I was thinking about how the book might end, and I can't imagine it would be a typical 'and they lived happily ever after,' where the farm owners give them good wages, they get a house for Ma, and the family is reunited. But a baby being born at the end could be part of what Ma says about the circle of life. "'They's a time of change, an' when that comes, dyin' is a piece of all dyin', and bearin' is a piece of all bearin', and bearin' an' dyin' is two pieces of the same thing. An' then things ain't lonely any more. An' then a hurt don't hurt so bad, 'cause it ain't a lonely hurt no more, Rosasharn. I wisht I could tell you so you'd know, but I can't,'" (286). Maybe in the beginning, the deaths of Grandma and Grandpa signified the start of the hardships for the family, and now at the end, the birth of Rose of Sharon's baby will signify the start of easier times.
By the way, this is a Rose of Sharon:
If you haven't read that part of the book yet, stop reading this now!
ReplyDeleteIf you've finished you know that the baby does not survive. I think that this definitely symbolizes what the Depression was. The family had an easier time than some with dealing with death because they lived on the farm and understood the whole circle of life and the fact that things have to die for other things to be born. They understood that new life would come out of death, but in this case it did not happen. There was just many deaths, and no new life. I think that in a way this is what the Depression was like, no matter how hard they worked and through everything they did, it was just one bad thing after another. This natural cycle of life was stilled during the Depression, it was just the bad death parts, like a very long cycle. The book ends before the Depression begins to lift, so we don't get to see what happens to the Joads and if they live through it, but I think that the uplifting, new life part of the cycle is far off, and will only begin to come when the Depression has ended.
I definitely agree with the point Eliza made. Holly, the picture of the Rose of Sharon got me thinking. What was Steinbeck's point in naming her character that? Rose of Sharon is a very weak character throughout the book because of her pregnancy, and because of her personality in general, which is very sad and just wants what she wants but doesn't seem to be able to do anything for herself. So I decided to Google Rose of Sharon to see if I could find out if it was a weak flower; when I typed it in, "Rose of Sharon Bible" came up under the search bar, so I googled that instead. A website came up with all the different bible verses that references the Rose of Sharon in the bible. In the bible the flower represents the coming of Christ and just Christ in general. He's compared to the flower, "The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose" Isaiah 35:1, the rose meaning the rose of sharon. This verse makes it seem like the rose represents new life, which would make perfect sense for Rose of Sharon's character who's supposed to be bearing new life, even though the baby ends up dead. I wonder if this is what Steinbeck meant by making this her name.
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