Steinbeck: of puppies and men
I was in my car listening to NPR the other night (yes, sometimes I listen to NPR) and someone mentioned that, back in the 30s, half of John Steinbeck’s first draft of Of Mice and Men had been eaten by the author’s new puppy.
So for Steinbeck, “the dog ate my homework” was really true, although since he wasn’t in school it didn’t serve as an excuse. In those pre-computer days he had no extra copy and was forced to re-create the missing half.
The person on NPR said that Steinbeck quipped that perhaps his dog was acting in the capacity of critic. I think that shows remarkable forbearance on Steinbeck’s part.
Steinbeck, of course, was a dog lover. But the “Charley” of Travels With Charley was not the same canine who ate Steinbeck’s homework, since Of Mice and Men was published in 1937 and Charley traveled with the author in 1960.
But Steinbeck got back at that puppy who had eaten his book. If you’re familiar with the plot of Of Mice and Men, the dimwitted but well-meaning giant Lennie accidentally kills a puppy while petting it, which foreshadows the more tragic ending of the book.
At one point in his life, British General Herbert Horatio Kitchener had four dogs whose name told an amusing little event. “Bang”, “Shot”, “Miss”, and “Damn!”
A part of me always wonders whether he ever called the last dog while in mixed company.
I live in Salinas, California, the birthplace of John Steinbeck. In 1998 the Steinbeck Center museum opened. I belong to its Steinbeck book club; we just finished Travels With Charley. We also just saw a film of a 2014 Broadway production of Of Mice and Men. I was especially interested in Charley for its on-the-road ruminations by Steinbeck, who was at the stage of life that I am in now. I wondered if he would look at political matters with less of a left liberal disposition like I certainly do. He did seem disappointed that the relatively high standard of living that had reached the masses since 1939’s Grapes of Wrath did not produce more happiness and contentment. A key theme of both of these works is that being alone is very difficult.
“Bill Barich, who wrote Long Way Home: On the Trail of Steinbeck’s America, also a retracing of Steinbeck’s footsteps, said:
“I’m fairly certain that Steinbeck made up most of the book. The dialogue is so wooden. Steinbeck was extremely depressed, in really bad health, and was discouraged by everyone from making the trip. He was trying to recapture his youth, the spirit of the knight-errant. But at that point he was probably incapable of interviewing ordinary people. He’d become a celebrity and was more interested in talking to Dag Hammarskjold and Adlai Stevenson. The die was probably cast long before he hit the road, and a lot of what he wrote was colored by the fact that he was so ill. But I still take seriously a lot of what he said about the country. His perceptions were right on the money about the death of localism, the growing homogeneity of America, the trashing of the environment. He was prescient about all that.”[8]
Published in 2012, the 50th anniversary edition of “Travels With Charley” included a disclaimer by Parini, who wrote:
“Indeed, it would be a mistake to take this travelogue too literally, as Steinbeck was at heart a novelist, and he added countless touches — changing the sequence of events, elaborating on scenes, inventing dialogue — that one associates more with fiction than nonfiction.
“It should be kept in mind, when reading this travelogue, that Steinbeck took liberties with the facts, inventing freely when it served his purposes, using everything in the arsenal of the novelist to make this book a readable, vivid narrative. The book remains ‘true’ in the way all good novels or narratives are true. That is, it provides an aesthetic vision of America at a certain time. The evocation of its people and places stay forever in the mind, and Steinbeck’s understanding of his country at this tipping point in its history was nothing short of extraordinary. It reflects his decades of observation and the years spent in honing his craft.”” — La Wik
Let’s please not give Bill Barich too much credit for suspecting the obvious. He assumed Steinbeck made up most of “Travels With Charley,” but I proved it. How I exposed the many fictions and fibs Steinbeck put into “Charley” — and how my findings forced Penguin Group to ask Jay Parini to rewrite his “Charley” introduction to say the book was fiction and not nonfiction — can be found in my Amazon ebook, “Dogging Steinbeck.” So too can an assessment of his Cold War liberal politics, which were never as leftist as conservatives claimed or liberals wished. Shawn Macomber blessed me and “DS” with a fine review in the Standard way back in 2013. http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/chicanery-row_695208.html
The book that Bill Steigerwald is plugging can be found at Amazon: Dogging Steinbeck: How I went in search of John Steinbeck’s America, found my own America, and exposed the truth about ‘Travels With Charley’
Welcome to Neo Neocon’s blog, Bill Steigerwald! In my earlier post I should have mentioned that I was reading Dogging Steinbeck along with Travels with Charley. I think that Dogging Steinbeck is very accurate.
bill steigerwald: Please hawk your book somewhere else. After reading your rant, I’m reminded of the spam that periodically fills blogs with “I made $100 in 10 minutes.”
And as you you Gringo, you might try to support this website by letting Neo get the commission on any books that the readers may purchase rather than “ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1426546497&sr=8-3&keywords=steigerwald”.
Needless to say I will not be making a purchase 🙁
MIkeII,
Personally, I wouldn’t characterize it as a ‘rant’. And if as objectively accurate as Steigerwald claims, his book is germane to the discussion. That he did NOT provide a link to his book on Amazon discredits the claim that he is ‘hawking’ his book. Those interested in further exploration of Steinbeck are simply now aware of it.
As for Gringo’s failure to mention neo’s commission, I doubt that it was intentional. More than once, in commenting, I’ve linked to a book on Amazon here without mentioning neo’s commission and I can assure you it was always an oversight.
Not all offense is mendacious in intent.
Maybe I am naive about the blogosphere. I assumed that Steigerwald reads Neo and just responded with his deep knowledge of Steinbeck and let Weekly Standard do the promoting of his book. The critical perspective of Dogging Steinbeck is one that many Neo enthusiasts would appreciate. More power to you, Steigerwald!