John Steinbeck

1
John Steinbeck

• February 27, 1902
• to
• December 20, 1968

2
Born in Salinas, California

• February 27, 1902
• German and Irish Ancestry
• Father John Steinbeck, Sr.
• County Treasurer
• Mother Olive Hamilton Steinbeck
• Former school teacher
• Influenced Steinbecks love of literature

3
Life and Education

• As a child, he worked as a hired hand on local
  ranches
• Graduated from Salinas High School in 1919
• Attended Stanford University as an English Major
• Did not attend regularly
• Worked various jobs while in school
• Did not graduate

• Left California in 1925 to pursue writing career
  in New York
• Unable to get published
• Returned to California

4
Early Writing Career

• Each novel received little attention and was not
  widely accepted in the literary world
• Cup of Gold was published in 1929
• The Pastures of Heaven
• To a God Unknown

5
Married Life and Literary Accomplishments

• Married Carol Henning in 1930
• Wrote Tortilla Flat in 1935
• Based on his observations
• Received the California Commonwealth Club's Gold
  Medal for best novel by a California author
• Wrote Grapes of Wrath in 1939
• Based on observations and research of human
  condition
• Won Pulitzer Prize

6
World War II

• War correspondent for the New York Herald Tribune
• Some of his reports were later collected and made
  into Once There Was a War

7
Success and Recognition

• Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962
• ...for his realistic as well as imaginative
  writings, distinguished by a sympathetic humor
  and a keen social perception.
• Source www.steinbeck.org/bio.html

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A Life Remembered

• Avoided publicity
• Died December 20, 1968 in New York City
• Survived by his third wife, Elaine (Scott)
  Steinbeck and one son, Thomas
• His ashes were placed in the Garden of Memories
  Cemetery in Salinas.
• Source www.steinbeck.org/bio.html

9
Of Mice and Men

• Set in the farm country of Californias Salinas
  Valley
• Written in the days following the Great
  Depression
• Characters are homeless migrant workers
• Live off the land
• Story of real people told in a fictional way
• Struggles of all people
• Filled with love and pain

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Lennie and George

• Lennie is mentally retarded
• George takes care of Lennie and protects him
• They travel together
• As migrant workers, they move from place to place
  where ever there is work
• Just trying to survive

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The American Dream

• A place to call home
• Money
• Family
• Land