the 1960s

The 1960s represent the decade in which John Steinbeck, the author of The Grapes of Wrath, died and in which the novel's status as a classic was firmly established through sustained readership, critical debate, and cultural penetration. Steinbeck died on December 20, 1968, having won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1962, an award for which The Grapes of Wrath was a cornerstone. By the end of the 1960s, the novel had sold more than 543,000 copies in hardcover alone, and its annual sales continued to climb in subsequent decades, eventually reaching 150,000 copies per year. The decade also saw the novel's first major stage adaptation, Frank Galati's faithful production for the Chicago-based Steppenwolf Company, which won a Tony Award for Best Play in 1990, though this occurred after the 1960s. During the 1960s, the novel was translated into nearly thirty languages, and its influence was acknowledged by figures such as Cesar Chavez, who cited Steinbeck as a valued predecessor in the farm labor movement. The 1960s also saw the beginning of the novel's inclusion in academic literary canons, with scholars such as Warren French using the phrase "the education of the heart" to describe its effect, and with the first wave of critical essays that would eventually make it one of the most studied American novels. The decade's social upheavals—the civil rights movement, the rise of the New Left, and the war on poverty—gave new relevance to the novel's themes of dispossession, collective action, and the dignity of the poor, ensuring that it remained a living text rather than a period piece. By the end of the 1960s, The Grapes of Wrath had become a fixture in high school and college curricula, a status it has retained ever since, and its title had entered the American lexicon as a shorthand for social injustice and the struggle of the working class.