Before You Read
Breakfast
Meet
John Steinbeck
Very few people ever
“mature.
. . . But sometimes . . .
awareness takes place—not very
often and always inexplainable.
There are no words for it
because there is no one ever to
tell. This is a secret not kept a
secret, but locked in wordlessness. The craft or art of writing
is the clumsy attempt to find
symbols for the wordlessness.
”
—Steinbeck
John Steinbeck was born and raised in Salinas,
California, a small town nestled in a sprawling
valley of lettuce farms. Bright and popular,
Steinbeck was the president of his senior class in
high school, wrote for the school newspaper, and
played sports. He was accepted to Stanford
University, but yearning for more life experiences,
he drifted in and out of college, never earning a
degree. Instead, he wrote and worked, taking jobs
as a ranch hand, a factory worker, a sales clerk, a
freelance newspaper writer, a construction worker,
and a farm laborer.
Steinbeck published four novels by the time he
was thirty-three. His fourth book, the novel Tortilla
Flat, was his first publicly acclaimed book. Set in
his familiar Salinas Valley, it vividly and humorously describes the joys and sorrows of a group of
unemployed men. The following year, Steinbeck
used his experiences as a factory worker to produce
and publish his next success, a novel entitled In
Dubious Battle, which includes realistic and violent
scenes based on labor strikes in California.
Perhaps Steinbeck’s greatest work is the novel
The Grapes of Wrath, written as the United States
796
UNIT 6
was getting back on its feet after
the Great Depression of the
1930s. This 1940 Pulitzer Prize
winner traces the difficult journey
of poor farmers from the Dust
Bowl poverty of Oklahoma to the
rich farmland of California’s
Salinas Valley. There the farmers
suffer tragically from injustice
handed out by powerful landowners and corrupt officials. Today,
The Grapes of Wrath is universally
respected for its depiction of the
individual’s quest for justice and dignity.
Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize for
Literature in 1962. He privately expressed fears
about winning the prize, noting that authors whom
he respected, including William Faulkner and
Ernest Hemingway, had produced no further major
works after receiving it. Six years after receiving
the prize, Steinbeck died, without publishing
another work.
[T]he writer is delegated to declare and to
“celebrate
[humanity’s] proven capacity for
greatness of heart and spirit—for gallantry in
defeat, for courage, compassion, and love.
”
“
[T]he free, exploring mind of the individual
human is the most valuable thing in the world.
And this I would fight for: the freedom of the
mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea,
religion, or government which limits or destroys
the individual. This is what I am and what I am
about.
”
—Steinbeck
John Steinbeck was born in 1902 and died in 1968.
How did you react to this story? Jot down your reactions to the characters, their
encounter, and the setting.
What are some of your favorite sensory details in this story? How did these
sensory details affect your reading of the story?
Writing About Literature Lively Description
Steinbeck creates vivid pictures of the setting by using specific, dramatic
adjectives and verbs, such as “there was a flash of orange fire seeping out of
the cracks of an old rusty iron stove.” Select another example of vivid
description from the selection. Describe the scene as you see it in your mind,
adding details to your mental picture, if you wish
“Morning,” said the young man.
The water was slowly drying on their
faces. They came to the stove and warmed
their hands at it.
The girl kept to her work, her face averted
and her eyes on what she was doing. Her hair
was tied back out of her eyes with a string and
it hung down her back and swayed as she
worked. She set tin cups on a big packing box,
set tin plates and knives and forks out too.
Then she scooped fried bacon out of the deep
grease and laid it on a big tin platter, and the
bacon cricked3 and rustled as it grew crisp. She
opened the rusty oven door and took out a
square pan full of high big biscuits.
When the smell of that hot bread came out,
both of the men inhaled deeply.
The elder man turned to me, “Had your
breakfast?”
“No.”
“Well, sit down with us, then.”
That was the signal. We went to the packing case and squatted on the ground about it.
The young man asked, “Picking cotton?”
“No.”
“We had twelve days’ work so far,” the
young man said.
The girl spoke from the stove. “They even
got new clothes.”
The two men looked down at their new
dungarees and they both smiled a little.
The girl set out the platter of bacon, the
brown high biscuits, a bowl of bacon gravy and
a pot of coffee, and then she squatted down by
the box too. The baby was still nursing, its head
3. Here, cricked means “turned or twisted.”
up under her waist out of the cold. I could hear
the sucking noises it made.
