Behind the harrows, the long seeders - twelve curved iron penes erected in the foundry, orgasms set by gears, raping methodically, raping without passion. The driver sat in his iron seat and he was proud of the straight lines he did not will, proud of the tractor he did not own or love, proud of the power he could not control. And when that crop grew, and was harvested, no man had crumbled a hot clod in his fingers and let the earth sift past his fingertips. - John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 5. Technology and modernization have swept tenant farmers off lands that they have occupied for generations. Steinbeck presents the displacement of these families by tractors sent in by the banks as something unnatural, a violent assault, a metaphorical rape by a beast. He accuses the banks of raping the families' way of life, the earth and their romantic association with the land.

Behind the harrows, the long seeders – twelve curved iron penes erected in the foundry, orgasms set by gears, raping methodically, raping without passion. The driver sat in his iron seat and he was proud of the straight lines he did not will, proud of the tractor he did not own or love, proud of the power he could not control. And when that crop grew, and was harvested, no man had crumbled a hot clod in his fingers and let the earth sift past his fingertips.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 5. Technology and modernization have swept tenant farmers off lands that they have occupied for generations. Steinbeck presents the displacement of these families by tractors sent in by the banks as something unnatural, a violent assault, a metaphorical rape by a beast. He accuses the banks of raping the families’ way of life, the earth and their romantic association with the land.

John Steinbeck Quotes