Friday’s Read it or Rant: The Grapes of Wrath
Alternate Title: Read it or Rant, 11:45 on Sunday counts as the weekend
Alternate Alternate Title: Dear God Why did I choose this book?
Oh, The Grapes. Sigh, I shoulda just watched the movie. You should just read my review and save the six hours it took me to read it. Really. I usually really like John Steinbeck, in fact East of Eden is one of my favorites. I picked The Grapes, because I wanted something deep, a thinker, something to counteract all the Sandra Boynton books I read each week. Yeah. Um, I was really wishing I was reading Hippos go Berserk three chapters in. I now think that John Steinbeck is a communist, racist, sexist, ageist, ignorant of female anatomy, homophobic, sadist, bipolar tool. I could go on for pages about all of the inconsistencies, and explanations for the above list but, eh. It has been done already by more qualified readers than I, so if you are interested go Google some reviews. Make sure you pick one that mentions the lack of editors during the Depression, that is the only explanation for this book! Now for the plot…only plot, don’t go looking to the Grapes for any characters you can’t describe in a five word sentence. One dimensional would be half a dimension too much. Anyway, on to the story…
The Grapes start with Tom Joad just after he is paroled from prison after serving four years for manslaughter (He kilt him a man with a shovel). As he walks home, he meets a preacher, (a former, disenfranchised minister) Jim Casy, who baptized him in a ditch when he was a kid, and Tom invites him home with him. When they arrive at the Joad home, they find it deserted. They are then off to his Uncle John’s residence a few miles away, where he finds his family loading an old clunker truck(the used car chapter was one of my favorites actually, very poetic) with everything they own; he learns that his family’s crops were destroyed in the Dust Bowl and that they were forced to default on loans, and they were “tractored off” (a tractor pushed over their house to make longer rows of cotton. Or corn. Or pot or whatever.) With their farm repossessed, the Joads put all their hope on yellow handbills that are distributed everywhere in Oklahoma (And Arkansas, and Kansas, oh and Missouri ), describing the beautiful country of California and the high pay you get for doing easy jobs, like picking peaches. (FWIW, I have picked peaches, and they are itchy, and the fuzz sticks to your arms, oh, and they are full of June Bugs). Okay, so anyway, the Joads, along with Jim Casy (hey, anybody notice who else has JC initials? hmm, not too creative are we Steinbeck?), are seduced by the handbills and invest everything they have into the exodus. Although leaving Oklahoma would be breaking parole, Tom decides that it is a risk he has to take.
Moving on, Grandpa and the dog die within the first 24 hours, they should have taken it as a sign and turned around. They soon discover that the roads are crowded with thousands of other families making the same trip all on the faith of those friggin yellow handbills. As the Joads continue and hear stories from other road weary travelers, and meet some coming BACK from California, they are starting to think that all may not be as the handbills promised. So by this time they are pretty much there, and they have to find work, because they can’t afford to go back! By the time they do get there Grandpa and Grandma (and the dog) are dead and Noah (the elder wackadoo Joad son) and Connie (the ((strangely named)) husband of the pregnant Joad daughter, ((strangely named))Rose of Sharon), have left, yup, just up and left.
The shriveling (in numbers and in weight—turns out not much to eat for migrants) family find hordes of applicants for every job and little (no) hope of finding a decent wage, because of the oversupply of dust bowlers. All they want is the simple American Dream: a house, a family, and a steady job. At first they have a glimmer of hope at the government camp, Weedpatch,(BEEP< BEEP<BEEP, COMMUNIST ALERT!). At Weedpatch they are clean, and safe, and have flushing toilets, but still no jobs, no food, and no money.
So they move on and find other laborers have begun to join unions (have I mentioned anywhere that I am a Republican, and how I feel about unions?). The surviving members of the family unknowingly work as strikebreakers on a peach orchard that is involved in a strike that eventually turns violent, killing the preacher Casy and forcing Tom Joad to kill again and become a fugitive(again or still or whatever). As he bids farewell to his mother in a (supposedly tear jerking) speech (whatever, I am just pushing through at this point, the end and my Marie Clarie are near!), and promises that no matter what happens, he will be a tireless advocate for the oppressed. Blah, blah, Yada, Yada. Rose of Sharon’s baby is stillborn (this would have been more sad if she were not such a sniveling moron((and she is supposed to be the Madonna archetype?!?)). Ma Joad keeps the family moving(if not the plot) and forces the family to leave another camp that has been flooded out. It is winter, and there is NO work. They have NO money, and NO hope. In the end, (next sentence is not mine, Thank God. I just stole it so that you could see how full of himself Mr. Steinbeck truly is) Rose of Sharon commits the only act in the book that is not futile: she breast feeds a starving man, still trying to show hope in humanity after her own negative experience. This final act is said to illustrate the spontaneous mutual sharing that will lead to a new awareness of collective values. Okay, whatever you say. As for the part about her breastfeeding, shall I point out how wrong this is? Cause ya know, I know a thing or two about breast feeding. No, I will move on! YEAH book OVER! Yippee!
