Speaking Volumes: Celebrating the 80th anniversary of ‘The Grapes of Wrath’

On April 14, John Steinbeck’s “The Grapes of Wrath” celebrates its 80th year.

The 1939 novel remains a quintessential piece of American literature still read in homes and classrooms throughout the country. It is a Pulitzer Prize winner and served as inspiration for the Oscar-winning 1940 film of the same name.

“The Grapes of Wrath” is the story of an Oklahoma farming family, the Joads, driven from their homestead during the Dust Bowl and traveling west toward California seeking work and a new start.

Steinbeck’s story captured the real plight of millions of Americans whose agricultural livelihood was destroyed by this ecological disaster that struck an already-struggling country amid the Great Depression.

“The Grapes of Wrath” was America’s best-selling book of 1939 and its true-to-life story created a political frenzy.

In California, many public libraries refused to carry the novel and book burnings were held.

The story was condemned by Oklahoma representatives in Congress as “a lie” and a “creation of a twisted, distorted mind.”

Conversely, it was staunchly defended by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, who was so moved upon reading that she called for reform to labor laws governing migrant camps like the one depicted in the novel.

Hollywood director John Ford rushed to create the 1940 classic film version starring Henry Fonda, which is widely considered one of the greatest American films of all time.

Steinbeck went on to win the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize for “The Grapes of Wrath,” and in 1962 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

“The Grapes of Wrath” remains not only a popular novel, but also a teaching tool for educating readers of all ages about the challenges faced by American families during the Great Depression and Dust Bowl.

Your local library has copies of “The Grapes of Wrath” in regular and large print, in eBook via Overdrive, and audiobook on CD. We also carry the 1940 motion picture on DVD.

The library also has many books about the writing and publication of “The Grapes of Wrath” as well as histories of the Dust Bowl and Depression era in which the book is set.

For more information about the controversy surrounding Steinbeck’s novel, check out “Obscene in the Extreme: The Burning and Banning of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath” by Rick Wartzman.

For those interested in how Steinbeck developed the story of the Joad family, check out “Working Days: The Journals of the Grapes of Wrath,” a unique look at Steinbeck’s life while writing “The Grapes of Wrath” through the lens of his private journals.

For more information about the real-life events that inspired the novel, check out Timothy Egan’s “The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl.”

Call your local branch for more information on available titles.

▪ Central Library — 941-748-5555;

▪ Braden River — 941-727-6079;

▪ Island — 941-778-6341;

▪ Palmetto — 941-722-3333;

▪ Rocky Bluff — 941-723-4821;

▪ South Manatee — 941-755-3892.

You also can access the library via the internet at mymanatee.org/library.

Katie Fleck is a librarian at the Central Library in downtown Bradenton. Speaking Volumes, written by Manatee County Public Library System staff members, is published each Sunday in the Bradenton Herald.