Blog #30: The Grapes of Wrath

After reading The Grapes of Wrath, I found the ending extremely disturbing! It ends up with the Joad family going into a barn. There is a young boy in there along with his father. His father is in really horrible shape. He has not eaten in six days (Steinbeck 454). First of all, that is a long time! I do not think most people could handle not eating for only one day! I do not eat breakfast most of the time, but ninety percent of the time I have both lunch and dinner. So I find it amazing that the man even lasted six days without eating a single thing. If I recall correctly, most people can only go like three days without eating. That may be drinking water though. But three days without water sounds like an awfully long time. Either way, the man has not eaten in six days and is very sick. One of the characters in The Grapes of Wrath, Rose of Sharon, was pregnant. She had just given birth to a still baby. That means that the baby was dead before it was even born. When they get to the barn, she sees this man who cannot eat anymore. He cannot eat because he has gone so long without food that his stomach would not be able to handle any real solid food, so Rose of Sharon says that she will breast feed him considering she has all of that milk, and no child. I think this is so weird. I would kind of understand if it had been the young boy that needed the milk, but it is a grown man. I believe that this was a very sincere action, and I think that because she politely asked everyone else to leave. I think of it differently because she was not just doing that to show off or put out, she really seemed to care about the health of the starving man. The Grapes of Wrath was pretty interesting book to say the least.

Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath. NY: Penguin, 1939. Print.