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To most American’s John Steinbeck is the man who wrote Of Mice and Men, if they even remember the author’s name. To the more literarily inclined, Steinbeck is one of the classical American authors you should get around to. And to those who have actually read and engaged with his works, he’s an intriguing man whose stories carry such an astounding number of layers in them, that it’s probably thicker than a seven-layer cake. For such an important author in the American Literary Canon, it seems like astonishingly few people are interested in reading his novels. As we celebrate his birthday today, lets take a look at his life, and some of his more famous works, to better understand him and what he was trying to say.
History:
John Steinbeck was born February 27, 1902, in Salinas, California. He spent his youth working on ranches and farms, and later labored with migrant workers on sugar beet farms. There he learned about the darker side of migrant life, and their brutal working conditions in the field. After graduating from Salinas High School in 1919 he studied English at Stanford University, but left without a degree in 1925. He moved to New York City, but when he ran out of money he moved Pacific Grove, California, where his father owned a cottage.
He published his first novel, Cup of Gold, in 1929. It was based on the life of a privateer, Henry Morgan, and his assault on Panama Viejo. Though it wasn't a smash success, it proved that Steinbeck could be a writer, and he stuck with the profession. In 1930 he met Ed Ricketts, a marine biologist who would become Steinbeck’s closest friend. Ricketts helped support Steinbeck and his wife through various jobs until Tortilla Flat, Steinbecks’ first critical success in 1935. After this Steinbeck began writing about migrant workers, his most significant being Of Mice and Men, and Grapes of Wrath, and began working with film companies to adapt his stories for the big screen. Grapes of Wrath would also prove to be controversial, and was actually banned by the Kern County Board of Supervisors in 1939 for its graphic depictions, and allegedly misrepresenting the migrant laborers it was about. The ban only lasted until 1941. Steinbeck also moved away from Pacific Grove in 1941, ending his longtime friendship with Ed Ricketts, who would die only 7 years later in 1948.
Steinbeck served in World War 2 as a war correspondent for the New York Herald Tribune, where he saw some action. After the war he returned to writing. The Pearl, 1947, was a reimagining of a story he had heard in La Paz, and he even wrote it knowing that it would be filmed. The same year he became one of the first Americans to visit the USSR since the communist revolution. He published East of Eden in 1952, which he personally considered to be his magnum opus, and it was a peak many thought he would never reach again after Grapes of Wrath.
John Steinbeck died in New York City on December 20, 1968, of heart disease and congestive heart failure. Over time his stories entered the American Literary Canon, and many of this works, like Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men, gained the dubious status of mandatory High School reading. Steinbeck also bears the honor of being one of the ten most frequently read authors in public High Schools, as well as being one of the ten most frequently banned authors from 1990 to 2004. Even so, his stories have only become more relevant than ever, and his sympathetic light for the plight of the exploited serves as fuel for many groups today.
Grapes of Wrath: The American Dream is Dead
The first of Steinbeck’s classics, Grapes of Wrath created the dustbowl story. A narrative about how the severe dust storms caused by draught and soil erosion in American and Canadian prairies during the 1930s displaced hundreds of thousands of people. The American classic follows Tom Joad as he and his family are forced to migrate away from Oklahoma after their farm is repossessed. Intent on California, the family suffers many hardships, including death and several members choosing to go their own way, only to discover that California has been overrun by thousands of migrant workers. Labor is in oversupply, and wages aren’t livable. The string of death and misfortune that follow the Joad’s through the story is in many ways the beginning of the death of the American dream. Originally published in 1939, Steinbeck was writing about current events. The American frontier had been settled, and the center 48 states had joined the Union. The classic American strategy of using the frontier as a release valve for social and political tension was no longer possible, and the Dustbowl left as many as 500,000 people completely displaced and living in makeshift migrant camps while their labor was exploited for pocket change. The American Dream is dead because there is nowhere left to go, and nothing left to take, except to anywhere you can find work for whatever they’ll give you. But that is merely one layer. Deeper analysis of the story reveals Biblical subtext with the migration to California representing the exodus from Egypt, and Tom Joad rising up to fill the shoes of Jesus and organize labor strikes after his friend Casy dies. Like a true masterpiece, Grapes of Wrath’s story and characters swim in deep waters and can serve as the frame for any number of allegories and interpretations.
