John SteinbeckLife and Works

February 27, 1902 – December 20, 1968

John Steinbeck

• One of the best known and most widely read American writers of the 20th century.

• Steinbeck wrote in the naturalist style, portraying people as the center of his stories.

John Steinbeck

• His people and his stories were taken from real life struggles in the first half of the 20th century.

• His body of work reflects his wide range of interests, including marine biology, jazz, politics, philosophy, history, and myth.

Born and Raised

• February 27, 1902 in Salinas, California

• He used this setting for many of his stories.

• Son of John Ernst Steinbeck III and Olive Steinbeck.

• One of four children (3 sisters)

Education

• Enrolled at Stanford University in 1919.

• Attended off and on until 1925.

• Never received a degree

Family

• Married Carol Henning in 1930

• Gwyndolyn Conger who gave him 2 children; Thomas Myles Steinbeck was born in 1944 and his second son, John Steinbeck IV was born in 1946.

• Married Elaine Scott in 1950

Early Works

• Steinbeck's first novel, published in 1929, was the unsuccessful mythological work Cup of Gold.

• Steinbeck achieved his first critical success with the novel Tortilla Flat (1935), which won the California Commonwealth Club's Gold Medal.

California Novels and Dust-Bowl Fiction

• Set among common people in the Great Depression.

• Of Mice and Men is his novella about the dreams of a pair of migrant laborers working the California soil. It was published in 1937.

Writing Style

• Steinbeck often wrote about the need for humans to be in partnership with nature.

• His characters are the outcasts of society, poor, uneducated and often rebellious.

• Themes: economic hardships, dreams and hope lost, the dangers of isolation, rootless (unwanted) Americans, man’s need to belong.

The Grapes of Wrath

• Steinbeck followed this wave of success with The Grapes of Wrath (1939), based on newspaper articles he had written in San Francisco, and considered by many to be his finest work.

The Grapes of Wrath

• The novel won the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1940.

• It was made into a famous film version starring Henry Fonda and directed by John Ford.

Of Mice and Men

• Setting: mid-state California, rural area, during the Great Depression

• Characters: Two migrant workers: George, a smart, small man; Lennie, a huge, “slow” man

• Title: a literary allusion referring to the poem “To A Mouse” by Robert Burns.

Film Versions

• The film versions of The Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men (by two different movie studios) were in production simultaneously, and Steinbeck spent a full day on the set of The Grapes of Wrath, then the next day on the set of Of Mice and Men.

Controversy

• Steinbeck's liberal political views, portrayal of the ugly side of capitalism, and his interpretation of the historical events of the Dust Bowl migrations led to backlash against the author, especially close to home.

• The Grapes of Wrath was banned from the Salinas County public schools and libraries in August 1939, lasting until January 1941.

Other Written Works

• During the Second World War, Steinbeck served as a war correspondent for the New York Herald Tribune.

• Some of his writings from his correspondence days were later collected and made into Once There Was A War (1958).

Steinbeck’s Contribution to Film

• He continued to work in film, writing Alfred Hitchcock's Lifeboat (1944), and the film A Medal for Benny (1945).

• His novel The Moon is Down (1942) became a film immediately.

• He wrote The Pearl (1947), already knowing it would be filmed, and traveled to Mexico for the filming

East of Eden

• Steinbeck wrote one of his most popular novels, East of Eden in 1952.

• Collaborated on the theatrical production of East of Eden, James Dean's film debut.

Awards and Honors

• Seventeen of his works, went on to become Hollywood films.

• Steinbeck achieved success as a Hollywood writer, earning an Academy Award nomination for Best Writing for Alfred Hitchcock's Lifeboat, in 1945.

Awards and Honors

• In 1962, Steinbeck won the Nobel Prize for Literature for his “realistic and imaginative writing, combining as it does sympathetic humor and keen social perception.”

• Won the Pulitzer Prize in 1940 for The Grapes of Wrath.

The Legacy of Steinbeck

• "His place in [U.S.] literature is secure. And it lives on in the works of innumerable writers who learned from him how to present the forgotten man unforgettably.“

• Steinbeck's works are frequently included on required reading lists in American high schools.