![]() ![]() The impetus for writing The Grapes of Wrath came out of John Steinbeck’s experience researching and publishing Harvest Gypsies, a seven-part San Francisco News series about the plight of agricultural migrant workers in California. What details did Steinbeck choose? How did he use them? What purpose was he trying to achieve? Guiding Questions Comparing the reports to The Grapes of Wrath offers students a rare look into a writer’s process of converting nonfiction material into fiction. It is exact and just the thing that will be used against me if I am wrong.”Įighteen of Collins’s reports are available from the EDSITEment-reviewed National Archives. ![]() Aware of the criticism the novel’s passion and partisanship were likely to arouse, Steinbeck noted in his writer’s journal (published as Working Days), “I need this stuff. He found an invaluable source in the official reports of Tom Collins, the director of California’s Arvin Migrant Camp. ![]() To achieve the authenticity he desired, Steinbeck sought to pile genuine, specific detail upon genuine, specific detail. In a 1939 letter, John Steinbeck wrote that his goal for The Grapes of Wrath was “to rip a reader’s nerves to rags.” Through the novel, Steinbeck wanted readers to experience the life of the Dust Bowl migrants with whom he had spent time. ![]() "I tried to write this book the way lives are being lived not the way books are written." ![]()
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