Grapes of Wrath Explain how the behavior of the Joads

shows Steinbeck’s view of the responsibility of the individual

to society as a whole. Chapter 14 made an interesting point.

At one point in the chapter it was stated that a farmer lost his

farm. As this man’s family picks up their belongings and

heads west they meet up with another family dealing with a

similar situation. Now these two families share a common

bond. A brotherhood is forming. This is the catalyst. No

longer is it one farmer saying he lost his land but two farmers

united saying they lost their land. Much the same

transformation happens to the Joad family – especially to the

characters of Ma, Young Tom, and Rose of Sharon. At the

onset of the novel we see the Joad family struggling just to

keep their immediate family together. They are focused on

just themselves. By the end of this wonderful book we see

the Joad family branching out in many different ways to

embrace all of mankind as one big family. Ma Joad’s main

concern at the beginning of the story is her family. She wants

to keep the unit together and works diligently to achieve this

goal. However, one by one, family members leave the group

for various reasons leading to the slow but sure disintegration

of the Joad clan. The first to go is Noah; then Grandpa and

Grandma die;Connie walks off and leaves Rose of Sharon;

Young Tom leaves because he has gotten into trouble again;

and Al becomes engaged and decides to go with his

fiancee’s family. Ma deals with each loss as best she can. As

the story progresses, we find Ma Joad becoming more and

more concerned with people outside the family unit. She

feels the need to share whatever meager food and

belongings her family has with other families enduring

hardships. She saw the needs of her own family at the

beginning of the story and by the end of the novel, she sees

the needs of her fellow man. Young Tom appears to be

self-centered when he if first introduced. He has just left

prison after serving four years for murder. Tom want to

enjoy life to the fullest and to be with his family. He is very

disturbed to find the family home deserted and almost

destroyed. He by this time has reacquainted himself with Jim

Casey, an ex-preacher. The more Tom listens to Jim and his

views on life, the soul of man, and the fellowship of mankind,

the less he focuses on himself and his needs. He then begins

to focus on the plight and abuse of the homeless farmers. He

starts to realize that in order for the migrant workers to

survive and succeed they must unite. He knows that if they

band together as one, they can demand that their God-given

rights under the constitution be honored. They can begin to

gain respect from their fellow man. After Jim is killed, Tom

takes up the cause of “his” people. He plans to work with

them. Just as Jim taught him, Tom realizes that man is no

good alone and that every man’s soul is just a piece of a

bigger one. Rose of Sharon is totally focused on herself from

the beginning. She is pregnant for the first time and in love

with her husband so her little world is complete. She

constantly bemoans the fact that she needs nutritious food so

her baby will be healthy. She is always concerned that what

she does or what others do to her will hurt her baby in some

way. She is so wrapped up in herself and the baby she is

carrying that she does not realize that her family is falling

apart. She whines and moans her way through most of the

book until her baby is born dead. The death of her child

seems to transform her. At the very end of the novel she

breast feeds a dying man. To me this is symbolic of drinking

from the milk of human kindness. She gives of herself to save

another human being. She too is learning about the

fellowship of man. In conclusion, as the Joad family

seemingly disintegrates, they actually merge in to a larger,

more universal family – the family of man.