So I copied and pasted some of the symbolic parts of the book, all VERY obvious, a ninth grader could have caught each of them, so read them for you’re your own edification, and so you can win the The Grapes of Wrath Section of Jeopardy with out having to actually, you know, read it.
The turtle in Chapter 3 is a metaphor for the working class farmers whose struggles are recounted in the novel. Significantly, the dangers posed to the turtle are those of modernity and business. The intrusion of cars and the building of highways endangers the turtle, and the truck that strikes the turtle is a symbol of big business and commerce. The struggling of the turtle also evokes the workings of narratives in general, since the trajectory of the turtle mimics the trajectory of the novel: moments of action and pauses, slow process, peripecias. This land turtle becomes a proleptic device for the following chapters.
Rose of Sharon’s pregnancy holds the promise of a new beginning. This promise is broken when she delivers a stillborn baby. However, the family moves boldly and gracefully forward, rather than slipping into despair, and the novel ends on a hopeful note.
There are numerous Judeo-Christian symbols throughout the novel. The Joad Family, like the Israelites, are homeless and persecuted people looking for the promised land. Jim Casy can be viewed as a symbol of Jesus Christ, who began his mission after a period of solitude in the wilderness. When the group first leave for their journey West, there are thirteen of them, representing Jesus Christ and the twelve apostles. Like Jesus, Jim offers himself as the sacrifice to save his people. Jim’s last words to the man who murdered him was: “Listen, you fellas don’ know what you’re doing,” similar to Jesus’s “Father forgive them; they know not what they do.” Tom becomes Jim’s disciple after his death.
A great flood at the end of the novel is related in the Bible as the story of Noah and the Great Flood. A flood symbolizes uncontained water, which has gone beyond the basic boundary between the earth and water. Floods also symbolize the end of one cycle of time and the beginning of a new cycle of time. Therefore, a flood symbolizes both death and regenerative birth at the same time. The image in which Uncle John disposes of the stillborn baby recalls Moses being sent down the Nile River, suggesting that the family, like the Hebrews in Egypt, will be delivered from the slavery of its present circumstances.
Next up for the Read it or Rant? I don’t know yet. I will pick something up at the library tomorrow, and let you know.
Filed under Read it or Rant | Comments (11)
Friday’s Read it or Rant: Incomplete
A few of the things I have done today other than write a review of the Grapes of Wrath:
- opened all my windows,
- flew a kite,
- taught The son how to climb the wobbly ladder at the park,
- laundry,
- watched The Son eat powdered parmesan cheese and crushed ice for lunch (though served something much tastier and slightly more nutritious), and
- took a nursey-nap
Despite set backs, I actually did finish reading the Grapes this week. It just turns out that writing this review is a little more time consuming than others I have done. I will try to get it posted this weekend, my apologies for the tardiness. In the mean time, A GUEST REVIEWER!!
“Son, hey! Hey, hold still a minute! Tell me about what book you are reading right now!”
“Boouck?”
“Yes, book. Hey, come back here! ”
(He returns with Monday the BullFrog, and plops himself in my lap.)
“BOOOCK! BOOOCK!”
“Okay, we can read Monday again.”
(reads Monday the BullFrog for the twelve hundredth time this week.)
“So what did you think?”
“aapergthableph! Boouck, rempick, clemgfghff. Appy.”
“ooookay. Um, what about the plot? The characters? The syntax?”
“Nack?”
“No, not snack. SYNTAX.”
“Nack! PAPLE!”
“Okay, we will have an apple after you finish your review.”
“NOOOOO! PAPLE! PAPLE! OOkie?”
“Good enough.”
