The Importance of Anger

In Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath a common theme of motivating force seems to reoccur: anger. Throughout the novel men are motivated by their anger, they are motivated to preserve their dignity and to institute change in the world around them, and at several points in the novel the reader is shown the “fruits” from this inspiring wrath. By emphasizing the motivational force of anger in his novel, Steinbeck seems to be guiding the reader to the belief that anger is, not only a productive and appropriate response, but also one that is capable of bringing about significant change.

As the novel progresses the reader is reminded time and again that an angry man is not a broken man. Ma Joad voices this realization to Tom in one passage saying “Take a man, he can get worried an’ worried, an’ it eats out his liver, an’ purty soon he’ll jus’ lay down and die with his heart et out. But if you can take an’ make ‘im mad, why, he’ll be awright.” (p352). This realization relies on the fact that an angry man is motivated by the attacks on his dignity; he is motivated to institute change.

This motivation, when considered an isolated incident such as one man being motivated to try his luck again at finding a job despite the bleakness of the odds, is not such a powerful thing, in terms of instituting change. But when this anger becomes widespread enough, and centered around a similar cause, that is when the products of this wrath can become larger and more powerful than just single man. Take for instance Casey’s anecdote of the prison riot that gave him the idea for the strike he was organizing. Casey attempts to explain it to Tom, but the lesson is lost on him. Here Steinbeck seems to be arguing that if enough people had brought their anger together and centered it around the common cause for access to property or wealth that perhaps a change could have brought about.

It is important to note, however, that Steinbeck complicates this simple black and white picture of anger producing the solution for injustice. The moral centers of the novel, Tom, Ma, and Casey, never seem to act on anger- they feel it, such as Tom’s reaction to the vigilantes who burn down the Hooverville, but they never act on it. This complication shows that although Steinbeck acknowledges the power of anger in brining about change, that this anger must be tempered and guided. Steinbeck wants the reader to realize that real change, social change, does not come from a simple catalyst to a reaction, such as anger, but that it requires an agent that can see the larger picture. This kind of change comes from someone like Tom, as Ma tells Tom and the reader that he is different from most people because he sees the big picture. At first Tom disregards the comment, but later in the novel, he proves his mother right when he talks about going out to bring the angry people together and to “Throw out the cops that ain’t our people” (p419) in order to allow themselves a chance to succeed.

For some readers, this message has seemed to smack of Communism, but disregarding the labels and mixed messages of materialism that are complicated and sprinkled throughout the novel- this revelation that Tom has seems to be more about simply reacquiring the dignity that these migrants have lost and been denied. It is this sort of “fruit” or result that Steinbeck seems to urging his readers to grasp from the vine of wrath; not simple a reaction to an unfavorable circumstance, but a motivation and reaction centered around an ideal that is larger than simply one man to bring about a real and lasting change.