Tom Joad and Anger

I would like to add to Andy's argument about the catalyst of anger in The Grapes of Wrath. While it is true that most men are motivated by anger, they lack the ability to find a way to focus their anger into action. At first this seems based largely upon intellectual capacity and the ability to understand what's at stake. Tom and Jim Casey are the smartest characters of the novel, and both men understand the larger picture. There is something more complex though that seems to drive men to action.

Several men are angry throughout the novel, and several even seem to understand what is driving down wages. Several different characters explain to the Joads why life is so difficult in California. These men are angry, on the verge of giving up, or on their way home. They see that if men were able to organize, wages might stop going down. These men, however, seem to lack the morality that drives Tom and Jim Casey. Largely they seem to see the problem in simple terms.

Ma tells Tom "Everthing you do is more'n you" and while it is okay for her to make Pa angry she has to "lean" on Tom (353). She recognizes that anger can be valuable both because it reaffirms gender roles and because it incites men to continue moving forward. Pa, and the men like Pa, must become angry because anger gives them a sense of purpose and meaning. They have been taken out of their normal environment, and they can no longer fulfill their usual duties (work, support the family, etc.). In many cases this seems to have an emasculating effect, and anger helps to counteract this. Tom needs to be "leaned" on because he understands himself as a part of a larger context and tends to think things through with this in mind.

The common thread between Jim Casey and Tom, which other men seem to lack is the time each had for reflection. Although Tom is naturally given to think about things in a larger context, he struggles with what he should actually do about the injustices he sees. After he kills the man who killed Jim Casey, he puts his family in danger an must go into hiding. This period of hiding allows him to focus inward in a way which Jim Casey had done in the wilderness before him. It is only after this period of reflection, that he is driven to work toward social change.