"And the little screaming fact that sounds through all history: repression works only to strengthen and knit the repressed." -The Grapes of Wrath
John Ernst Steinbeck Jr. was an American author born in 1902 and passed away in 1968. He first became widely known with a series of humorous stories in 1935. Tortilla Flat was a social novel, dealing with the economic problems of rural labor, like his works to come. However, unlike the humorous tone of Tortilla Flat, his next novels were of a more serious style of fiction.
Steinbeck published the first of what is now called his "Dustbowl trilogy" in 1936. This trilogy included Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, and East of Eden. Set in 1930's America, during The Great Depression, Steinbeck's Dustbowl trilogy encompasses themes of racism, loneliness, prejudice against the mentally ill, and the struggle for personal independence.
In 1940, Steinbeck earned a Pulitzer Prize for The Grapes of Wrath, and in 1962, he received the Nobel Prize for Literature — "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do, sympathetic humor and keen social perception."
However, due to what was then considered the controversial nature of The Grapes of Wrath, Steinbeck did receive backlash for his political views, negative portrayal of aspects of capitalism, and sympathy for the plight of workers.
Of the controversy, Steinbeck wrote, "The vilification of me out here, from the large landowners and bankers, is pretty bad. The latest is a rumor started by them that the Okies hate me and have threatened to kill me for lying about them. I'm frightened at the rolling might of this damned thing. It is completely out of hand; I mean a kind of hysteria about the book is growing that is not healthy."
And this leads us to our questions!
This week's questions:
In August 1939, Kern County, the real-life county that the fictional Grapes of Wrath takes place in, claimed the book was both obscene and misrepresented conditions there. The Kern County Board of Supervisors banned The Grapes of Wrath from the county's publicly funded schools and libraries until the ban was lifted in January 1941.
Do you feel that controversial fiction should be able to be banned by government bodies from publicly-funded institutions?
What are your favorite books that are, or have been, considered controversial? What is it about them that drew you to them?
We also welcome any other discussion or comments about John Steinbeck or his works.
If you have another author you'd like to see a discussion on, please leave it in the comments below for a chance to be featured in a future chapter!
Have fun!
Resources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Steinbeck
https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1962/steinbeck/biographical/
https://www.biography.com/writer/john-steinbeck