The Grapes of Wrath American Dream Quotes

Why don’t you go on west to California? There’s work there, and it never gets cold. Why, you can reach out anywhere and pick an orange. Why, there’s always some kind of crop to work in.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 5. The landowner, who has come to evict the tenant family from their home and farm, suggests that they travel to the Promised Land of California. The Golden State becomes the go-to destination for hundreds of thousands of migrants fleeing the misery of the Dust Bowl. But the promise of a better life turns out to be a false one, there aren’t enough jobs for all the unemployed migrants who overcrowd California.

Hot sun on rusted metal. Oil on the ground. People are wandering in, bewildered, needing a car.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 7. We have staccato speech. Staccato sentences. Rapidly changing topics. Images of hot sun. Corrosion and rust. Oil that is both dirty and wealth-promising. Confusion and flight. It all adds up to the dispossessed migrant farmers’ exodus to their uncertain future. Will they make it to the Promised Land? Or will that dream be corrupted? The tone and language of the passage are foreshadowing of the uncertainty of the California dream.

Joe, did you know you was talkin’ to pikers?
I ain’t a piker. I got to get a car. We’re goin’ to California. I got to get a car.
Well, I’m a sucker. Joe says I’m a sucker. Says if I don’t quit givin’ my shirt away I’ll starve to death.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 7. There are many important themes in play here: the American Dream, California, money and starvation. Steinbeck also makes great use of irony. The used car lot owner is having a go at one of his customers, labeling him stingy and tight-fisted – a piker! He is trying hard to manipulate him into buying one of his defective, over-priced used cars. The customer wants to get to California which he believes to be an earthly paradise – the American Dream! The salesman engages in a bit of oversell, saying that he is a sucker who is loving his shirt. The irony is that it is the customers he is trying to sucker and steal their shirts.

Soften ’em up, Joe. Jesus, I wisht I had a thousand jalopies! Get em’ ready to deal an’ I’ll close ’em.
Goin’ to California? Here’s jus’ what you need. Looks shot, but they’s thousan’s of miles in her.
Lined up side by side. Good Used Cars. Bargains. Clean, runs good.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 7. The unscrupulous second-hand car dealer speaks at a frantic pace in his bid to rip off car buyers with as many jalopies as possible. He tells his salesman to soften up customers, so that he can can close the sale of his beat-up rust buckets. He is greedily exploiting desperate migrant farmers headed for a better life in California, so that he can extract maximum profit from them. The dealer claims that his cars are good, but the reader knows that they are defective and sub-standard. This is an example of dramatic irony. This passage also foreshadows the nature of the California dream. The dealer’s deception of migrants with worn-out cars that are made to seem roadworthy, suggests that the American Dream of a good life in California may turn out to be just that – simply a dream!

Maybe we can start again, in the new rich land – in California, where the fruit grows. We’ll start over.
But you can’t start. Only a baby can start. You and me – why, we’re all that’s been. The anger of a moment, the thousand pictures, that’s us. This land, this red land, is us; and the flood years and the dust years and the drought years are us. We can’t start again.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 9. Tenant farmers discuss the question of starting again in the new rich land of California. Steinbeck is commenting on the hopelessness felt by the tenant farmers. The passage begins on an optimistic note that tenant farmers can restart new lives in California. But the tone then significantly changes. A mood of despondancy takes over, as the farmers realize that the umbilical cord that bonded them to the land has been broken, that connection which was their source of life and meaning is gone, and they can’t start again. It’s all a deception.

"Tom, I hope things is all right in California…Seems too nice, kinda. I seen the han’bills fellas pass out, an’ how much work they is, an’ high wages an’ all; an’ I seen in the paper how they want folks to come an’ pick grapes an’ oranges an’ peaches. That’d be nice work, Tom, pickin’ peaches. Even if they wouldn’t let you eat none, you could maybe snitch a little ratty one sometimes. An’ it’d be nice under the trees, workin’ in the shade."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 10. If something seem too good to be true, then maybe it is. Ma Joad is fantasizing about the good life in California. But at the same time she has reservations that the reality will match the dream as promised in the fruit farm owners’ flyers. This is foreshadowing of things to come for the Joads.

"I’m scared of stuff so nice. I ain’t got faith. I’m scared somepin ain’t so nice about it."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 10. The practical Ma Joad is skeptical of the promise of an abundant and better life in California. She hopes that it will live up to its promise. But she admits to being scared that the promised land there is only a dream. Ma proves to be a very perceptive woman, as she foreshadows that California will not be quite the utopia the migrants had hoped for.

