The Grapes of Wrath Hunger and Starvation Quotes

"We ain’t gonna hurt you. Now who tol’ you to come bus’ up our dance?" He waited for a reply. "You’re our own folks," Huston said sadly. "You belong with us. How’d you happen to come? We know all about it," he added.
"Well, goddamn it, a fella got to eat."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 24. The Farmers’ Association callously exploits the hunger of migrants to recruit three of them to cause trouble for fellow migrants at Weedpatch. But despite their betrayal, Ezra Huston and his Central Committee show their humanity by not hurting them.

The decay spreads over the State, and the sweet smell is a great sorrow on the land. Men who can graft the trees and make the seed fertile and big can find no way to let the hungry people eat their produce. Men who have created new fruits in the world cannot create a system whereby their fruits may be eaten. And the failure hangs over the State like a great sorrow.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 25. This passage demonstrates the utter failure of the capitalist and economic system in California. Steinbeck write with deadly irony that agricultural science and technology can produce a bumper food harvest, but not the means whereby hungry people can eat it. Jobless migrants and the poor cannot afford to buy the produce. So much of it remains unsold and people go hungry. An inhumane capitalist system produces starvation in a land of plenty. The Pink Floyd song about the Great Depression, <em>Sorrow</em>, references the first line of the passage: "The sweet smell of a great sorrow lies over the land / Plumes of smoke rise and merge into the leaden sky / A man lies and dreams of green fields and rivers / But awakes to a morning with no reason for waking."

The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit – and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains.
And the smell of rot fills the country.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 25. In California there is a bountiful harvest and over-abundance of food. It goes to waste, because in order to keep up the price the farm owners believe it must be destroyed. We get the horrifying image of "golden mountains" of oranges having kerosene sprayed on them, while a million people go hungry. This is uncontrolled industrial farming and quest for profits run amok, as a corrupt economic system scales new heights of inhumanity. The "smell of rot" not only refers to the wasted food, but also to the rotten system. Steinbeck brands the farmers’ actions a "crime" and speaks of the farm employees’ anger at having to carry it out.

There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificates – died of malnutrition – because the food must rot, must be forced to rot.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 25. Steinbeck uses Biblical language in this chapter and passage to describe what he believes is an unspeakable crime against people and nature. Farmers cannot sell their crops because people are too poor to buy them. For many it is more economical to destroy or leave the crops to rot rather than harvest them, leaving people to starve. Farmers cannot make a profit from an orange, so children die of malnutrition, Steinbeck says in his savage indictment of the system.

The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 25. The chapter’s final words are Biblical in tone expressing almost a sentiment of doom. The last sentence references the song <em>Battle Hymn of the Republic</em> written by Julia Howe shortly before the American Civil War. The novel’s title is taken from a line of the song: "Mine eyes hath seen the glory of the coming of the Lord; He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored; He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword; His truth is marching on." The "grapes of wrath" metaphor is also an allusion to Revelations 14:19 where evil people perish: "And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great wine press of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the wine press, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs." A number of themes are in play in this important passage from the novel. They include the inhumanity of the large farmers, their greed, the anger of the people and the hunger that drives that anger. Steinbeck warns of the rising wrath of people left to starve in a California rich with food destroyed because harvesting isn’t profitable enough. There is foreshadowing of a rebellion by the people against this cruel system. Personification is used by the author in his depiction of the pigs "screaming."

"If a fella owns a team a horses, he don’t raise no hell if he got to feed ’em when they ain’t workin’. But if a fella got men workin’ for him, he jus’ don’t give a damn. Horses is a hell of a lot more worth than men. I don’ understan’ it."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 26. Willie Eaton lashes out at the broken system whereby migrant workers are exploited and used by employers for cheap labor. Horses are treated better than workers, he claims. They get fed while the families of workers cannot afford to eat. Just before this passage Willie hits at the low wages: "I been out here a year, an’ wages is goin’ right on down. Fella can’t feed his fam’ly on his work now, an’ it’s gettin’ worse all the time. It ain’t gonna do no good to set aroun’ an’ starve. I don’ know what to do."

"Well, one day they give us some beans that was sour. One fella started yellin’, an’ nothin’ happened. He yelled his head off…Then another fella yelled. Well, sir, then we all got yellin’. And we all got on the same tone, an’ I tell ya, it jus’ seems like that tank bulged an’ give and swelled up. By God! Then somepin happened! They come a-runnin’, and they give us some other stuff to eat."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 26. Jim Casy tells a story about his time in jail, how one prisoner protesting about the food failed to achieve any success. But when a group of prisoners protested together they got better food, proving the power of organized resistance.

"We come to work there. They says it’s gonna be fi’ cents. They was a hell of a lot of us. We got there an’ they says they’re payin’ two an’ a half cents. A fella can’t even eat on that, an’ if he got kids – So we says we won’t take it. So they druv us off. An’ all the cops in the worl’ come down on us. Now they’re payin’ you five. When they bust this here strike – ya think they’ll pay five?"

