Hot sun on rusted metal. Oil on the ground. People are wandering in, bewildered, needing a car.
– John Steinbeck
The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 7. We have staccato speech. Staccato sentences. Rapidly changing topics. Images of hot sun. Corrosion and rust. Oil that is both dirty and wealth-promising. Confusion and flight. It all adds up to the dispossessed migrant farmers’ exodus to their uncertain future. Will they make it to the Promised Land? Or will that dream be corrupted? The tone and language of the passage are foreshadowing of the uncertainty of the California dream.