Prominent novelist, John Steinbeck, author of The Grapes of Wrath (1939), uses the fifth chapter as a weapon to assert that man, more often than not, is at the mercy of his own creations. Using symbolism, anaphora, and metonymy at the very heart of the sculpture while carefully chiseling the edges with well-placed pathos, Steinbeck delivers his thesis. Steinbeck’s purpose is to warn humanity of the grave danger our society faces when man is but a slave to objects of his own making. Steinbeck uses a passionate, persuasive, but by no means overly dramatic tone to address an audience who is accustomed to hardships such as those imposed by the Great Depression.

            Steinbeck uses several literary devices in the fifth chapter of The Grapes of Wrath to support his thesis. Perhaps the most obvious of those devices are Steinbeck’s use of symbolism, metonymy, and anaphora. The strongest connection to the reader’s mind was achieved through symbolism, such as when Steinbeck states, “The Bank – or the Company – needs – wants – insists as though the Bank or the Company were a monster, with thought and feeling.” (33) Here the Bank symbolizes all that man creates but fail to control. Hence, man gives those creations the power and ability to control the actions of generations to come. Furthermore, Steinbeck bolsters his argument that man created his own slave through not only his use of metonymy in which the Bank symbolizes the concept of one’s utter lack of control, but also his use of anaphora. We see the author’s use of anaphora when he writes, “The driver sat in his iron seat and he was proud of the straight lines he did not will, proud of the tractor he did not own or love, proud of the power he could not control.” (Steinbeck 36) Steinbeck uses anaphora to emphasize man’s, by no means unwonted, pride of that which is not in his possession. Surely, we believe that which we make to be ours, and thus, worthy of our pride. However, the truth Steinbeck wishes to express in the fifth chapter of The Grapes of Wrath is that man only possesses that which he is capable of mastering, of controlling, of destroying.

            Furthermore, Steinbeck uses pathos to not only rejuvenate his argument but also to assure the audience of his credibility as an author who has directly experienced the Great Depression and the pain of seeing the land, which has become so dear, so intimate, murdered. This rhetorical appeal is clear when Steinbeck states, “The man sitting in the iron seat did not look like a man; gloved, goggled, rubber dust mask over nose and mouth, he was part of the monster, a robot in the seat….The driver could not control it (tractor) – straight across country it went, cutting through a dozen farms and straight back.” (35) Later, Steinbeck uses pathos once again to describe the tractor’s driver, “A twitch at the controls could swerve the cat’, but the driver’s hands could not twitch because the monster that had built the tractor, the monster that had sent the tractor our, had somehow got into the driver’s hands, into his brain and muscle, had goggled him and muzzled him – goggled his mind, muzzled his speech, goggled his perception, muzzled his protest.” (36) With his use of pathos, Steinbeck has crafted a masterpiece of the most immense proportions. Given the complexity of his thesis, the image of the monster, the emphasis of man’s pride in what is not his, combined with the appeal to emotion obvious in the description of the driver, Steinbeck successfully delivers his message across to the reader.

            Finally, Steinbeck carefully structures his argument in the fifth chapter of The Grapes of Wrath so as to appeal to all audiences in all eras and societies. We find that the concept of the Bank or the monster is immortal. This monster has murdered many in the past centuries, and it continues to murder many today. Despite all the advances in technology, despite the invention of the “tractor” as Steinbeck implies, we remain incapable of controlling it, incapable of guiding it. We remain paralyzed, puppets to objects of our own making, slaves in the hands of monsters, monsters to which we have given life. Steinbeck wishes to characterize the severe pit that we, as a people; we, as a nation; we, as a world, have fallen in. With each new invention, each new ingenious technology, we become not closer to finding our path out of the pit, but rather closer down the path to the destruction of humanity. We must learn to control the products of our ingenuity; we must learn to master our creations. Albert Einstein once said that “The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.” He who cannot learn to halt an invention, to destroy the stream before it floods the nation, chooses to live imprisoned, blinded, enslaved by matters of his own making. That is the point Steinbeck wishes to imply in the fifth chapter of The Grapes of Wrath.

Works Cited

Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath. Penguin Classics, 2006. Print.

– Ayah Gouda