Hey fellow enthusiasts, I am planning to go to SF later this year for a week. I would love to see at least a speck of "Steinbeck Country" in that time, but it is probably a stretch. Has anyone here driven down the freeway from Salinas to King City and if so, would you recommend the trip? Or should I just stick to Monterey and Salinas? As I'm in the area for only a week I would realistically have only a day for a trip like that... would also love any recommendations for Monterey and Salinas, if anybody here has been! Thanks in advance:)

What does my collection really need next?

I'm reading the Grapes of Wrath right now, and for one I've been taken by just how contemporary these folks 100 years ago spoke and thought and acted. Of course people have always been people, but you can never really internalize that fact.

I've also been very surprised by the way he describes mechanized agriculture. Starting in chapter 5, but continuing onward throughout the rest of the book so far, both the Joad family chapters and the interstitial chapters return to this theme of the horror of this new way of farming.

It would be one thing if he were describing modern livestock practices, but he's just talking about tractors, describing them in apocalyptic terms. The description of the driver is more sci-fi horror than historical fiction. And I understand why it's done in the context of this story, but I haven't been able to find any info on whether this is a belief framework he personally held.

So does anyone here know whether he was inserting personal thoughts into the story like a Taylor Sheridan off-topic rant? Or was it just an effective way to communicate the existential horror that these characters must feel watching the sudden, violent twilight set on their 10,000 year old way of life?

My friend just relayed a story to me...

"I’ve been meaning to tell you, because you reading Steinbeck jogged my memory:

I dated someone in college whose family had a lot of land in the Bay Area and in Tahoe. (His family came from Ireland prior to the famine.) I don’t know what this means, but his grandmother was on the social registry for the City of SF.

Anywhoo, John Steinbeck got a summer job fixing one of their houses/barns in Tahoe. But he had screwed it up so badly that he fell through the roof. So they fired him. 🤣"

Decided I'd read Steinbeck upon countless recommendations . I've bought East of Eden + Grapes of Wrath. Before I read them, I'd like to know if there's anything I should read first to give me a good understanding of his style.

David Wyatt introduction. Does anyone recall?

It certainly didn't have everything in it, I wish there was more of the Hamiltons and I wish they had somehow found a way to work Chapter 13's "Sometimes a glory..." into it (my favorite piece of literature) BUT I felt it really captured the essence of my favorite novel.

Not really a spoiler but I'll mark it anyway. At the end of part 2 he mentions that Cain had children, which is true, but also that we're his descendants, which isn't. I don't know if there are different versions, but the way I learned it was that there was a third brother, Seth. He was the ancestor of Noah (with the arc), and since Noah and his family were the only ones to survive the flood, no one today descends from Cain.

It's hard to imagine Steinbeck would have just been careless considering how central bible lore is to that chapter. Are there different versions or is this just a minor oversight I'm thinking way too much about?

I grew up in Salinas in the 60s. My memory is that many residents did not like Steinbeck because he wrote about them - yeah, he fictionalized the stories and characters, but not enough that folks didn’t know whom he was referring to. F’rinstance, Cathy Ames in East of Eden was based on a woman who was very much alive when Steinbeck wrote East of Eden, and allegedly married into the Tynan family, owners of Tynan Lumber on Front Street. Tynan was her fifth husband, as I heard.

The twins were based on the young Murphy boys whose grandfather was Dr. Murphy who delivered John Steinbeck.

When the librarian proposed renaming the public library to The John Steinbeck Library, there was a lot of negative reaction. Some who were opposed to the name change back in the mid-1960s, their family names now grace the plaque outside the Steinbeck Museum.

I was young when I heard these rumours - so maybe they are all nonsense. I can’t find anything online talking about basing his stories on real Salinas residents. Anybody out there remember these rumors?

Is anyone here a fan of Mumford & Sons? Much of Marcus Mumford's work was inspired by the writings of Steinbeck.

Hi Steinbeck fans! We just put up episode threads for every episode in the new Netflix East of Eden series.

Come join us at /r/EastOfEdenSeries/!

Completely blank pages. Has anyone else had this issue with their copy? I will be purchasing a new copy today and am hoping it doesn’t have the big N plastered on the front.

Rereading Steinbeck’s East of Eden and found this amazing aerial of Salinas, CA in 1906 on the library of congress website. You can see the Steinbeck house close to center, but he was only 4 years old at the time. The red light district and Chinatown is on this side of the train tracks to the left, just off camera (where “Kate’s” was). Lots of real places in this photo that were mythologized and made it into the book. I also figured out where the Hamilton Ranch was about 40 minutes south and it’s still as lonely and barren as it was described.

So I have a book that has: Of Mice and Men, the Pearl, Tortilla Flat and Cannery Row. I read 3 of those. And my favourites are (it may sound overly harsh but I want to give more information to go off of):

1. Of mice and men. Straight-forward prose, liked the George and Lenny dynamic, overall deep characters given the volume of words, the ending I didn't expect and it kind of stuck with me.

   1. Cannery Row. Had some hilarious moments, liked Doc and Mack and the gang very much, some subplots were interesting but lead nowhere. Also I found the setting of Monterey kind of boring. I guess it's his hometown area but apart from the different animals I don't know how it would be good for worldbuilding.
   2. The Pearl. The message and the ending is good but pace and my familiarity with the setting is bad.

So do I go for Tortilla Flat (which I have) or East of Eden?

I gave up tattooing a while ago, but I made an exception for Ed Ricketts.

Cannery Row is my favorite book, and it had a huge influence on my graphic novel inspired by the history of the central California coast, so this felt like a fittingly permanent way to honor that particular fixation.

The portrait also had to be tattooed upside down from my perspective, on the outside of my calf, while I folded myself into a shape not recognized by modern anatomy. All things considered, I’m pretty happy with it.

Based on Steinbeck's 1947 novel of the same name, directed by Victor Vicas, and starring Joan Collins, Jayne Mansfield, Dan Dailey, and Rick Jason.

/r/steinbeck is ready for a fresh start, new energy, new direction, and someone like you to bring it back to life. If you’ve been thinking about growing your impact without starting from scratch, this is your chance!

Ready to take it over?

Head to r/RedditRequest to submit your request and make it yours before it’s taken. Just make sure you read through the eligibility requirements first.