We filled our plates, poured bacon gravy
over our biscuits and sugared our coffee. The
older man filled his mouth full and he chewed
and chewed and swallowed. Then he said, “God
Almighty, it’s good,” and he filled his mouth
again.
The young man said, “We been eating good
for twelve days.”
We all ate quickly, frantically, and refilled
our plates and ate quickly again until we were
full and warm. The hot bitter coffee scalded our
throats. We threw the last little bit with the
grounds in it on the earth and refilled our cups.
There was color in the light now, a reddish
gleam that made the air seem colder. The two
men faced the east and their faces were lighted
by the dawn, and I looked up for a moment
and saw the image of the mountain and the
light coming over it reflected in the older
man’s eyes.
Then the two men threw the grounds from
their cups on the earth and they stood up
together. “Got to get going,” the older man said.
The younger turned to me. “’Fyou want to
pick cotton, we could maybe get you on.”
“No. I got to go along. Thanks for breakfast.”
The older man waved his hand in a negative. “O.K. Glad to have you.” They walked
away together. The air was blazing with light at
the eastern skyline. And I walked away down
the country road.
That’s all. I know, of course, some of the reasons why it was pleasant. But there was some
element of great beauty there that makes the
rush of warmth when I think of it.
Vocabulary
800
avert (ə vurt) v. to turn away or aside
UNIT 6
Active Reading and Critical Thinking
Responding to Literature
Personal Response
How did you react to this story? Jot down your reactions to
the characters, their encounter, and the setting.
Analyzing Literature
Recall and Interpret
1. How does the narrator introduce this incident? What are
the first things he describes? What do the introduction
and the descriptions tell you about the narrator?
2. What observations does the narrator make about the
family of migrant workers? What seems to be important
to the family? Explain.
3. What do the narrator and the migrant workers talk about?
What tone is conveyed by the family’s words and actions?
(See Literary Terms Handbook, page R16.) Support your
answer with details from the story.
4. What does the narrator say about his memory at the end
of the story? What might his attachment to this memory
suggest about his life? What deeper understanding or
awareness of life does he seem to gain?
Evaluate and Connect
5. Reread your journal entry from the Reading Focus on
page 797. What new details would you like to add to your
description after reading “Breakfast”?
6. Steinbeck wrote about migrant workers who lived in
small, supportive communities. In what ways does
Steinbeck portray the narrator as part of such a supportive community?
7. Steinbeck wrote to reach the heart of working people.
Explain which aspects of this story might appeal to a
farmer, a rancher, or a laborer.
8. What are some of your favorite sensory details (see page
R14) in this story? How did these sensory details affect
your reading of the story?
Literary Criticism
According to critic Daniel Aaron, Steinbeck portrays migrant
workers as the “preservers of the old American verities,
innocent of bourgeois properties, but courteous, trusting,
friendly, and generous. . . . What preserved them in the
end . . . was a recovery of a neighborly interdependence that
an acquisitive society had almost destroyed.” How does
Steinbeck portray the workers in “Breakfast”? What effect
does their behavior have on the narrator? Discuss your
answers in a small group.
Literary ELEMENTS
Implied Theme
The theme of a piece of literature is a dominant idea,
often a universal message about life, that the writer
communicates to the reader. Authors rarely state a
theme outright. Instead, they use an implied theme,
letting the main idea or message reveal itself through
events, dialogue, or descriptions. In “Breakfast,” the
implied theme is built around the narrator’s warm
recollection of an encounter with a group of migrant
workers.
1. What is the implied theme, or message about life,
in this selection? State the implied theme in your
own words.
2. What details and descriptions support this theme?
• See Literary Terms Handbook,
p. R16.
Extending Your Response
Writing About Literature
Interdisciplinary Activity
Lively Description Steinbeck creates vivid pictures of the
setting by using specific, dramatic adjectives and verbs, such
as “there was a flash of orange fire seeping out of the cracks
of an old rusty iron stove.” Select another example of vivid
description from the selection. Describe the scene as you
see it in your mind, adding details to your mental picture, if
you wish.
History: California Farming Research and prepare a brief
report on the different groups of migrant workers in
California during the 1900s. Begin with the 1930s and update
your report with information about current migrant workers
in the state. Include visuals, such as photographs, in your
presentation to the class.
Save your work for your portfolio.
MIDCENTURY VOICES
801