On Rereading The Grapes of Wrath and the New American Diaspora
mattlove.substack.com
I don't feel like writing a formal literary essay about my recent rereading of The Grapes of Wrath, so a rambling list of my thoughts has to suffice. I will say: it was a profoundly moving experience to read this novel again 35 years later. I had forgotten a lot of it, and most of my memories were connected to the movie. I will also say this: this novel needs to be read and reread. It might have more relevance today than it did when it was published in 1939, for the chief reasons of trying to understand how destitute Americans have changed since then. This book also provides insights into the current hatred of a certain class of destitute Americans, the Americans of a new diaspora that is unlike other ones in our country's history. It is a diaspora that has people dispersed, moving, some forced, some not—and then not moving. This diaspora ends in stasis, in the willows or under the overpass, or stretched out on a tarp nearby a crap car that just crapped out.
On Rereading The Grapes of Wrath and the New American Diaspora
On Rereading The Grapes of Wrath and the New…
On Rereading The Grapes of Wrath and the New American Diaspora
I don't feel like writing a formal literary essay about my recent rereading of The Grapes of Wrath, so a rambling list of my thoughts has to suffice. I will say: it was a profoundly moving experience to read this novel again 35 years later. I had forgotten a lot of it, and most of my memories were connected to the movie. I will also say this: this novel needs to be read and reread. It might have more relevance today than it did when it was published in 1939, for the chief reasons of trying to understand how destitute Americans have changed since then. This book also provides insights into the current hatred of a certain class of destitute Americans, the Americans of a new diaspora that is unlike other ones in our country's history. It is a diaspora that has people dispersed, moving, some forced, some not—and then not moving. This diaspora ends in stasis, in the willows or under the overpass, or stretched out on a tarp nearby a crap car that just crapped out.