American Literature and the Great Depression

When one considers how the Great Depression affected American Literature, John Steinbeck tends to stick out, if only because his fiction generally discusses the same themes and anxieties that has come to define the Great Depression in the public consciousness. Indeed, Steinbeck's Grapes Of Wrath, a realist novel which follows the Joad family as they travel west after they losing their farm to the Dust Bowl, is frequently considered the quintessential encapsulation of the thematic and stylistic effects the Great Depression had on American Literature. Somewhat less considered, though no less crucial to understanding the effects of the Great Depression on American Literature, is the influence the Great Depression had on the careers of black writers, and particularly those who were a part of the Federal Writer's Project, the New Deal program support writers during the Depression. By considering Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath...
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