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One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years
First published in 1939, Steinbeck’s Pulitzer Prize-winning epic of the Great Depression chronicles the Dust Bowl migration of the 1930s and tells the story of one Oklahoma farm family, the Joads—driven from their homestead and forced to travel west to the promised land of California. Out of their trials and their repeated collisions against the hard realities of an America divided into Haves and Have-Nots evolves a drama that is intensely human yet majestic in its scale and moral vision, elemental yet plainspoken, tragic but ultimately stirring in its human dignity. A portrait of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless, of one man’s fierce reaction to injustice, and of one woman’s stoical strength, the novel captures the horrors of the Great Depression and probes into the very nature of equality and justice in America. At once a naturalistic epic, captivity narrative, road novel, and transcendental gospel, Steinbeck’s powerful landmark novel is perhaps the most American of American Classics.
This Centennial edition, specially designed to commemorate one hundred years of Steinbeck, features french flaps and deckle-edged pages.
For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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Creators
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Series
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Publisher
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Release date
March 1, 2022 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9780593635421
- File size: 605336 KB
- Duration: 21:01:06
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in l940, this famous protest novel is a natural for audio. The story is told almost entirely in the country vernacular of the destitute workers of the 1930's--some 300,000 strong--who had been driven from their farms and were pouring into California to face hunger, squalor and humiliation. (An inept narrator, reading their dialogue, could easily have made them sound like the Beverly Hillbillies.) Instead, Dylan Baker's sensitive interpretation has given them the dignity--even the nobility--that Steinbeck intended. He has also avoided another serious pitfall: overdramatizing some of Steinbeck's speeches in the last half of the book, avoiding what the Joads called "a preacher voice." The listener is hardly aware of occasional lapses into sentimental prose as Steinbeck delivers his many impassioned sermons against the selfishness and greed of the rich. Altogether, this is an outstanding performance; John Steinbeck would have relished it. J.C. Winner of AUDIOFILE Earphones Award (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine
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