(hands The Son some dried apple slices and a Tagalong)
Filed under Read it or Rant, The Son | Comments (5)Friday’s Read it or Rant: Can’t Wait for Heaven
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Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven: A Novel by Fannie Flagg
I have recently read about 1980s Kabul, A child murder case, Sierra Leone, and a depressed family. I was all set to read a nice, light hearted book about a small town and quirky, yet mildly entertaining characters. And then the main character died! In the second chapter! I swear y’all, I almost chucked this one, and picked up a bodice ripper. I stuck with it because I have enjoyed Fannie Flagg in the past, and this was a return to Elmwood Springs, Missouri, a place I thoroughly enjoyed in Standing in the Rainbow.
So this is old school chick lit at it’s best. The back cover says that it asks the age old question: “What is life all about, anyway?” Um, whatever. Plato, it is not. It is about Aunt Elner Shimfissle who is a really old (no one knows how old because she has no birth certificate, and her sister buried the family bible) country woman. She climbs a ladder up a fig tree in her front yard, dislodges a wasp nest, gets stung bunches of times, falls, and dies. The End. No just kidding, she really does die, but the novel covers the ripple effect that she had in hundreds of people’s life. Everyone in her town, and many out of it, have hilarious stories and touching anecdotes about Aunt Elner. The novel also follows Elner to heaven. Yes, Really. So this is the part of the book that you really need to read with a grain of salt,(read the meaning of that here). This is not a religious manifesto by any stretch of the imagination. I would not read it with your Sunday School class or anything. Heaven is whatever she wants it to be, and God’s name is Raymond. He also calls himself Buddha, Mohammad, and Elvis. My summary stops here because I can’t tell any more without giving away the whole thing.
Which brings us to the million dollar question, does Hey You recommend it? Well, that depends. This book is light. Real Light. Like a half eaten Peep light. If that is what you are looking for, then yes, I would recommend it. The characters are charming, if not as well fleshed out as they could be. The plot does have some nice twists, but not exactly inspired ones. It is a good book to read on the tread mill, or while your child is watching Elmo. It is not a good book to write your senior thesis on.
Next up: Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. That should be a little heavier than a Peep.
Filed under Read it or Rant | Comments (2)Friday’s Read it or Rant: Fortunate Lives
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Fortunate Lives: A Novel by Robb Forman Dew
Eh. S’okay. I swear y’all, I really do read a lot of books that I LOVE. I just have not reviewed one of them yet. This week’s book, Fortunate Lives: A Novel was not really one that I even liked. Potential? Really it had tremendous potential. It just did not quite get there. Parts of the book were really even good, just not, you know, the whole thing. The Brother gave this one to me (actually I took it out of a stack he was going to sell).
Okay, the basic gist of the plot (hey– that could be the problem!) is a family that has plenty of money, plenty of friends, throws great parties, and has the respect of the community. The Husband and Wife love each other and are faithful. The kids are brilliant (like Harvard brilliant), not into drugs or anything, and are reasonably well behaved. They had a son who was killed many years ago, and on the surface everyone has dealt with it, key word: SURFACE. So these two people that do not fit into their perfect little lives show up, unannounced, and unwanted. A single mom (whom I hated, but was hands down the most interesting character) Netta, and her daughter Anna Tyson. They are odd. And Netta is nuts. So Netta and Anna Tyson each affect every member of the family differently and you think that this whole perfect family is going to collapse…..but then they don’t. Everything is fine. Did I mention the lack of plot yet?
I really enjoyed the technical aspect of this book, it was very gracefully written. The language was exquisite, and I really dug the sort of ethereal feel to the writing of the family , and then the switch to a more crass style when talking about Netta. Honestly, there were pages at a time were it felt more like I was reading poetry instead of a novel (which we know it is since it is so cleverly in the title and all ). The characters were so dimensional, and each person in the book could have had a novel written about them alone, if only they had, whats that thing called again? Um, you know, where the story is about something? Oh yeah! A PLOT.
To sum up. If your literary snob brother is selling a book, there is a good reason why. If you see Fortunate Lives: A Novel at the library, and your toddler is running around like crazy and your arms are already full of Dr. Seuss, and you just need something to read, then by all means, pick this up. But, don’t spend your money on it. Unless you have lots of money to waste on stuff, in which case, can I have some?
Next up: a book that should be funny! If you have suggestions of books for me to read, email me, heyyou@thehuckablog.com. Also, if you have read this book, PLUEASSE put your own review in the comments section.
Filed under Read it or Rant | Comments (2)Friday’s Read it or Rant: an intro
A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah
Welcome to the first installment of the Friday’s Read it or Rant. Looking for a nice light-hearted read? Perhaps something to read before bed? Something to inspire you? Make you feel anything other than depressed and kinda bored? Then A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, by Ishmael Beah, is not the book for you.
