In Dubious Battle by John Steinbeck was first published in 1936 at a time when things in the US were still pretty desperate, before World War 2 kick-started the recovery from the Great Depression. I have to say that I had never even heard of this book, but as I enjoyed reading East of Eden recently I thought I would see what else was available at the library and this one popped up. In Dubious Battle is the first of three books that he wrote on labour issues in California, the other two being of course Of Mice and Men and The Grapes of Wrath. In 1935 Steinbeck had a very tough time of it when he went to New York looking for work that just wasn’t there so he knew first hand how difficult it was for a (non) working man.

In Dubious Battle tackles the issue of itinerant farm labourers, specifically apple pickers. By the time the apple pickers had made their way to the farms by train the rate of pay had fallen. The farm owners are taking advantage of the situation, knowing that the men are just about on their knees.

Jim Nolan is a young man who has had a tough time, beaten by cops and then jailed for vagrancy when he had only stopped to see what was going on at a labour meeting. Whilst in jail his mother dies, the system has just about defeated him. He feels that the unfairness of life has to be re-balanced and so decides to join the Party. It isn’t specified as the Communist Party, I suppose Steinbeck thought the book was going to be controversial enough.

Jim is an intelligent chap and impresses the Party leaders so it’s not long before he is taken to the fruit farm to mingle with the disgruntled workers. The Party wants to make the workers come out on strike so Jim and the others set about manipulating the men and then go to work organising everything. It’s only ever going to end in disaster and the Party bigwigs know that. In reality the Party guys are no more interested in the ordinary working people than the landowners are. The small guy is expendable as far as the Party is concerned.

Apparently Steinbeck was interested in the psychology and behaviour of crowds and how they react to certain situations, he has the Party men manipulating everything and it’s clear that Steinbeck is no more enamoured of the Party members than he is of the landowners.

When vigilantes from the nearest town rear their ugly heads Steinbeck has two characters saying:

“Mac, who in the hell are these vigilantes, anyway? What kind of guys are they?”

“Why, they’re the dirtiest guys in any town. They’re the same ones that burned the houses of old German people during the war. They’re the same ones that lynch Negroes. They like to be cruel. They like to hurt people, and they always give it a nice name, patriotism or protecting the constitution. But they’re just the old nigger torturers working. The owners use ’em, tell ’em we have to protect the people against the reds. Y’see that lets ’em burn houses and torture and beat people with no danger. And that’s all they want to do anyway. They’ve got no guts; they’ll only shoot from cover, or gang a man when they’re ten to one. I guess they’re about the worst scum in the world.”

Amen to that, I love Steinbeck. The next book of his I’ll be reading is A Russian Journal.