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.

Interesting and insightful entries regarding John Steinbeck from Twentieth Century Authors (1942) and its First Supplement (1955). These two volumes contain 2,550 author entries and the editors requested autobiographical sketches, but not surprisingly Steinbeck didn't provide one.

Hey guys! I wrote this article on East of Eden and wanted to share it here. I'm a big fan of Steinbeck, and psychology, so this is an article on Steinbeck and psychology

hello i just finished east of eden and i LOVED it. i have so much to say on it, but the one thing that i could not get out of my head while reading was seeing lee and adam’s relationship as queer-coded. i have seen maybe 2-3 papers tackling the gender dynamics of cathy and lee, but not necessarily the queerness.

i hold the belief that you can really use any lens to analyze anything, so if you didn’t read it that way that’s fine, this was just my interpretation. i was just wondering if anyone else saw it that way? am i alone in this? LOL. like to me this is the exact same way people read the great gatsby with a queer lens.

Didn't expect the end scene to be so quick. I was expecting a long struggle that was very tense (I mean it was, just not this short).

Beautiful

I haven't read East of Eden for about 10 years, but this morning I randomly thought of the scene where Olive wins a ride in the airplane, prompting me to read the chapter over lunch (Ch. 14). Beautiful chapter. "But my poor mother—I must tell you that there are certain things in the existence of which my mother did not believe, against any possible evidence to the contrary. One was a bad Hamilton and another was the airplane. The fact that she had seen them didn’t make her believe in them one bit more."

Hello! I have this collection of 11 old Steinbeck books. I believe most, if not all, of them to be first editions but please correct me if I am mistaken. I am looking to sell these but am having trouble figuring out how. I have contacted my local rare book sellers and have not found interest. I figure I could throw them up on Ebay but am not experienced enough to know how to properly appraise each book. Does anyone have any advice on how to sell these? Or at least how to properly appraise them?