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RR 2006/421 Critical Companion to John Steinbeck: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work Jeffrey Schultz and Luchen Li Facts on File New York, NY 2005 ix + 406 pp. ISBN 0 8160 4300 0 £44.50; $65
Facts on File Library of American Literature
Keywords Fiction, United States of America
Review DOI 10.1108/09504120610709565
John Steinbeck (1902-1968) produced works of fiction celebrated for their social relevancy, compassion, and humor. His classics include Of Mice and Men (1937), The Red Pony (1938), The Grapes of Wrath (1939) and East of Eden (1952). Much of his most notable work, written during the Great Depression of the 1930s, focuses on the ordinary lives and economic struggles of migrant laborers. Rural California, particularly the Salinas Valley, serves as the setting for the majority of his stories. Commonly viewed as the quintessential American writer and extensively read, Steinbeck's novels continue to sell more than two million copies a year. In addition, he was a prolific writer - publishing at times during his life a book a year. His stories have been widely adapted to film and theatre; Steinbeck adaptations to film, for example, have garnered four Academy Awards and 29 Academy Awards nominations. In 1962 he won the Nobel Prize in literature. Numerous biographies and critical studies have been published and several Steinbeck-focused scholarly journals have been produced over the years.
Conversely, John Steinbeck's life was troubled and his work was not without controversy. He struggled with alcohol addiction and depression most of his life. He had difficult and complicated relationships with both family and friends. Consequently, autobiographical references to those strained relationships often appear in his works of fiction. The power and influence of his writings has been the subject of...