[theFIRMbss]

>You might think that John Steinbeck, not Margaret Mitchell, was the emblematic novelist of the 1930s, and that the publishing event in American fiction in that difficult decade was his "Grapes of Wrath." Published in 1939, it captured the Depression experience that many Americans had

------------------------------------------------------------------

King Kong came out in
'33, Disney's Snow White
was in '36.

I think those two films
and how everyone loved them
say more about us

than Steinbeck's novel.
It's the whole sense-of-life thing,
enjoyment of life.

Even enduring
hardships of the depression
people loved these films.

[caryatid]

Even Especially during hardships of the depression people loved these films.

In times of stress ... men [and women] turn to humour, and beauty, and fantasy, and romance, and things filled with hope for a brighter future ... for relief.

Chronicles of hard times are more important to people who have not "enjoyed" those hard times. GWTW would not have been popular during Reconstruction. Its time had not come. Time had to pass and memories fade before GWTW would have a receptive audience.

Think of all the charmingly upbeat musicals that came out of the hard years of WWI and WWII. They were a tonic for the times in which they were written. They were truly inspired.

Think also of the fact that nothing like that has been produced during a long period of prosperity. Adversity is a catalyst for creativity.