"But I like to think how nice it’s gonna be, maybe, in California. Never cold. An’ fruit ever’place, an’ people just bein’ in the nicest places, little white houses in among the orange trees. I wonder – that is, if we all get jobs an’ all work – maybe we can get one of them little white houses. An’ the little fellas go out an’ pick oranges right off the tree. They ain’t gonna be able to stand it, they’ll get to yellin’ so."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 10. The theme of hope rings through Ma Joad’s words of positivity when she dreams of what it will be like in California when they get there. As the family loads up their jalopy, Ma fantasizes about the American Dream of owning a little white house and living a bountiful life in the Golden State. It almost sounds too good to be true!

"I knowed a fella from California. He didn’t talk like us. You’d of knowed he come from some far-off place jus’ the way he talked. But he says they’s too many folks lookin’ for work right there now. An’ he says the folks that pick the fruit live in dirty ol’ camps an’ don’t hardly get enough to eat. He says wages is low an’ hard to get any."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 10. Tom Joad tells his mother what he heard about the migrant situation in California. It turns out not to be good news for the huge numbers crowding into the state in search of work. There isn’t enough work to go round, pay is poor, camp living conditions are bad and people are huntry. This foreshadows that the California dream will not be what it’s cracked up to be for families like the Joads.

And still the family stood about like dream walkers, their eyes focused panoramically, seeing no detail, but the whole dawn, the whole land, the whole texture of the country at once.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 10. Steinbeck describes the moment of departure for the migrating Joads, in terms of their American dream. The family is part of a bigger movement of hundreds of thousands of migrants who will take Highway 66 to California. All have been lured by a collective dream of hope and plenty in the West. What will this new land bring to the Joads? This passage reflects the grand scale of their dream as they leave Oklahoma and head off into the unknown.

Ma said, "You won’t be no burden. Each’ll help each, an’ we’ll all git to California. Sairy Wilson he’ped lay Grampa out," and she stopped. The relationship was plain.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 13. When Ivy and Sairy Wilson express worry that they will be a "burden" on the Joads going to California, Ma Joad rejects this. The families have formed a bond of friendship, Sairy helping to lay Grampa out, and Ma says that they will help each other make it to the Golden State. Hope and the American dream remain alive for the Joads and Wilsons.

"She went on excitedly. "Connie gonna get a job in a store or maybe a fact’ry. An’ he’s gonna study at home, maybe radio, so he can git to be a expert an’ maybe later have his own store…An’ we’ll gave a nice car, little car…An’ we’ll live in town, an’ go to pitchers whenever an’ – well, I’m gonna have a
‘lectric iron, an’ the baby’ll have all new stuff."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 16. Rose of Sharon describes her version of the California dream to Ma Joad. She dreams up a house in town, going to the movies, husband Connie getting his own store, having a car, and buying everything new for the baby. There is a lot of over-expectation and air of self-deception in Rose of Sharon’s list of wishes. This is further strengthened by the reaction of Ma Joad, who changes the subject and "seemed to know it was all a dream," we are told.

Ma suddenly seemed to know it was all a dream. She turned her head forward again and her body relaxed, but the little smile stayed around her eyes. "I wonder how Granma feels today," she said.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 16. When Ma Joad listens to Rose of Sharon speak about herself and Connie having a house, car and their own store in California, Ma realizes that this is all a dream. She believes that her daughter is deceiving herself with such high hopes. So Ma changes the subject.

"I tried to tell you folks," he said. "Somepin it took me a year to find out. Took two kids dead, took my wife dead to show me. But I can’t tell you. I should of knew that. Nobody couldn’t tell me, neither. I can’t tell ya about them little fellas layin’ in the tent with their bellies puffed out an’ jus’ skin on their bones, an’ shiverin’ an’ whinin’ like pups, an’ me runnin’ aroun’ tryin’ to get work – not for money, not for wages!" he shouted.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 16. The angry ragged man at the campsite tells the Joads his distressing story about life for him and his family in California. Unable to get work in the state, his wife and two children died from starvation. The promised good life there turned out to be a lie for them.