East Of Eden: Finding God in a Godless World
East of Eden is the peak of writing that many believed Steinbeck would never again reach after Grapes of Wrath. Published in 1952, it is considered by Steinbeck himself to be his magnum opus. Even more deeply seeped in Biblical identity than Grapes of Wrath, Adam Trask’s twin sons, Caleb and Aron echo Cain and Abel, while Adam and his depraved wife represent the choice for good or evil. In its sprawling narrative, East of Eden makes plenty of allusions to the book of Genesis, with the name itself coming from Genesis, Chapter 4, Verse 16 of the King James Version, “And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the Land of Nod, on the east of Eden.” Interestingly, one of the thematic pillars of the story is “timshel”, a Hebrew word that Adam’s friend insists has been mistranslated in the English version of the Cain and Abel story and means that humans are neither compelled to follow God, or condemned to depravity, but instead make the choice. Yet the story references that exact English translation of Cain and Abel with its title, and implies that the story and all its characters already exist outside of Eden, even as Adam and Aron parallel the Biblical Adam and Abel, who should have been living in Eden. The implication plays on “timshel.” Eden was not what made Adam and Aron good people, and the east of Eden does not make Caleb and Adam’s wife bad people. Even in a land to which the sinful are banished, you can be a good person.
Of Mice and Men: The First Classic You Should Read
Though Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden are considered his greatest works, it would be foolish to overlook the immense success and persistence Of Mice and Men has had in the American education system. At a brisk 106 pages in the penguin classics edition most high schoolers will read, the story achieves more than most authors could hope to do in their entire career. The relationship between George and Lennie is both instantly relatable and layered. At once father and son, brothers, and best friends, you can empathize with George’s frustration with wrangling Lennie, even as you love watching Lennie adopt puppies and worry about how much control George has over him. Everyone has been scolded by an authority figure for something they thought was harmless. And everyone has messed up and tried to hide from their mistake. That’s what makes the ending of the novel so heart wrenching. When Lennie has made a mistake he can’t hide from, George can’t let him off with a scolding, and they’ve run out of time, their inseparable relationship becomes the very thing that drives George to take responsibility for Lennie. It has to be him. Letting someone else handle Lennie’s punishment would be a betrayal of Lennie’s trust in George, even as George has to use that trust to put down Lennie as quickly and painlessly as he can.
It is precisely because most reader’s first exposure to Of Mice and Men will be in High School, a time where they exist somewhere between George and Lennie, that makes the story so impactful. They’re close enough to Lennie’s childlike mind that they can easily latch onto it and empathize with him. But they’re grown up enough that they can recognize the potential damage Lennie could cause and realize that it is George’s constant vigilance that keeps Lennie out of trouble. When George not only allows Lennie to hurt someone but urges him to crush Curley’s fist and then goes drinking that night, the dominos are in place. As a high schooler, you see how lack of thought, and a lack of responsibility, destroy not only their lives, but the lives of those around them. Because of George’s lenient oversight, Lennie kills Curley’s Wife. Their dream is shattered. George must again take responsibility for Lennie, giving him a more merciful death than the lynch mob will. And their dream, the American dream, dies with him.
