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Literary Devices
Definition of Allusion
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals, historical events, or philosophical ideas... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to... read full definition
Chapter 9
Explanation and Analysis—The Pilgrim's Progress:
In Steinbeck’s description of the many women who were forced to lead their households out of Oklahoma and other Western states as a result of the Dust Bowl, he alludes to John Bunyan’s book The Pilgrim’s Progress and the St. Louis Fair:
The women sat among the doomed things, turning them over and looking past them and back. This book. My father had it. He liked a book. Pilgrim’s Progress. Used to read it. Got his name in it. And his pipe—still smells rank. And this picture—an angel. I looked at that before the fust three come—didn’t seem to do much good. Think we could get this china dog in? Aunt Sadie brought it from the St. Louis Fair. See? Wrote right on it.
In this passage, Steinbeck compares the attitudes of men and women when forced to pack up their homes and leave. The men, he suggests, fall into a despondent state and busy themselves with distracting tasks. In contrast, the women accept the necessity of the move, but linger among the “doomed things” that hold emotional significance but cannot, for lack of space, be retained.
To illustrate this difference, Steinbeck describes an unnamed female figure who finds her father’s copy of The Pilgrim’s Progress, a work of allegorical Christian fiction written in 1678 by English Puritan John Bunyan. The book, which was read widely in the colonial period of U.S. history, details the arduous journey undertaken by its protagonist, Christian. The plot of the book therefore serves as a parallel here to the difficult journey that the Joad family must undertake. The woman then turns to a “china” (or porcelain) dog, brought by an aunt from the St. Louis Fair, a major international exposition held in St. Louis in 1904. These allusions highlight the family memories, both personal and historical, embedded in these objects that must be left behind out of necessity.
Related Themes:
Chapter 13
Explanation and Analysis—All that Lives:
After Grampa Joad dies of a stroke during the family’s trip to California, which Casy interprets as a sign of Grampa Joad’s strong connection to the land of Oklahoma, the family requests that Casy, a former preacher, say a few words to mark their informal funeral. In his brief sermon, Casy alludes to a poem by William Blake, an 18th-century English poet:
This here ol’ man jus’ lived a life an’ jus’ died out of it. I don’ know whether he was good or bad, but that don’t matter much. He was alive, an’ that’s what matters. An’ now he’s dead, an’ that don’t matter. Heard a fella tell a poem one time, an’ he says ‘All that lives is holy.’ Got to thinkin’, an’ purty soon it means more than the words says. An’ I wouldn’ pray for a ol’ fella that’s dead. He’s awright. He got a job to do, but it’s all laid out for ’im an’ there’s on’y one way to do it.
Casy’s sermon is unusual. No longer confident in his own religious faith, Casy offers a secular version of a sermon, refusing to comment on whether Grampa Joad was “good or bad” but instead noting that “he was alive, an’ that’s what matters.” He recounts a line from a poem that reads “All that lives is holy.” Here, he alludes to the closing line of Blake’s A Marriage of Heaven and Hell: “For everything that lives is holy.” Casy paraphrases the poem slightly, but uses it to suggest that life is sacred, regardless of whether or not a person is pious or a sinner.
Related Themes:
Chapter 26
Explanation and Analysis—French Revolution:
At the peach-picking compound, the Joads encounter a labor strike. Curious about the protest, Tom sneaks out at night and encounters Casy, who has been working as an advocate for the workers. Casy then describes the experiences of a fellow labor advocate who was threatened by the workers, as they feared that his activities would raise trouble with the owners and the authorities. In recounting the event, Casy alludes to various historical revolutions:
Says, ‘Git out. You’re a danger on us.’ Well, sir, it hurt his feelin’s purty bad. But then he says, ‘It ain’t so bad if you know.’ He says, ‘French Revolution—all them fellas that figgered her out got their heads chopped off. Always that way,’ he says. ‘Jus’ as natural as rain. You didn’t do it for fun no way. Doin’ it ’cause you have to. ’Cause it’s you. Look at Washington,’ he says. ‘Fit the Revolution, an’ after, them sons-a-bitches turned on him. An’ Lincoln the same. Same folks yellin’ to kill ’em.
After the man attempted to start a union, their meeting was broken up by vigilantes hired by the farm owners. Afterwards, the scared workers turn him out, refusing to have anything further to do with him in fear of being fired or arrested. In response, the man compares their situation to that of several historical revolutions, including the French Revolution and the American Revolution. Those revolutions, the man notes, were more bloody and violent than the comparatively mild labor protests. Further, he suggests that people have always “turned on” the revolutionaries who sought to help them, noting Abraham Lincoln, who was assassinated, as an example. These allusions place the labor movement in the American Southwest alongside a long history of class struggle and political radicalism.
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—Pretty Boy Floyd:
After the Joads decide to leave the government camp, they return to their overstuffed car and Tom begins to talk about his experiences in prison, to Ma Joad’s distress. In her response to Tom’s anecdote about a man nicknamed “Hooligan,” who attempted unsuccessfully to escape from the prison, Ma Joad alludes to Charles Arthur Floyd, more widely known as “Pretty Boy Floyd,” who gained fame and infamy after several bank robberies in the the American West during the 1930’s:
“They tie up the mouth an’ take ’im back inside. Fellas laughed so hard they like to died. But it busted Hooligan’s spirit. He jus’ cried an’ cried, an’ moped aroun’ an’ got sick. Hurt his feelin’s so bad. Cut his wrists with a pin an’ bled to death ’cause his feelin’s was hurt. No harm in ’im at all. They’s all kinds a screwballs in stir.’’
“Don’ talk about it,’’ Ma said. “I knowed Purty Boy Floyd’s ma. He wan’t a bad boy. Jus’ got drove in a corner.’’
Desiring to speak openly and honestly about his experiences in prison, Tom describes Hooligan’s failed escape attempt. After climbing over one of the prison walls, Hooligan was swiftly bagged by the wardens. Embarrassed and despondent, Hooligan then killed himself. Ma Joad, who does not like to hear Tom talk about prison, implores him to stop. “I knowed Purty Boy Floyd’s ma,” she states. Floyd, who was raised in Oklahoma, robbed several banks in the 1930’s, and his exploits received widespread media attention. Some regarded him as a folk hero due to legends that he burned mortgage documents, freeing people of their debts to the banks during the Great Depression.
At first, Ma Joad’s allusion seems to bear little relationship to Tom’s story about Hooligan. For her, however, Floyd’s story attests to her belief that criminal behavior is a social phenomenon, not a result of poor character. As a result, she has sympathy for young men, like Floyd, Hooligan, and Tom, who have run up against the law. Floyd, she believes, “wan’t a bad boy” but rather “jus’ got drove in a corner” by poverty and police brutality. She alludes to Floyd at several points in the novel, reflecting her fear that Tom, like Floyd, might someday lose his life in conflict with the authorities.
Related Themes:
