Plot Summary Of 'The Grapes Of Wrath'

1. Set-Up the story by describing where and when it occurred - this would be the first act of the story.

The year was 1866, it was a hot summer afternoon, so hot that the folk of Missouri were sweating a river ten times the size of their own. On a very large plantation surrounded by forests with canopies so thick that under it no one can see through the umbra it casts below. It is also a place where not many people can get to, let alone get out. The plantation’s beautifully ornate mansion, whose grand fixtures could not even illuminate the dark forest, even though it stands tall and proud, almost as if it was an overseer to protect its inhabitants. A little ways off from the house, but far enough that its protective shadow falls short, is
Translate the people involved in the event into characters and write a brief description of each one.

Joseph: The son of a wealthy family that lives on a private property in the county. Joseph's family owns a large amount of land, while neighboring families often barely scrape by. He tends to brag about his family’s immense wealth to the other neighborhood kids, who often feel inferior to Joseph and agitated at his constant bragging. They also feel jealous of Joseph and his family, which leads to certain individuals taking action against him.

Bucephalus: A boy fresh from the countryside, Bucephalus is the younger brother of Cletus. He used to be a rather well-mannered child, however, after meeting Joseph, he realizes that Joseph is the embodiment of everything he hates in a person. Deciding that he had enough with Joseph’s condescending attitude, he teams up with his older brother, Cletus, to hatch a plot against Joseph.

Cletus: Cletus is the older brother of Bucephalus. He’s a very mischievous, strong, but not so clever child.So, he is easily convinced by his younger brother to team up and steal Joseph’s straw hat to teach him lesson.

3. Describe the event that led up to the event depicted in the
Cletus decides that Bucephalus would be the one to lure Joseph to the haystack by telling him that he found something really grand inside one of the haystacks. After Joseph and Bucephalus enter the yard, Bucephalus would excuse himself from Joseph and meet up with Cletus behind one of the haystacks. Then, once Joseph gets close enough to the haystack where Cletus and Bucephalus are hiding behind, they would then jump out at him and get him to give up his hat and then they would take off before anyone noticed what they were