The complex narrative and themes, combined with the quick and easy read, leaves entire classrooms engrossed in the book, and then astounded that it’s over so quickly. More than philosophizing, or capturing the American condition, Of Mice and Men is a quick, gripping story that leaves you wanting more, steeped in the ideas of the American Literary Canon. Students leave the book shocked at the ending, and interested in why the book ended the way it did. One of the most prevalent detriments to teaching English in American high school is that students often don’t see the point. They don’t understand what the teacher is trying to explain, or how its important. They read a story and like to stick to surface level analysis because why would they look for a second story in the one they just read one. The power in Of Mice and Men is that its depth is obvious. Even the most basic reader who wants to insist the curtains are just blue can see that there’s more going on in this story. And importantly, its so easy to become emotionally attached to Lennie, that an audience of High School readers will turn to their teacher and ask why he had to die. The easy emotional investment, and lightning pace makes Of Mice and Men a powerful tool for teaching students how to read and interpret the themes and complex layers present in American Literary Canon, and that is why it is one of Steinbeck's greatest works. Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden are masterpieces with all of the complexity that comes with that. Of Mice and Men is an introduction to American Literature and serves as a cipher, the first steppingstone, that helps you begin to understand what everything else is trying to say. If you want to keep the classics alive, people need to read and understand them, and to teach them to do that, you should have them read Of Mice and Men.
John Steinbeck’s Writing Advice: Forget the Faceless Masses
One of the aspects of writing that can paralyze an author and leave them staring at a blank page, or an unfinished sentence, is wondering if people will write it. This is hardly a unique challenge of writing. The faceless masses, the nebulous “people” are a cannibalistic concept that not only chews up and spits out the entertainment placed before them with little to say but “more”, but they also eat away at the creative, plaguing them with an impossible task of sating the hunger of everyone. It’s a trouble all creatives deal with, whether it be filmmaking, theater, music, art, and even writing.
In the words of John Steinbeck, “Forget your generalize audience. In the first place, the nameless, faceless audience will scare you to death and in the second place… it doesn’t exist. In writing, your audience is one single reader. I have found that sometimes it helps to pick out one person- a real person you know, or an imagined person and write to that one.” If you try to write for everyone, you will appeal to no one. But focusing your audience from “people” who want entertainment, to a “person” with actual interests, you can enter into conversation with them, consider if that one person will actually like your story, and use that to guide your writing.
John Steinbeck in Memory
John Steinbeck was a complicated man, and its impossible to cover his entire life and work in such short order. We remember him for his classics, even as they’re filled with Biblical allusions by an agnostic writer. His writing spurred popular support for the plight of the migrant worker, though he was not one of them after he started writing for a living. His stories tell us the American Dream is dead, despite being how Steinbeck pulled himself up and cemented his place in the American Literary Canon. And although he is dead, Steinbeck has achieved immortality through his work. A man of many contradictions, John Steinbeck raised many questions during his life, so as we celebrate his birthday please take the time to consider at the Discussion Questions and think a bit more about this classical American author.
Discussion Questions
1. Of Mice and Men is one of the first steppingstones to understanding the wider American Literary Canon. Two other introductions to American literature are The Great Gatsby, with its unique ability to have metaphors for practically anything in any aspect of the story, and Catcher in the Rye, whose melancholic story and themes are easily relatable to a high school audience. What other stories serve as an introduction to American literature, and what makes them more easily accessible than other classics?
2. It’s been said by Ricketts’ biographer, Eric Enno Tamm, that with the exception of East of Eden, Steinbeck’s writing had a noticeable decline after the death of his good friend. This might sound like an attempt to inflate Rickett’s importance, but the question is worth asking. Did Steinbeck’s writing actually drop in quality after the death of his great friend? If it did, why was East of Eden the exception?
3. When Steinbeck received the Nobel Prize in 1962, there was actually an immense amount of pushback. His detractors called him a hack whose novels were weighed down by 10th rate philosophizing, and that his Nobel Prize was one of the academies biggest mistakes. Yet today, he is held up as one of the greatest American authors. Have we seen more in Steinbeck than his detractors have, or have we simply read less of him and fixated on his masterpieces while letting his lesser works fall by the wayside?
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