In the evening a strange thing happened: the twenty families became one family, the children were the children of all. The loss of home became one loss, and the golden time in the West was one dream.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 17. This passage shows how migrant families during their time of misfortune can bond together to form one bigger and stronger family. Different families, though not related, reach out to one another and through adversity forge new bonds. By day they are individual families, but at night a wonderful metamorphosis takes place and they are reborn into a collective. They are now one community helping one another achieve the shared dream of a "golden time" in California.

"She’s a nice country. But she was stole a long time ago…An’ you never seen such purty country – all orchards, an’ grapes, purtiest country you ever seen…But you can’t have none of that lan’. That’s a Lan’ and Cattle Company. An’ if they don’t want ta work her, she ain’t gonna git worked. You go in there an’ plant you a little corn, an’ you’ll go to jail!"

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 18. Pa and Tom Joad meet a man and his son who are quitting California after being unable to get work there. The man warns the Joads that all the good land in California has been bought up by a property company. This foreshadows that California may not be the land of milk and honey the Joads are expecting.

"Sure, nice to look at, but you can’t have none of it. They’s a grove of yella oranges – an’ a guy with a gun that got the right to kill you if you touch one."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 18. Looks are deceiving, the man swimming in the Colorado River warns Pa Joad, who asks if it’s nice in California. It may be beautiful to look at, the man warns, but landowners control the land and will shoot you if you touch one of their oranges. The man suggests that California as a land of opportunity and riches for migrants is a great deception.

"Fella can’t starve beside a nice river…I can’t he’p it. I can’t leave this here water…You know how the folks are nice to me. But they don’t really care for me."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 18. Noah Joad abruptly announces to his brother Tom that he is parting company with the family. He asks his brother to tell Ma and says that he will survive by fishing. Noah doesn’t fit in and feels that the others don’t care for him. His American dream has now fallen apart, he is just intent on survival.

Al jammed on the brake and stopped in the middle of the road, and, "Jesus Christ! Look!" he said. The vineyards, the orchards, the great flat valley, green and beautiful, the trees set in rows, and the farm houses.
And Pa said, "God Almighty!" The distant cities, the little towns in the orchard land, and the morning sun, golden on the valley. A car honked behind them. Al pulled to the side of the road and parked.
"I want ta look at her." The grain fields golden in the morning, and the willow lines, the eucalyptus trees in rows.
Pa sighed, "I never knowed they was anything like her." The peach trees and the walnut groves, and the dark green patches of oranges. And red roofs among the trees, and barns – rich barns.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 18. The Joads feast their eyes for the first time on California’s aesthetically pleasing lush San Joaquin Valley. Probably no other passage in the novel describes the beauty of California like this one. The refugees from the exhausted Dust Bowl farms are impressed by what they see. Steinbeck uses color imagery, "green" and "golden," to suggest that they have arrived at a place teeming with new life, hope and prosperity. The San Joaquin Valley and the Sacramento Valley together form the 450-mile long Central Valley, which is the world’s largest agricultural area. Little wonder that the Joads believe that they have just reached Paradise.

"If I’d of knowed it would be like this I wouldn’ of came. I’d a studied nights ’bout tractors back home an’ got me a three-dollar job. Fella can live awful nice on three dollars a day, an’ go to the pitcher show ever’ night, too."
Rose of Sharon looked apprehensive. "You’re gonna study nights ’bout radios," she said. He was long in answering. "Ain’t you?" she demanded.
"Yeah, sure. Soon’s I get on my feet. Get a little money."
She rolled up on her elbow. "You ain’t givin’ it up!"
"No – no – ‘course not. But – I didn’ know they was places like this we got to live in."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 20. Connie’s American Dream is not what he imagined it to be. In an argument with Rose of Sharon he says that if he had known that things would be as bad as they are in their quest for a better life in California, he would have taken a job as a tractor man for three dollars a day. This foreshadows Connie’s later departure.

"I’m hungry," Ruthie whined.
"No, you ain’t," Ma said. "You had good mush."
"Wisht I had a box a Cracker Jack. There ain’t nothin’ to do. Ain’t no fun."
"They’ll be fun," Ma said. "You jus’ wait. Be fun purty soon. Git a house an’ a place, purty soon."
"Wisht we had a dog," Ruthie said.
"We’ll have a dog; have a cat, too."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 30. The American dream is still shining bright for an optimistic Ma Joad, despite the family’s trials and hardships. When Ruthie complains about having no Cracker Jack or fun, Ma promises her not only fun, but a house, a dog and a cat. Ma is a symbol of hope and the glue that holds the Joad family together.
Close