Battle Hymn of the Republic

The "Battle Hymn of the Republic" is the source of the novel's title, chosen by Carol Steinbeck, and its lyrics—especially "He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored"—provide the book's central metaphor of righteous anger and inevitable judgment against social injustice.

Origin and Selection of the Title

The novel's title was not Steinbeck's first choice. On September 2, 1938, Carol Steinbeck, the novelist's first wife, discovered the title from the second verse of Julia Ward Howe's abolition song, "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," first published in The Atlantic Monthly in February 1862. Steinbeck wrote in his daily journal (later published as Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath, 1938-1941) that he thought it "a wonderful title." He considered it "Carol's best title so far," and his drama agent, Annie Laurie Williams, exulted, "Tell Carol she is a whiz at picking titles and she has done it again with the new one." The title may have been inspired by Carol's hearing of Pare Lorentz's radio drama, Ecce Homo!, which ends with a martial version of Howe's song. Steinbeck was impressed with "the looks of it—marvelous title. The book has being at last." Her role as facilitator is recorded permanently in one half of the novel's dedication: "To CAROL who willed it." On February 23, 1939, Steinbeck told his editor Pascal Covici that he had given Carol the holograph manuscript of The Grapes of Wrath: "You see I feel that this is Carol's book."

The Song's Lyrics and Their Thematic Resonance

The novel's title comes from the second verse of Howe's song: "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;/He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored." Steinbeck, a loyal Rooseveltian New Deal Democrat, liked the song "because it is a march and this book is a kind of march—because it is in our own revolutionary tradition and because in reference to this book it has a large meaning," he announced on September 10, 1938, to Elizabeth Otis, his New York literary agent. The phrase "grapes of wrath" also echoes biblical sources: Deuteronomy 32:32-33 and Revelation 14:18-20, which speak of the winepress of God's wrath. Though no one connected with Steinbeck's novel seems to have been aware of it, a British writer, Boyd Cable, had published a World War I novel called Grapes of Wrath in 1917, which was prefaced by the complete lyrics of Howe's song.

The Song as a Structural and Symbolic Element

Steinbeck insisted that The Grapes of Wrath be "keyed into the American scene from the beginning" by reproducing all the verses of "Battle Hymn." This demand was only partly met: Viking Press compromised by printing the first page of Howe's sheet music on the book's endpapers in an attempt (unsuccessfully, it turned out) to deflect accusations of communism against the novel and its author. The song's imagery of a just and terrible reckoning permeates the novel's climax. In chapter 25, Steinbeck writes of the destruction of food to maintain prices: "There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success." And then: "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." This passage directly echoes the song's metaphor, transforming it from a divine judgment into a human one—the wrath of the oppressed gathering toward an inevitable explosion.

The Song's Legacy and Cultural Impact

The "Battle Hymn of the Republic" has been a cornerstone of American protest and revolutionary tradition. Steinbeck's use of it linked his novel to that tradition, and the phrase "grapes of wrath" has entered the American lexicon as a symbol of righteous anger against injustice. The song's martial rhythm and apocalyptic imagery gave Steinbeck a framework for his narrative of a people in flight and a nation in crisis. The novel's title, drawn from this song, has become one of the most recognizable in American literature, and its resonance continues to be felt in discussions of social justice and economic inequality.