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Ecological Holism in The Grapes of Wrath用生态主义整体观解读《愤怒的葡萄》IntroductionWith the development of modern industrial civilization, all kinds of environmental pollutions, such as water pollution, ozone layer damage, greenhouse effect, acid rain, pollution of atmosphere, oil leakage and so on, are concerned by more and more people. At the same time, Many scholars also begin to review and reinterpret the literary works from ecological perspective. The Grapes of Wrath by John Ernest Steinbeck is one of those literary masterpieces.John Ernest Steinbeck (1902 --- 1968) is considered to be one of the best-known American novelists of the 20th century and a storywriter, playwright, an essayist and an amateur marine biologist at the same time. He was born in Salinas, California and lived most of his first forty years in the Salinas Valley, where was later the setting for most of his fiction and moved him deeply. It should be pointed out that Steinbecks long residence in the Salinas Valley covered years of both regional and national unrest, changes which he observed and later utilized especially in his most sociologically oriented novel The Grapes of Wrath. His father was a government official, and his mother was a school teacher. Through the influence of his schoolteacher mother, Steinbeck read widely, especially in English classical literature. He supported himself from his youth, working as a farm laborer, a seaman on a cattle-boat, a newspaper reporter, a bricklayer, a chemists assistant, a surveyor, and a migratory fruit-picker. These experiences of working-class life were very educational for him because it set the basis of his works, established the characteristic tone of his fiction, and provided firsthand observation of the attitudes, manners and language of the workingman, especially in The Grapes of Wrath. When Steinbeck decided to write a novel about the plight of the migrant farm workers, he took his task very seriously. To prepare, he lived with an Oklahoma farm family and made the journey with them to California.The Grapes of Wrath, published in 1939, is an epic chronicle during the Great Depression of the United States in 1930s. When The Grapes of Wrath appeared, it soared to the top of bestseller lists, selling nearly half a million copies. Although many Oklahomans and Californians reviled the book, considering Steinbecks characters to be unflattering representations of their states people, the large majority of readers and scholars praised the novel highly. In 1940, the novel was awarded the Pulitzer Prize and adapted to the screen. Although Steinbeck went on to have a productive literary career, none of his later books, like The Moon is Down (1942), East of Eden (1952), The Winter of Our Discontent (1961) and Travels with Charley (1962), had the impact of The Grapes of Wrath. Set during the Great Depression, the novel focuses on the Joads, a poor family of tenant farmers driven from their Oklahoma home by drought, economic hardship, agricultural industry changes and bank foreclosures forcing tenant farmers out of work. Due to their nearly hopeless situation, and in part because they were trapped in the Dust Bowl, the Joads set out for California. Along with thousands of other "Okies, they sought jobs, land, dignity, and a future. During Joads journey, the authors ecological holism including the criticism of anthropocentrism and desire-oriented theory can be read between the lines throughout the novel.Literature ReviewAfter The Grapes of Wrath had been published, it aroused the panic of the ruling classes from all the states. It was forbidden to be published in some states. They thought some characters in the novel uglified local peoples images, but nothing could shake its important position in the contemporary literature history in America. Most of the readers have set a high value on this novel. Many scholars have made extensive and deep research on it from different angles. Some Scholars have explored Steinbecks work from the perspectives of some contemporary critical theories, such as feminism, multiculturalism, and new historicism, both in China and abroad. However, with the serious environmental problems, a few scholars have begun to study the work from eco-logical perspectives. For instance, Gao Yi from the foreign language school of Xiamen university writes a paper named An eco-criticism reading of The Grapes of Wrath using eco-criticism approach to interpret the ecological consciousness in the novel from the aspects of natural ecology, social ecology and spiritual ecology. In addition, eco-feminism perspective is used in Xin Yuanyuan thesis Eco-feminism in The Grapes of Wrath, to exlore the common destiny between Joad Ma and the land to show the double dilemma of Joad Ma and the land.However, until now, even fewer scholars have studied the work from ecological holism perspective. Inspired by this, this thesis will employ the ecological holism to probe into The Grapes of Wrath. In content, this thesis will explain the ecological holism from three aspects. The first one is anthropocentrism criticism, mainly focusing on natural environments ecological disasters in the novel. The second one is conquest of nature criticism related to socially industrial civilization and the last one is desire-oriented theory criticism, thats to say, mankinds spiritual crisis, thus hoping that our human beings can reflect on the roots of various problems we are currently confronted with and how to build an ecological civilization of the harmonious coexistence of between human beings and nature. ConclusionIn The Grapes of Wrath, Steinbeck reveals his eco-logical awareness, the hierarchical society of the modern civilization and the distorted human spirit. The 21st century is the century of ecology. Many ecological problems have risen with the development of industrialization: the expansion of population makes the consumption of resources increase; human beings inference with nature makes a variety of species go extinct; development of industrialization makes the energy exhausted. Therefore, as we are facing with these severe ecological crisis and environmental disaster now, it is of extraordinary significance to study The Grapes of Wrath, hoping that Steinbecks novel may arouse peoples ecological consciousness and form favorable ecological behaviors to realize the wonderful ideal that builds a beautiful garden with balanced ecosystem ultimately.