yelled, only a few of’em at the Hopper ranch─”

“Then it don’ matter. Then I’ll be all aroun’ in the dark. I’ll be ever’where-wherever you look. Wherever they’s a fight so hungry people can eat, I’ll be there. If casy knowed, why, I’ll be in the way guys yell when they’re mad an’- I’ll be in the way kids laugh when they’re hungry an’ they know supper’s ready. An ‘when our folks eat the stuff they raise an’ live in the houses they build-why, I’ll be there. See? God, I’m talkin’ like Casy. Comes of thinkin’ about him so much. Seems like I can see him sometimes.”(1939:374)

Jim Casy lives after time in jail, he becomes involved with labor activists.

A human is a complete human when he can love people around him, when he can

serve them, and the solidarity is in the air of their life. Then he converts his

religion. He thinks that people need to be kind and generous. He has his own

definition of holiness; the unity of men and God. He thinks that God just brings

people in a disastrous condition and God has no more merci by seeing the poverty

and involve in the activity of the working class.

(46)

35

it’s you. Look a Washington,’ he says. “Fit the Revolution, an’ after, them son-a-bitches turned on him. An’ Lincoln the same. Same folks yellin’ to kill ‘em. Natural as rain” (1939:343)

Casy stared blindly at the light. He breathed heavily. “Listen,” he said. ”You fellas don’ know what you’re doin’. You’re helpin’ to starve kids.”

“Shut up, you red son-of-a-bitch.”

The heavy man swung with the pick handle. Casy dodged down into the swing. The heavy club crashed into the side of his head with a dull crunch of bone, and Casy fell sideways out of the light.

“Jesus, George. I think you killed him.”

“Put the light on him,” said George. ‘Serve the son-of-a-bitch right. “The flashlight beam dropped, searched and found Casy’s crushed head. (1939:344-345)

Casy is a real socialist. By giving the rest of his life for the poor and

finally died. His death brings and builds the tune of evolutionary optimism as the

death of Jesus. Though in his doubtful, he still believes in God. He had joined and

had many much contact with working class people. He brings ‘soft utopian” in the

sense of setting out to build an ideal social order, as against the “hard utopian” of

the Marxist kind of who sees it arriving after the conflict and struggle.

Here Casy is the focalization of Steinbeck. Steinbeck does not want to

make any revolution, what he did is the revealing the truth and hopes that the

governance will bring prosperity for the working class, represented by the

oppressed peasant who has to work for the landowner to get some food and

money. He with his basic point has out a serious question to capitalism a by itself

a sufficient ordering of society. If the three basic factors of production, land,

capital and labor (persons) are treated as land and capital (things), it is hardly to

(47)

The ruling class can exploit the lower class as they like it. They want to

get much profit by pressing the system of wage and it is not necessary for ruling

class to give the peasants the sufficient facility and the basic material needs. The

basic social process is the satisfaction of the material needs for food, clothing and

shelter. In the camp for the peasants where they work, it can not be found. People

satisfied these material needs in the natural world that surrounded them, a world

which they transformed for their own needs through the process of labor.

Unfortunately, the working class is still oppressed and they do not have any

access to have a proper life.

Casy is a real hero. He has already had four categories of proletarian

priest. First, he is the part of proletarian milieu by forming apostolic cells in the

breath of community especially the lower class, represented by the peasant.

Second, his presence likes an insertion into the working class. Third, he shows his

solidarity with his experiential participation in the struggles of the working men

and women and the last his engagement by involving himself in the proletarian

existence.

Ma Joad has replaced Pa’s position. She decides everything and keeps

Casy with them. Ma Joad thinks that Casy has to be with them, no matter happens

with them. People have to help each other.

Ma stepped in front of him.” I ain’t gonna go.”

What you mean, you ain’t gonna go? You got to go. You got to after the family.” Pa was amazed at the revolt.

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37

I tell you, you got to go. We made up our mind.”

looked helplessly about the group. “She’s sassy,” he said. “I never seen her so sassy.” Ruthie giggled shrilly.

“So goddamn sassy,”Pa murmured. “An’ she ain’t young, neither.”

The whole group watched the revolt. They watched Pa, waiting for him o break into fury. They watched his lax hands to see the fists form. And Pa’s anger did not rise, and his hands hung limply at his side. And in a moment the group knew that Ma had won. And Ma knew it too. (1939:149-150)

Ma may come from the real person: Steinbeck’s mother and Carol, his first

wife whose uncompromising heart. Ma is described as a tough mother but when

she tries to be assertive.

Pa Joad has forty acres land but ruined by the bad weather and the monster

of the bank system.

Rose of Sharon dreams of the next life in California. She and Connie have

a dream to get a job in town and own their store. She believes in the possibility of

living a decent life with her husband and eventual child. Rose of Sharon Connie

and Connie will leave Joads and start their own family. This poverty makes

people keep on dreaming for prosperity. They tend to have a dream in which they

can have many things to make their life easy. In fact, they have nothing.

(49)

baby—“Her face glowed with excitement. ”An’ I thought —well, I thought maybe we could all go in town, an’ when Connie gets his store — maybe Al could work for him.” (1939:145)

Here Sharon with her dream represents the life of the middle class. She

wishes the standard life of American at that time; living with electricity,

refrigerator and radio. With these stuffs, they can live happily. No more darkness

by using electric lamp, they can get ice in the long drought and by using radio will

connect houses and the world.

Tom is teasing Rose of Sharon to make her forget Connie but she still

mourns for Connie’s abandonment. Tom with his sarcastic word mocks Connie.

Maybe Connie has preparation to be the president of U.S.A to change their life

and bring them to the prosperity and the stability of economic and politics which

contrary with the real condition when Roosevelt at that time could not make any

progress at all in every aspect of economic and politics.

In their way to come to the cotton field, Ma asks Rosasharn to feeding the

dying man by offering him Rosasharn’s breast symbolizing her sacrifice by giving

food for the dying man. For lower class people who live in communal way, they

have to sacrifice each other as Sharon has done for the dying man by feeding him

because of starvation.

Rose of Sharon loosened one side of the blanket and bared her breast. “You got to,” she said. She squirmed closer and pulled his head close. “There!” she said. “There.” Her hand moved behind his head and supported it. Her fingers moved gently in his hair. She looked up and across the barn, and her lips came together, and she smiled mysteriously. (1939:405-406).

JOHN STEINBECK: THE MAN AND THE ENVIRONMENT (INTERTEXTUALITY IN THE SOCIAL AWARENESS OF STEINBECK’S IN DUBIOUS BATTLE, OF MICE AND MEN, AND THE GRAPES OF WRATH)

TABLE OF CONTENTS