Jeffery Ernest Steinbeck
11 min read
Reading time
2,067
Words
Published
7
Film credits
89
Books
7
Awards
John Steinbeck won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1962 despite harsh criticism from American literati. The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, and East of Eden are among his major works, many adapted into films. His novels critiqued American materialism and portrayed the working class during the Great Depression.
Names, aliases, and relatives of John Steinbeck — birth name, kin, and personal ties.
John Steinbeck by the numbers — life, work, and family.
John Steinbeck — early life, career, personal life, and legacy.
John Steinbeck was born on February 27, 1902 in Salinas, California to Olive Hamilton, a former schoolteacher, and John Ernst Steinbeck, County Treasurer. He was the third of four children and the only son. He graduated from Salinas High School in 1919 and attended Stanford University intermittently until 1925, leaving without a degree. During his youth, he worked as a sales clerk, farm laborer, ranch hand, and factory worker, experiences that later informed his writing.
Steinbeck published his first novel, Cup of Gold, in 1929. During the 1930s he produced most of his major works: Tortilla Flat 1935, In Dubious Battle 1936, Of Mice and Men 1937, and his Pulitzer Prize-winning The Grapes of Wrath 1939. In 1941 he moved to New York City with his second wife. He wrote the screenplay for Viva Zapata! 1952, receiving an Academy Award nomination. Throughout his career, 17 of his works were adapted into films, and he earned three Oscar nominations.
Steinbeck was married three times: to Carol Henning from 1930 to 1943, to Gwyndolyn Conger from 1943 to 1948, and to Elaine Anderson from 1950 until his death in 1968. He had two sons with Conger: Thom born 1944 and John IV born 1946. In 1948, his close friend Ed Ricketts died, and he divorced Conger. He also toured Russia that year.
In 1962 Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, and in 1964 he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Lyndon B. Johnson. His novel East of Eden was selected for Oprah’s Book Club in 2003, sparking a sales surge of 600,000 copies. On what would have been his 75th birthday, he was commemorated on a U.S. postage stamp. Steinbeck’s works continue to be widely read and adapted.
The complete filmography of John Steinbeck — every film, TV show, and documentary credit, ranked by popularity.
Every award, honor, and recognition received by John Steinbeck — Grammys, hall-of-fame inductions, civic honors, lifetime achievements.
John Steinbeck's bibliography — every authored, edited, and co-written book, ranked by edition count.
A wall of memorable lines from John Steinbeck — lyrics, interviews, and off-the-cuff remarks captured over a lifetime.
A Man on a Horse Is Spiritually, as Well as Physically, Bigger Than a Man on Foot.
Man Is the Only Kind of Varmint Sets His Own Trap, Baits It, and Then Steps in It.
It Has Always Been My Private Conviction That Any Man Who Puts His Intelligence up Against a Fish and Loses Had It Coming.
I Have Never Smuggled Anything in My Life. Why Then Do I Feel an Uneasy Sense of Guilt on Approaching a Customs Barrier?
The Profession of Book Writing Makes Horse Racing Seem Like a Solid Stable Business.
It Is a Common Experience That a Problem, Difficult at Night, Is Resolved in the Morning After the Committee of Sleep Has Worked on It.
It Seems to Me That If You or I Must Choose Between Two Courses of Thought or Action, We Should Remember Our Dying and Try so to Live That Our Death Brings No Pleasure on the World.
Give a Critic an Inch, He’ll Write a Play.
We Spend Our Time Searching for Security and Hate It When We Get It.
I’ve Seen a Look in Dogs’ Eyes, a Quick Vanishing Look of Amazed Contempt, and I Am Convinced That Basically Dogs Think Humans Are Nuts.
In Utter Loneliness a Writer Tries to Explain the Inexplicable.
If You’re in Trouble or Hurt or Need Go to Poor People. They’re the Only Ones That’ll Help the Only Ones.
Nobody Sticks a Knife in the Status Quo and Gets Away with It.
Little-known facts about John Steinbeck — origins, oddities, and behind-the-scenes details from a public life.
According to biographer Jay Parini, Steinbeck in the mid-1990s was the most popular deceased American writer, with 750,000 copies of his works selling annually. Oprah Winfrey’s selection of East of Eden in 2003 boosted sales to 600,000 copies.
Steinbeck is one of the few Nobel laureates in literature to be nominated for an Academy Award for writing. He earned three nominations for Lifeboat 1944, A Medal for Benny 1945, and Viva Zapata! 1952.
After winning the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1962, the New York Times criticized the Swedish Academy’s choice, and Steinbeck himself humbly said he did not deserve it. He remained bitter about the criticism until his death.
Steinbeck was outraged by Alfred Hitchcock’s racism in Lifeboat 1944 towards actor Canada Lee, and he clashed with the director on set.
The stage version of Of Mice and Men won the 1977 Joseph Jefferson Citation for Play Production at the Wisdom Bridge Theatre in Chicago.
Denied a military commission during World War II due to his left-wing politics, Steinbeck served as a journalist and propagandist instead.
Through his ancestors John Rolfe and Mary Sculliard, Steinbeck is a seventh cousin twice removed of President Barack Obama.
His novella Sweet Thursday, a sequel to Cannery Row, was adapted into the 1955 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Pipe Dream, which won five Tony Awards but is considered one of their weakest works.
As of 2005, only one of Steinbeck’s sons, Thom, survived; John Steinbeck IV had died earlier.
Steinbeck was born at 3:00 pm PST in Salinas, California.
He vehemently opposed anything linked with fame, especially publicity and interviews.
During the 1930s, he worked as a journalist for the San Francisco News.
Quick answers to the questions readers ask most about John Steinbeck.
Celebrities similar to John Steinbeck — same craft, ranked by reach.
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