I'm looking at The Great Depression and the New Deal: A Very Short Introduction by Eric Rauchway as a possible source for my paper. This is an ebook that I have found through the Wesleyan library. I have read a little bit of this ebook. The content of this ebook has been good so far. The ebook goes in depth into a lot of subjects during the Great Depression. The only thing this book lacks is the personal accounts. It may be better to have more personal accounts, in order to understand the time period.
I have found one thing that may prove Steinbeck is historically correct. On page 47, the ebook says that families were "Tractored out" of their farms due to the lack of modernization. This means that the traditional farmers were failing because the technology of the time out competed the mule and the farmer. In this, families lost there farms and there was less work because of this.
The link to the ebook.
After skimming through the e-book, I agree with you in that it's a good book. It contains a lot of historical information that could possibly assist readers in understanding the time period. History is one of the most important things to consider when reading a novel, and a better understanding of it will assist a reader in better understanding the novel as a whole. Additional, history directly relates to one of the topics that I plan on doing, politics, so that makes understanding the history of The Grapes of Wrath even more important. Overall, I think this would be a great book to read if someone wants to have a better understanding of both the book and the time period.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with you and Davian. The rich history in this book is what ties it all together. Though the Joad's didn't really go through the problem of being "tractored out", many other families did in different regions. In Grapes of Wrath you can see the history coming out of the book. The Hoovervilles part in the book really caught my attention because that was such a huge part during the Great Depression and seeing the families point of view affected my opinion greatly. All the troubles that these families went through relate back to the theme of history.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on this. It sure seems like a great book. It does have a lot of historical information that will help readers in knowing about the time period of the Great Depression. History is very important when knowing about books, especially the Grapes of Wrath. If you didn't know about what happened during this time period, you would be very confused about why people were "tractored out." The technology just wasn't there for the small farmers with their mules, so they had no chance to survive. Great job!
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