The Grapes of Wrath - Question 7

What techniques does the author use to engage the audience and make the story effective?

Steinbeck was one of the most talented authors of his time, and he had a few specific writing styles that made his works very effective. First, Steinbeck loved details. In the novel The Grapes of Wrath, he used very vivid details. He used a boat load of them to describe the Joad's daily life. And by the time the book was finished, I could probably go get my auto mechanics license at the local auto body shop because Steinbeck went into such great detail. He includes so much detail that it is easy to forget that you are outside the book, and not right next to the Joad family, traveling along the road. With all the details provided, you could probably write a movie script to match the book exactly. Steinbeck also liked to mix in every once in a while a chapter that painted a picture of the Dust Bowl era from a historical viewpoint. They tended to tell the darker side of the Dust Bowl era, depicting car salesmen selling cars for way too much money, bank tellers evicting tenant farmers, and dust storms that ruined the land. He used a lot of repetition in those chapters and that really drove the idea home of how bad the Dust Bowl really was.

Steinbeck also used the standard writing tricks when he wrote this novel. He wrote in many great themes and symbols, and that really helped to hook the reader. Steinbeck may or may not have known that his book would become a timeless classic, but his amazing writing style helped to assure him a spot on the list. No other author compares to the amount of detail that Steinbeck put into this story. He put his heart and soul into the book, and it obviously shows. Steinbeck's book will never be forgotten through out history.

Steinbeck, John, and Robert J. DeMott. The Grapes of Wrath. New York: Penguin, 2006. Print.