AMERICAN CRITICAL ARCHIVES 8 John Steinbeck: The Contemporary Reviews The American Critical Archives GENERAL EDITOR: M. Thomas Inge, Randolph-Macon College 1. Emerson and Thoreau: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by Joel Myerson 2. Edith Wharton: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by James W. Tuttleton, Kristin O. Lauer, and Margaret P. Murray 3. Ellen Glasgow: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by Dorothy M. Scura 4. Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by John L. Idol, Jr., and Buford Jones 5. William Faulkner: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by M. Thomas Inge 6. Herman Melville: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by Brian Higgins and Hershel Parker 7. Henry James: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by Kevin J. Hayes 8. John Steinbeck: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by Joseph R. McElrath, Jr., Jesse S. Crisler, and Susan Shillinglaw 9. Walt Whitman: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by Kenneth M. Price John Steinbeck The Contemporary Reviews Edited by Joseph R. McElrath, Jr. Florida State University Jesse S. Crisler Brigham Young University Susan Shillinglaw San Jose State University CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, Sao Paulo, Delhi Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 8RU, UK Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521114097 © Cambridge University Press 1996 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 1996 This digitally printed version 2009 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication data John Steinbeck: the contemporary reviews / edited by Joseph R. McElrath, Jr., Jesse S. Crisler, and Susan Shillinglaw. p. cm.—(American critical archives; 8) Includes index. ISBN0-521-41038-X(hc) 1. Steinbeck, John, 1902-1968—Criticism and interpretation. 2. American fiction—20th century—Book reviews. I. McElrath, Joseph R. II. Crisler, Jesse S. III. Shillinglaw, Susan. IV. Series. PS3537.T3234Z7155 1996 823'.912—dc20 95-13434 CIP ISBN 978-0-521-41038-0 hardback ISBN 978-0-521-11409-7 paperback Frontispiece portrait courtesy of The Steinbeck Research Center, San Jose State University. Contents Series Editor's Preface vii Introduction ix Cup of Gold (1929) 1 The Pastures of Heaven (1932) 11 To a God Unknown (1933) 21 Tortilla Flat (1935) 29 In Dubious Battle (1936) 49 Of Mice and Men (the novel, 1937) 71 The Red Pony (1937) 95 Of Mice and Men (the play, 1937) 107 The Long Valley (1938) 131 The Grapes of Wrath (1939) 151 The Forgotten Village (1941) 193 Sea of Cortez (1941) 201 The Moon Is Down (the novel, 1942) 215 The Moon Is Down (the play, 1942) 239 Bombs Away (1942) 257 Cannery Row (1945) 269 The Wayward Bus (1947) 291 The Pearl (1947) 313 A Russian Journal (1948) 327 Burning Bright (the novel, 1950) 341 Burning Bright (the play, 1950) 355 The Log from the Sea of Cortez (1951) 369 East of Eden (1952) 381 Sweet Thursday (1954) 405 The Short Reign of Pippin IV (1957) 427 Once There Was a War (1958) 441 The Winter of Our Discontent (1961) 451 Travels with Charley in Search of America (1962) 479 America and Americans (1966) 497 Journal of a Novel: The East of Eden Letters (1969) 507 The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights (1976) 523 Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath 1938-1941 (1989) 543 Index 555 Series Editor's Preface The American Critical Archives series documents a part of a writer's career that is usually difficult to examine, that is, the immediate response to each work as it was made public on the part of reviewers in contemporary news- papers and journals. Although it would not be feasible to reprint every re- view, each volume in the series reprints a selection of reviews designed to provide the reader with a proportionate sense of the critical response, whether it was positive, negative, or mixed. Checklists of other known re- views are also included to complete the documentary record and allow access for those who wish to do further reading and research. The editor of each volume has provided an introduction that surveys the career of the author in the context of the contemporary critical response. Ide- ally, the introduction will inform the reader in brief of what is to be learned by a reading of the full volume. The reader then can go as deeply as necessary in terms of the kind of information desired—be it about a single work, a pe- riod in the author's life, or the author's entire career. The intent is to provide quick and easy access to the material for students, scholars, librarians, and general readers. When completed, the American Critical Archives should constitute a com- prehensive history of critical practice in America, and in some cases Great Britain, as the writers' careers were in progress. The volumes open a window on the patterns and forces that have shaped the history of American writing and the reputations of the writers. These are primary documents in the liter- ary and cultural life of the nation. M. THOMAS INGE Vll Introduction John Steinbeck did not particularly like book critics, "these curious sucker fish who live with joyous vicariousness on other men's work and discipline with dreary words the thing which feeds them."1 It is hardly surprising. Each book published in his lifetime was attacked by prestigious reviewers, and for a highly sensitive man the criticism bit deeply. "Once I read and wept over reviews," he wrote in 1954; "then one time I put the criticisms all together and I found that they canceled each other out and left me nonexistent."2 That complaint points to the central feature of this collection of reviews. With the publication of each book, Steinbeck was both roundly attacked and as widely lauded. Reading the reviews in American, English, and Canadian magazines and newspapers, one is struck by the consistency of dissent; even books considered his weakest—Burning Bright and The Wayward Bus—re- ceived plaudits from important reviewers. There was never a consensus on a Steinbeck text. Still, a common and persistent misconception about Steinbeck's work is that critics panned the post-Grapes fiction. That assumption became com- monplace in the 1960s. Writing in the Saturday Review in 1969 about the posthumously published journal of a Novel, Lawrence William Jones posited this view of Steinbeck's career: "Steinbeck's post-war reception was one of nearly unrelieved and often misdirected hostility. Of the eight fictional works published during this period, only The Pearl was even fleetingly praised, and it has inevitably suffered from constant comparison with Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea." The only specific truth articulated in that statement is that Steinbeck was with some regularity compared to Hemingway, as when, in 1952, they published within weeks of one another The Old Man and the Sea and East of Eden—both late and, to some minds, stunning novels. It is also true that many felt critical disdain toward Steinbeck for supposedly com- promising his talent. For them, his later work was frivolous, artificial, pon- derous, or trite, whereas the work of the 1930s resonated with a clarity and force absent in the later books. But false and misleading is the suggestion that Steinbeck's postwar reception was one of nearly unrelieved hostility. What the reviews in this volume teach us, first, is that the "great" social novels of the 1930s produced no such positive consensus during that decade, and, sec- ond, that each subsequent text was met with broadly divergent opinions. Some, in fact, called East of Eden, Cannery Row, and even Travels with]