The Grapes of Wrath Has My Vote for Great American Novel

Publishers Weekly posted a list of novels for consideration for the much-lauded moniker of “Great American Novel.” For brevity, we will call it GAN.  Before I go any further, let me confess that I have not read all the titles listed, but I have read my fair share.

I am going with The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck as the GAN.

Let me explain. There are a lot of good titles up there, but I can think of any number of reasons not to consider them. I will pass on The Sound and the Fury because I think the selection should be accessible, and Faulkner is not. Ditto for Catcher in the Rye, not because it is not accessible, but I am dubious about considering a novel of teenage angst for the title. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest? Another good novel, but I don’t think a story that takes place in a mental hospital is varied enough to earn the title, although a re-read could conjure up images of the current U.S. Congress.

Racism is such an intrinsic part of the American story that I have a hard time passing over any of that genre—Uncle Tom’s Cabin (which many argue was a contributing factor to the Civil war, and one I have never read), The Invisible Man, To Kill a Mockingbird, Native Son and Go Tell It to the Mountain are all hard to pass up.

The Sun Also Rises and The Things They Carried were great reads, but all the action took place in other countries (Europe and Vietnam, respectively).  We are talking the Great American Novel.

But Grapes of Wrath is distinctly American, and it is great. Other reasons for my choice:

• It takes place in the United States.
• It is about suffering, stereotyping and prejudice, although I will grant that it is not about racial prejudice.
• It takes place during a formative period in American history—the Great Depression.
• The story includes the American brand of religion in the person of Jim Casy. When pressed, though, Casy chooses social justice.
• It includes strong women. Ma Joad tries to hold the family together in diversity without robbing her husband of what self-esteem he has left. Rose of Sharon starts out as a teenage girl, but ends is as a strong woman wet nursing a starving man after her own baby is stillborn.
• The story keeps happening over and over in the United States—people moving and looking for work, from the Great Migration of African Americans to the influx of illegal immigrants from Mexico—and each instance deals with the same themes.
• Steinbeck was an American writer, for the most part writing about American themes.

I can be convinced otherwise. Let’s have some input. What is your vote for the Great American Novel, and it does not have to be on this list from Publishers Weekly.

See ya’ later.

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Comments

[Skip]

It's not likely to be at the top of anyone's list, but the USA trilogy by John Dos Passos moved me even more than did GoW, and that's going some. It's an incredibly inventive work.

[Tim Sunderland]

I will add it to my reading list. Thanks for th e recommendation.