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. Bernard Smith, writing for the New York the depiction of labor strife; he wanted to explore aHerald Tribune, said that Mr.Steinbeck s narrative philosophical viewpoint, which he continued tobuilds and mounts and at last soars and further adds examine throughout his writing career.that the author is one of the most gifted writers ofSYNOPSISour younger generation. Peter Quenell, reportingfor the New Statesman and Nation, called the book Chapter 1 one of the best novels of social conflict I have yet Jim Nolan checks out of his boardinghouse andread. The only prominent negative review was writ- crosses the city to the shoddy office of Harry Nil-ten by Mary McCarthy, penning her Minority son, a recruiter for the Communist Party.Harry isReport for the Nation.She had already expressed a interested to learn that Jim s father is Roy Nolan, astrong dislike for Steinbeck s writing in previous labor agitator.Jim explains that his father wasreviews.Among other negative adjectives, McCarthy gunned down three years earlier during an attemptcalled the book wooden, inert, childish, and tedious.to dynamite the slaughterhouse where he worked,and that his mother died only a month earlier whileCONTEMPORARY PERSPECTIVESJim was in jail on trumped-up charges of vagrancy.What concerns many of the present-day analysts of Jobless and cut off from his past, Jim feels as if he isIn Dubious Battle is the historical accuracy of the dead and he hopes that the party will make himbook.From the beginning, left-leaning readers get alive again. Harry agrees to recommend Jimprotested the amoral and dispassionate nature of for party membership and invites him to stay for aMac.Certainly, McKiddy and Chambers, the two few days while they wait for a response from theCommunist organizers interviewed by Steinbeck in membership committee.his research for the book, demonstrated a deep andChapter 2concerned relationship with the fruit pickers andHarry leads Jim to a cottage inhabited by threeother farm laborers.Jackson Benson and Annemen: Mac, the leader of the group, Dick, a boy, andLoftis point to Steinbeck s awareness of the misrep-Joy, a large man with a battered face.Mac explainsresentation, but also demonstrate this was an artis-that Joy has been screwy ever since he was left intic choice a way for the author to highlight hisjail for three days with a broken jaw because theprimary theme of the mechanistic behavior of mendoctor would not treat a God-damned red. Jimin groups.Led by unemotional machines, men beginadopts Mac as his mentor, and asks him to use histo act as unfeeling machines.Others, includinginfluence to get him assigned to work in the field asSusan Shillinglaw, have noted the lack of Hispanics,soon as possible.Negroes, and Asians among the crop pickers.Stein-beck, having worked among farm laborers from an Chapter 3early age, had a keen awareness of the ethnic and Jim is writing letters to party sympathizers whenracial diversity of migrant agricultural laborers in Dick arrives with the news that Joy has been lockedCalifornia.Again, for the purposes of the novel s up for stabbing a cop.Mac instructs him to contacttheme, the homogeneity of the group becomes cru- George Camp, a lawyer and sympathizer, and then In Dubious Battle 123to try to collect bail money for their friend.He Chapter 6announces that he and Jim are heading to the Tor- The ranch owners sense the growing agitationgas Valley to organize the apple pickers, whose among the pickers.A foreman offers to pay Jim forwages have just been cut by the Torgas Valley information about what is going on.TensionGrowers Association.spreads through the ranks.Things finally come to ahead, when Old Dan falls and breaks his hip.AChapter 4faulty ladder becomes a symbol of injustice.MacEarly the next morning, the two men stow awayinstructs London s assistant Sam to convince theaboard an empty boxcar.Late that evening, theyworkers that they need a leader.The men electarrive in the rural town of Torgas.Mac has a list ofLondon, who appoints a strike committee.Mac and50 active party sympathizers in the town, one ofJim rush to town to wire for assistance.Theywhom is Al Anderson, the owner of a diner.Alreceive word that Joy has escaped from jail.Macserves a hot dinner to Jim and Mac.He is excitedpressures Al Anderson, who reluctantly introducesabout the pending strike, but concerned about howthe two men to his father.Mac explains to old Mr.it will affect his father, one of the valley s fewAnderson that the strike will start the followingremaining small apple farmers.Jim and Mac walkmorning, and that he is likely to lose his ranch toto the nearest migrant camp and mix with the resi-the local mortgage company if his apples godents.London, the leader of the camp, is furiousunpicked.He offers to see that Anderson s applesbecause his daughter-in-law is in labor, and theare picked for free if he will agree to let the strikerslocal hospital refuses to attend her.Mac claims toset up their camp in his meadow.have experience delivering babies.He organizes themen to heat water and donate clean rags.A tangi- Chapter 7ble change comes over the camp as the men begin Dick arrives with Doc Burton, whom Mac places inworking together for a common cause.Later, when charge of setting up the strike camp in an orderlyJim asks Mac where he learned birthing, Mac and sanitary fashion to prevent the public healthadmits that he has never done it before, but that he officials from closing it down
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