Commentaire sur le chapitre 8 du roman Les Raisins de la colère deJohn Steinbeck

The Grapes Of Wrath, End of Chapter 8

John Steinbeck wrote his famous novel The Grapes Of Wrath in 1939. In this book, we can follow the life of the Joad, a modest family who dreamed to have a better life and chose to go to find it in California. In the extract studied, we discover Tom's family and we can guess what are they links. we can notice that this is the first time that Tom and Al meet each other.

In fact, we can say that this chapter is very important for understanding. With these details, an understanding of this text becomes easier.

We are going to see which elements highlight the way of life of the Joad and then, we are going to analyse the relationship between Al and Tom and how the author introduce this.

All the atmosphere and settings are introduce in this chapter. We are slowly understanding their daily life, we are realising that they are talking with a different English. In fact they have an accent of the south, maybe they are using a dialect. They are not using a classical English. We can think that it is a good idea used by the author because it strenghten the realism of the book. It makes us feel like we are there as a reader but also as a spectator.

The setting seems to be a farm. There is different animals which live in a farm and that we can find in the text like chickens. We can also say that because of the different speeches, they are talking about Trucks and other things that makes us thinking about a farm. By the way, the word "Truck" is repeated several times. It is also personify. We can read it when they say "I can drive her" or "load her up". The mundane truck become a very important thing for them. We can maybe say that it is a member of this modest family. They need it for their work, their need it for their daily life.

The author plays with us ; in fact he describe the smell, a smell which is a typical fact of the farm. He wants us to be aware of the trial which attends to the family. Their social class is low, and it seems to be difficult for them to leave their place. It is how we are going to pay attention to the characters and to their relationship.

First of all, we can notice that Tom's father is named "Pa". He does not have any first name, he is named with his nickname. He is one of the only person who did not have a name contrary to Al, Tom, or Noah.

He is very important in the passage. He is the family's leader. He is in charge of the journey, of the money. He had decided to sell things in order to pay for the trip. He is supporting his family. As a reader, we can notice that he speak several times and Tom's Granpa push us to think this thanks to his "Sure did" said in the extract studied.

However, Al seems to be omnipresent in this passage. The father is refering to him all the time. But we can notice one thing ; he does not enter in the beginning but he appears when he achieves his activity. We do not know him thanks the actions he does but thanks to speeches of Pa.

By the way, Pa describe him as a good man, good at fixing things, good with girls. But when he arrives, he seems to be arrogant. But when he actually saw Tom, he seems to become less proud and arrogant. We can say that thanks to the sentence "admiration and veneration shone in his eyes".

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