Harvest Gypsies By John Steinbeck Analysis

In “Harvest Gypsies”, by John Steinbeck, John shows the readers the plight of the gypsies during the 1930’s. He describes their life and makes the readers sympathize for the families. Steinbeck shows sympathy through his writing for the migrant families by describing their living conditions, which is evident through them living in unhealthy tents, and on how the families are full of sullen anger caused by their children’s deaths.
Throughout the entire story Steinbeck, describes their confined and unhealthy homes. For example, he starts off the story by introducing a family of six and describing their little place they call home.” held together...rusty baling wire” (Steinbeck, 41). As Steinbeck describes their “home”, the reader can paint a
picture of their tent. There is no room for personal space, one bed, one quilt and no bathroom. They have to have a certain arrangement to get to places and to sleep. All six live on the bed. Mother, Father, and two children between them. The other two sleep on the other side. Outside of their home is a clump of willows, there they lay their feces. There are flies around the feces but those same flies are in the tent where they live. With this in mind, he later on says that there was lots of filth everywhere in the tent, especially to the apple box that is their dining table, “flies clinging to…dinner table” (Steinbeck,41). Through their lives they might not notice but the flies that live in their home can carry diseases. These flies go to the human feces in the willow and go to their homes. As the flies land in the willow, the feces have so much bacteria in them it’s easy to transport the bacteria. The flies are attracted to the apple box that portrays their table. As they eat, they also eat bacteria due to the flies. As can be seen, the family of six lived in a confined, unsanitary, and unhealthy home.
Moreover, Steinbeck builds the sympathy for the families with their children’s deaths. To emphasize, the families shown to us in this story both of them lose children “went into convulsions and died”(Steinbeck,41). The middle class family had lost their child due to malnutrition and that family was paralyzed into dullness because they had no way to help their child. This caused this family to lose energy. Their father could not work because he was no longer alert and was no longer quick-paced. Their spirits began fading as they moved lower in the caste. Their faces showed dullness. Another key point, was the second family, they built a home out branches and weeds. Unlike the first family, they had no bed only the floor. The wife one day had given birth to a child but its was born dead, “Born on the floor...born dead”(Steinbeck,43). After seeing her child dead, she had rolled over and stayed there for two days. She no longer has energy to do anything anymore, her drive for cleanliness has been ripped out of her. She was a mother but after seeing her child dead, she couldn’t be one for her other children. She no longer helps with the clothes. Not just the mother has suffered but the father. He no longer works anymore and just gave up the desire to talk. He is slow at work and needs more strength than others. To finalize, during the Great Depression many families had many plights. From losing work, to no money, to deaths, and so much more. Steinbeck writes the struggles of these families so that he can inform the readers of the migrants hard troubles.