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 26. Jim Casy, who has become a labor activist, tells Tom Joad that he is part of a group of striking workers refusing to work until wages are raised. He reveals the deceit of the Hooper Ranch owners. Workers were promised they would be paid five cents for each box of peaches collected. But when they arrived they were paid two and a half cents. The Joads are getting five cents because they are strikebreakers, but Casy foreshadows that this will soon be cut. His comments also highlight the corruption of the police, who serve the interests of ranch owners by coming down hard on striking workers.

"You fellas don’ know what you’re doin’. You’re helpin’ to starve kids."
"Shut up, you red son-of-a-bitch."
A short heavy man stepped into the light. He carried a new white pick handle.
Casy went on, "You don’t know what you’re a-doin’."
The heavy man swung with the pick handle. The heavy club crashed into the side of his head with a dull crunch of bone, and Casy fell sideways out of the light.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 26. As Jim Casy leads the workers’ strike for decent wages, he gets murdered for his troubles. Two police officers approach and recognize Casy as the worker’s leader and call him a communist. As Casy pleads that the officers are helping to starve children, one of them smashes his skull with a pick handle. In a Biblical allusion, Casy forgives the corrupt officer before he dies, using the same language Christ did when he forgave his crucifiers. In sacrificing his life in the cause of workers’ rights, the former preacher is presented as a Christ-like figure.

Tom laughed uneasily, "Well, maybe like Casy says, a fella ain’t got a soul of his own, but on’y a piece of a big one – an’ then – "
"Then what, Tom?"
"Then it don’ matter. Then I’ll be 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. Wherever they’s a cop beatin’ up a guy, 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."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 28. As Tom Joad prepares to leave his family, he takes time to bid goodbye to his mother, delivering the novel’s most famous speech. From the dark isolation of his cave, he reveals how he has seen the light and humanity of Casy’s "one soul" philosophy. In his final appearance of the novel, he pledges to devote his life to fighting for justice for poor people oppressed by a corrupt system. His message is one that offers hope and leadership to hungry migrant workers searching for a just deal. Fully committed to Casy’s idea that we are all part of the one community of humanity, Tom has become Casy. He even admits that he speaks like him. And like Casy also, Tom went into a wilderness of his own, the cave, and discovered his true calling.

And in the little towns pity for the sodden men changed to anger, and anger at the hungry people changed to fear of them. Then sheriffs swore in deputies in droves, and orders were rushed for rifles, for tear gas, for ammunition.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 29. Initially people in the towns are sympathetic to the suffering of the migrant families when California floods. But that soon changes and turns to fear and anger. Expecting trouble, extra deputies are appointed and guns ordered to protect the towns from the threat of hungry migrants.

"He’s dyin’, I tell you! He’s starvin’ to death, I tell you."
"Hush," said Ma. She looked at Pa and Uncle John standing helplessly gazing at the sick man. She looked at Rose of Sharon huddled in the comfort. Ma’s eyes passed Rose of Sharon’s eyes, and then came back to them. And the two women looked deep into each other. The girl’s breath came short and gasping.
She said "Yes."
Ma smiled. "I knowed you would. I knowed!"

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 30. While walking the highway the Joads shelter in a barn from a downpour and encounter a starving man and his son. The boy cries out for help for his dying father. In this scene we see in action Ma Joad’s earlier comment that the poor are the ones who help if you are in need. Ma realizes that her family can save the man from starving to death. Aware that Rose of Sharon’s breasts are still full of the milk meant to feed her stillborn baby, she glances at her daughter. Her unspoken request is understood by Rose of Sharon, who in a remarkable act of kindness, generosity and self-sacrifice immediately says yes. This powerful scene closes the novel and reflects the idea of Emerson’s "Over-Soul," the universal soul that connects everyone, a philosophy that finds expression through the character of Jim Casy. Rose of Sharon’s decision to nurse the stranger back to life is also a strong message of hope in the strength and resilience of the human spirit.

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 smiled mysteriously.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 30. Rose of Sharon is often compared to Mary, the mother of Jesus, because of this final scene of self-sacrifice and act of altruism. After her own loss and hardship, she lies down beside the starving man in the barn, guides his mouth to her breast and breastfeeds him. Despite losing her own baby, she offers life to a total stranger with her breastmilk. Her suckling of the dying man evokes the image of The Pietà, the Christian art work depicting Mary holding the body of Jesus after he is taken down from the cross. In this closing passage, Steinbeck present a message of hope, compassion and kindness, to be found even in a world of inequality and injustice. This is the Promised Land that poor migrant families have arrived at, where new life can come out of tragedy, humanity endures amid hardship and desperation, and each of us is part of the one human family. Rose of Sharon’s gesture is the living expression of Jim Casy’s belief that we are all part of the one great soul.
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