The Husband picked this one up after reading a review in The Heifer newsletter, and thought it would be educational and inspiring. He read it first and said, “Make sure you take your Happy drugs before reading it.” This is basically the autobiography of a 12 year old, Sierra Leonean (Leonesse? Leionoite?) kid who wants to be the first famous rapper from his country. He and his other wannabe friends walk to a village twenty miles away to perform in a talent show. While they are gone, his village is attacked by rebels (the RUF, the Revolutionary United Front) and his family is missing. The next hundred or so pages are him hiding from rebels and the state soldiers. He is hungry. He is scared. He is lonely. He meets other hungry, scared, and lonely teenage boys. At some point they are overtaken by the state soldiers and given the choice to fight or die. They chose fight. They are all pumped full of narcotics and shown violent movies (I hear a good argument against violent movies and video games!). They are given guns bigger than they are and told to kill as many people as possible, women and children included. Eventually they are pretty much kidnapped by UNICEF and put in a rehab facility with other RUF boy soldiers. They, of course, all try to kill each other; the UN is confused about what they did wrong. They get rehabbed, kid goes to NYC, makes speeches, gets adopted, writes book.
So you would think that this would be an exciting book right? A tear jerker maybe? But no, it is BORING! And poorly written. It could be educational if someone was unaware of the epidemic of child soldiers in many African conflicts, or of the continued slaughter of innocents in civil wars around the globe, or the fact that this happened during the nineties, not decades ago…..the thing is….I already knew all of that, and the book was just not very interesting. Seriously… mad props to the kid. It is astonishing that he made it out alive, and I am sure he has a very bright future ahead of him as a diplomat or teacher, but not a writer. To sum up. Spend your $22.95 on a donation to UNICEF, Heifer, or Doctors without Borders, and read texts about world conflict, not A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah.
Filed under Read it or Rant, lexapro lexplains it | Comments (10)Vote here! Would you like my opinion?
Do you think that I should start posting a weekly book review? I am already posting what we are reading over to right there, what you have not been paying attention to all that the huckablog has to offer? for shame…. Anyway your choices are:
A. Yes, Hey You! You should totally do that. I respect your opinion on all things literary.
B. Hell-to-the-NO. You opine much to freely already.
C. Eh. You can if you want, but I do not really read so I will just ignore those posts.
Filed under Read it or Rant | Comments (14)Have you ever had your Library card cut up? Um, me either.
I got another nasty letter from the Library today. So begins the cycle of enjoyment, guilt, and shame.
You see….confession time….I am a bad book borrower. I go to the library and get armfuls of books, voraciously fly through all of them in a week or two, return them and only go back for story time with The Son for weeks at a time. After a month I get a letter, “Dear Mrs. Hey You, Our records show that the books Bodice Ripper in Bali, and Natural Family Planning (side note: Have y’all actually read about Natural Birth Control? You can only have sex six days a month and those are the days you least feel like having it!! It should be called Birth Control by Abstinence) have not been returned and are four weeks past due. Please return them immediately and if this is a problem please contact us at blah blah blah.” No big deal, I casually look for the missing books that are lost because I never really read them and they never made it out of the car.
A month later, “Dear Mrs. Hey You, We here at the County library depend on our borrowers to return books so that we can keep our costs low. You still have not returned Bodice Ripper in Bali (horny much? Try reading less and using The Pill instead of that hippie natural crap), and Natural Family Planning ( you know this does not work right? Look at Michelle Duggar) Your borrowing privileges have been revoked until the mentioned items have been returned or paid for. Blah, Blah, Blah.” I have the good grace to at least feel slightly ashamed that I have lost library books, AGAIN. I look for them in the garage thinking that the husband dumped them in there when he cleaned out my car. Nope. Oh well. La-de-dah, I will worry about that another day.
Next month, “Listen up Lady! Give us back our damn books! We LOANED them to you. That means you GIVE THEM BACK!! We are all talking about you and your book choices and we have plastered them all over the internet for people to laugh at, (ha ha, I already did that, that’ll show you!) You may not ever come here again if you do not give us back our books!!” The Husband sees this one, finds the books, drives to the library, pays the two dollar late fine, apologizes for me, and has my card re-instated. I hide in car, ashamed to show my face.
The next week I check out arm loads of books and promptly lose The Passion in Paris and Parenting Toddlers for Dummies.