Great Depression Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ==Literature== {{Quote box|quote=And the great owners, who must lose their land in an upheaval, the great owners with access to history, with eyes to read history and to know the great fact: when property accumulates in too few hands it is taken away. And that companion fact: when a majority of the people are hungry and cold they will take by force what they need. And the little screaming fact that sounds through all history: repression works only to strengthen and knit the repressed.|width=40%|source=βJohn Steinbeck, ''The Grapes of Wrath''<ref>''[[The Grapes of Wrath]]'', by [[John Steinbeck]], Penguin, 2006, 0143039431, p. 238</ref>}} The Great Depression has been the subject of much writing, as authors have sought to evaluate an era that caused both financial and emotional trauma. Perhaps the most noteworthy and famous novel written on the subject is ''[[The Grapes of Wrath]]'', published in 1939 and written by [[John Steinbeck]], who was awarded the [[Pulitzer Prize]] for the work, and in 1962 was awarded the [[Nobel Prize]] for literature. The novel focuses on a poor family of sharecroppers who are forced from their home as drought, economic hardship, and changes in the [[Agriculture|agricultural industry]] occur during the Great Depression. Steinbeck's ''[[Of Mice and Men]]'' is another important novella about a journey during the Great Depression. Additionally, Harper Lee's ''[[To Kill a Mockingbird]]'' is set during the Great Depression. Margaret Atwood's Booker prize-winning ''[[The Blind Assassin]]'' is likewise set in the Great Depression, centering on a privileged socialite's love affair with a Marxist revolutionary. The era spurred the resurgence of social realism, practiced by many who started their writing careers on relief programs, especially the [[Federal Writers' Project]] in the U.S.<ref>David Taylor, ''Soul of a People: The WPA Writers' Project Uncovers Depression America'' (2009).</ref><ref>Jerre Mangione, ''The Dream and the Deal: The Federal Writers' Project, 1935β1943'' (1996)</ref><ref>Jerrold Hirsch, ''Portrait of America: A Cultural History of the Federal Writers' Project'' (2006)</ref><ref>Stacy I. Morgan, ''Rethinking Social Realism: African American art and literature, 1930β1953 '' (2004), p. 244.</ref> Nonfiction works from this time also capture important themes. The 1933 memoir ''Prison Days and Nights'' by [[Victor Folke Nelson]] provides insight into criminal justice ramifications of the Great Depression, especially in regard to patterns of recidivism due to lack of economic opportunity.<ref name="PDN2">''Prison Days and Nights'', by Victor F. Nelson (New York: Garden City Publishing Co., Inc., 1936)</ref> A number of works for younger audiences are also set during the Great Depression, among them the [[Kit Kittredge]] series of ''[[American Girl (book series)|American Girl]]'' books written by [[Valerie Tripp]] and illustrated by [[Walter Rane]], released to tie in with the dolls and playsets sold by the company. The stories, which take place during the early to mid 1930s in [[Cincinnati]], focuses on the changes brought by the Depression to the titular character's family and how the Kittredges dealt with it.<ref name="Communications2000">{{cite book|last=Harry|first=Lou|title=Cincinnati Magazine|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2O0CAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA59|access-date=July 10, 2017|date=October 1, 2010|publisher=Emmis Communications|pages=59β63|archive-date=April 15, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415123527/https://books.google.com/books?id=2O0CAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA59|url-status=live}}</ref> A theatrical adaptation of the series entitled ''[[Kit Kittredge: An American Girl]]'' was later released in 2008 to positive reviews.<ref name="Morency">{{cite book|last=Morency|first=Philip|title=On the Aisle, Volume 2: Film Reviews by Philip Morency|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AGyM0Bhsr-QC&pg=PA133|publisher=Dorrance Publishing|isbn=978-1-4349-7709-0|pages=133β|access-date=August 22, 2017|archive-date=August 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210817050620/https://books.google.com/books?id=AGyM0Bhsr-QC&pg=PA133|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Pimpare2017">{{cite book|last=Pimpare|first=Stephen|title=Ghettos, Tramps, and Welfare Queens: Down and Out on the Silver Screen|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SCrADgAAQBAJ&pg=PA216|access-date=July 10, 2017|year=2017|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-066072-7|pages=216β|archive-date=April 15, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415123813/https://books.google.com/books?id=SCrADgAAQBAJ&pg=PA216|url-status=live}}</ref> Similarly, ''Christmas After All'', part of the ''[[Dear America]]'' series of books for older girls, take place in 1930s [[Indianapolis]]; while ''Kit Kittredge'' is told in a third-person viewpoint, ''Christmas After All'' is in the form of a fictional journal as told by the protagonist Minnie Swift as she recounts her experiences during the era, especially when her family takes in an orphan cousin from Texas.<ref name="Smith2006">{{cite book|last=Smith|first=Robert W.|title=Spotlight on America: The Great Depression|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lZhrdFflrzEC|access-date=July 10, 2017|date=January 26, 2006|publisher=Teacher Created Resources|isbn=978-1-4206-3218-7|archive-date=April 15, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415134347/https://books.google.com/books?id=lZhrdFflrzEC|url-status=live}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page