Grapes of Wrath- Hope

In the book , 'The Grapes of Wrath', one thing that keeps all the characters going and trying to reach their goals of making it to California is hope. Hope that they can start over again and hope that they will be able to find a job. They hope that they will be able to provide for their families again and they hope that they this rough patch of their life will soon be over. Hope is such a strong thing in this book. With out hope, the farmers would have given up a long time ago. If they did not have any hope, the farmers would not even try to make the trip up to California. If they did not hope that they could some day have a better life with out the fear and suffering that they had to face in Oklahoma, the farmers would have nothing. Hope is what brought the farmers out to California. They hoped that if they could make it through the dangerous journey to get to California, there would be a job waiting there for them. If they were not hopeful throughout their journey, they would have just given up and not found a job and their family would starve. Hope is a very strong force in this book because it is what gave not only the farmer's but also the family of the farmer's strength to keep going. If the family of the farmer's did not have hope and did not believe that the farmer's could help them and provide for them, they would not have been dedicated enough to make the trip out to California and they would have probably just died. Since they had hope, they were able to make it out to California and make a better life for themselves. The hope that California symbolizes for the farmers and their families is inspirational. I think that when people have hope, it can give them the strength and power to do amazing things.


Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath. New York: Penguin, 2002. Print.