Through a diversity of primary source resources that include works by politicians and literary figures, book reviews, and interviews, this book enables student readers to better understand literature of the Great Depression in context through original documents.

• Provides readers with an understanding of the great cultural issues of life in America in the 1930s

• Integrates and aligns material for the ELA Common Core Standards and American literature and social studies curriculum, supplying useful tools to support literary works—analysis, history, document excerpts, discussion questions, and areas for study

• Places three of the most significant writers of the decade within the sources of turmoil that affected their fiction

• Enables readers to construct their own visions of how three great writers represented the changing aspects of American culture in that era