New beginnings and new land, while made out to seem as beacons of hope and chances

for prosperity, are complete opposites; new beginnings offer neither success nor
happiness, but rather more failures and recurring sorrows. John Steinbeck and Jack
Hodgins introduce the idea of new beginnings and settlements just as they emphasize
the importance of togetherness as a community and a family in The Grapes of Wrath
and Broken Ground. However, it is important to consider that these new beginnings
were involuntary and rather forced due to situational circumstances. These
circumstances caused drastic changes in the lives of the characters, changes that
ultimately led them towards a downward spiral. In both novels, change in location
helped advertise new beginnings as a chance for a new, improved lifestyle, which
turned out to be a mere lie. The “promised land” was simply a hoax, which they
would later realize, as it left them with nothing more than the broken pieces of
their woven dreams.

Steinbeck and Hodgins both examine the idea of “promised land” where their
characters, Steinbeck’s Joad family and Hodgins’s returned soldiers, hope to find
both joy and prosperity. The characters, however, later learn that the idea of the
“promised land” is simply just that - an idea - because it does not exist. While
the “promised land” is different in both novels, it being a beautiful home and
paying jobs in The Grapes of Wrath and actual land for settlement in Broken Ground,
it represents the same hope for both novels – the hope of new, positive beginnings.
Both Steinbeck and Hodgins lead readers to believe that the relocation of their
characters is setting the stage for a turn of events in their lives, a turn for the
better. This change, though, ...

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... harsh and tragic. Similarly, Hodgins symbolizes a life full of hardships in
Portuguese Creek with the death of Elizabeth, for she had been the only good thing
that had come out of the war. The positives of the families and communities working
together were ultimately overshadowed by the negativity of these same families and
communities falling apart; only further showing readers that new beginnings are not
a chance for a better life, but center stage for one that is worse.