The Grapes of Wrath-- Quotes

Question 1

Women and children knew…

Answer 1

deep in themselves that no misfortune was too great to bear if their men were whole.

Question 2

The men sat still…

Answer 2

– thinking – figuring.

Question 3

the dawn came…

Answer 3

but no day

Question 4

The concrete highway was edged with…

Answer 4

a mat of tangled, broken, dry grass.

Question 5

(Casy) there aint no sin…

Answer 5

and there aint no virture, theres just stuff people do

Question 6

(Casy) I got the call to lead the people…

Answer 6

an’ no place to lead ‘em.

Question 7

When the monster stops growing…

Answer 7

it dies. It can’t stay one size.

Question 8

And all of them [the owners] were…

Answer 8

caught in something larger than themselves

Question 9

Men ate what they had not raised…

Answer 9

The land bore under iron, and under iron gradually died.

Question 10

Muley: like a…

Answer 10

damn ol’ graveyard ghos’. I been goin’ aroun’ the places where stuff happened.”

Question 11

“Fella gets use’ to a place, it’s hard to go,” said Casy…

Answer 11

“Fella gets use’ to a way of thinkin’ it’s hard to leave.”

Question 12

The Western land, nervous under the beginning change. The Western States, nervous as horses before a thunder storm…

Answer 12

The great owners, nervous, sensing a change, knowing nothing of the nature of the change

Question 13

And then all of a sudden..

Answer 13

the family began to function

Question 14

She (ma) walked for the family and..

Answer 14

held her head straight for the family.

Question 15

the twenty families became one family, the children were the children of all…

Answer 15

The loss of home became one loss, and the golden time in the West was one dream.

Question 16

Rose of Sharon:] “Maybe right at first while Connie’s studyin’ at home it won’t be so easy, but …

Answer 16

– well, when the baby comes, maybe he’ll be all done studyin’ an’ we’ll have a place, little bit of a place.”

Question 17

“Ma suddenly seemed to know it was all a dream. She turned her head forward again..

Answer 17

and her body relaxed, but the little smile stayed around her eyes.

Question 18

[Casy:] “If he needs a million acres to make him feel rich, seems to me he needs it …

Answer 18

‘cause he feels awful poor inside hisself, and if he’s poor in hisself, there ain’t no million acres gonna make him feel rich.”

Question 19

ma is the…

Answer 19

citadel of the family

Question 20

a vacant house…

Answer 20

falls quickly apart

Question 21

..they come into 66 from the tributary…

Answer 21

side roads… 66 is the mother road…

Question 22

Men ravenous for work…

Answer 22

murderous for work

Question 23

Men ravenous for work…

Answer 23

murderous for work

Question 24

“I tried to tell you fellas,” he said. “Somepin it took me a year to find out….

Answer 24

Took two kids dead, took my wife dead to show me. (ragged man about the lies in california)

Question 25

“They were not farm men…

Answer 25

any more, but migrant men.

Question 26

“They were hungry and they were fierce. And they had …

Answer 26

hoped to find a home, and they found only hatred.”

Question 27

Whenever they’s a fight so hungry people can eat, I’ll be there. Whenever they’s a cop beatin’ up a guy, I’ll be there

Answer 27

Whenever they’s a cop beatin’ up a guy, I’ll be there (Tom Joad)

Question 28

And the little screaming fact that sounds through all history:…

Answer 28

repression works only to strengthen and knit the repressed.”

Question 29

The quality of owning freezes you …

Answer 29

forever in “I,” and cuts you off forever from the “we.”

Question 30

The quality of owning freezes you …

Answer 30

forever in “I,” and cuts you off forever from the “we.”

Question 31

Men sang the words..

Answer 31

and women hummed the tunes.

Question 32

[the man swimming in the Colorado River:] “Well, Okie use’ ta mean you was from Oklahoma. …

Answer 32

Now it means you’re a dirty son-of-a-bitch. Okie means you’re scum.” (18.72)

Question 33

[the man swimming in the Colorado River:] “Sure, nice to look at, but you can’t have none of it. They’s a grove…

Answer 33

of yella oranges – an’ a guy with a gun that got the right to kill you if you touch one.”

Question 34

All California quickens with produce, and the fruit grows heavy, and the …

Answer 34

limbs bend gradually under the fruit so that little crutches must be placed under them to support the weight

Question 35

[Ma Joad:] “I’m learning one thing good,” she said. “Learnin’ it all the time, ever’ day. …

Answer 35

If you’re in trouble or hurt or need – go to poor people. They’re the only ones that’ll help – the only ones.”

Question 36

Then the hungry men crowded the alleys behind the stores to beg for bread,

Answer 36

to beg for rotting vegetables, to steal when they could.

Question 37

At night the frantic men walked boldly to hen roosts and carried off the squawking chickens…

Answer 37

If they were shot at, they did not run, but splashed sullenly away; and if they were hit, they sank tiredly in the mud.

Question 38

[Ma Joad:] “Use’ ta be the family was fust…

Answer 38

It ain’t so now. It’s anybody.”

Question 39

And the smell of…

Answer 39

rot fills the country.

Question 40

And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit …

Answer 40

cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate—died of malnutrition—because the food must rot, must be forced to rot.

Question 41

And now they [the Joads] were weary and frightened …

Answer 41

because they had gone against a system they did not understand and it had beaten them.