Week of October 6-12 Entry #5

This week, I have read chapters 18 through 20. Basically, the story continues to flow on. In chapter 18, the Joads get warned by a man and his son, who are coming back from California. They say that there are no jobs in California. In chapter 19, the perspective changes and the narrator explains a brief history of California. California was once part of Mexico. The story comes back again to the tenant farmers in chapter 20. Chapter 20 describes some more hardships of the tenant farmers. Grampa is dead, but the family does not have money to bury the dead body properly. Also, Tom and Casy meed a man named Floyd. Floyd explains that they cannot organize together to find jobs because if so, the police will arrest them. Despite Floyd's words, some farmers try to fight against landowners and, Tom and Casy attack the police. Casy takes all the blame and gets arrested.
Again, as I have written before, this story consistently changes perspectives, and it makes me so confused. I guess that is why so many people call it difficult and "classic," which always implies the meaning "boring." Anyways, the story just seems to flow on. Every time I read, the hardships the tenant farmer group faces changes. First was the landowners who drove them away. Second was the greedy salespeople, and the third was the police, who only favored the landowners. As I was reading this part, I have started to thank that I wasn't born at this period. The life of these people didn't seem hard; it was just hopeless. Nothing good happened for them. Some even died during the journey. Still, I start to find this book less boring, but more interesting because the introduction seems to be done. I wonder what will happen to Casy later on.