John steinbeck title of breakout work

He won the Nobel Prize in Literature "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social perception". During his writing career, he authored 33 books, with one book coauthored alongside Edward Ricketts , including 16 novels, six non-fiction books , and two collections of short stories. The Pulitzer Prize —winning The Grapes of Wrath [ 5 ] is considered Steinbeck's masterpiece and part of the American literary canon.

Much of Steinbeck's work employs settings in his native central California , particularly in the Salinas Valley and the California Coast Ranges region. His works frequently explored the themes of fate and injustice, especially as applied to downtrodden or everyman protagonists.

John steinbeck death

Steinbeck was born on February 27, , in Salinas, California. John's mother, Olive Hamilton — , a former school teacher, shared Steinbeck's passion for reading and writing. Both valley and coast would serve as settings for some of his best fiction. There he learned of the harsher aspects of the migrant life and the darker side of human nature, which supplied him with material expressed in Of Mice and Men.

He explored his surroundings, walking across local forests, fields, and farms. He had considerable mechanical aptitude and fondness for repairing things he owned. Steinbeck graduated from Salinas High School in and went on to study English literature at Stanford University near Palo Alto , leaving without a degree in He traveled to New York City where he took odd jobs while trying to write.

When he failed to publish his work, he returned to California and worked in as a tour guide and caretaker [ 17 ] at Lake Tahoe , where he met Carol Henning, his first wife. When their money ran out six months later due to a slow market, Steinbeck and Carol moved back to Pacific Grove, California , to a cottage owned by his father, on the Monterey Peninsula a few blocks outside the Monterey city limits.

The elder Steinbecks gave John free housing, paper for his manuscripts, and from , loans that allowed him to write without looking for work. During the Great Depression , Steinbeck bought a small boat, and later claimed that he was able to live on the fish and crabs that he gathered from the sea, and fresh vegetables from his garden and local farms.