Steinbeck Today

The Grapes of Wrath tops the ForbesAutos.com "Top 10 Great Books with Cars" rankings. It is followed by The Great Gatsby, On the Road, and A Good Man is Hard to Find: "Our admittedly highly subjective list, enumerated below, came about after we asked academics, librarians, authors, poets, journalists, automobile industry executives and others for their suggestions. In culling the final 10, we considered the importance of the piece of writing, the reputation of the author and the role that the vehicle, or vehicles, play in the work —both as characters in their own right and, where applicable, as symbols." (taken from "Great Books with Cars," by Jeremy Rosenberg, ForbesAuto.Com, http://www.forbesautos.com/advice/toptens/ literature/vehicles.html)

—submitted by Arthur Krim

October 18, 2006: "The News Hour" on PBS concluded with an essay on the re-masculinization of coffee. It began with a discussion of coffee as a signifier at the beginning of In Dubious Battle and ended with the line, "Not Starbucks. . . Steinbeck."

—submitted by Kevin Hearle

Unverifiable, but amusing: Lee Richard Hayman's collection, recently donated to the Martha Heasley Cox Center for Steinbeck Studies at San José State University, contains a book titled The Bedside Book of Celebrity Gossip which prints the following: Humprey Bogart to John Steneinbeck: "Hemingway tells me he doesn't think you're all that good a writer." (New York: Crown, 1984)

—submitted by Tim Welch

Ricky Ian Gordon.

Photo by Pauline St. Denis

The Grapes of Wrath, a new opera by Ricky Ian Gordon scheduled for its world premiere at Minnesota Opera next February, got a December sneak preview performance at the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center on West 13th Street in Manhattan. Selections from the opera were performed by singers Mary Phillips, Theodore Chletsos, Brian Leerhuber, John Michael Moore and Julia Mintzer with pianist Tim Long. There was also a discussion with Gordon and librettist Michael Korie moderated by Opera News features editor Brian Kellow. The opera opens at Minnesota Opera on February 10, 2007; it is scheduled at the Utah Opera in spring 2007 and at Houston Grand Opera and Pittsburgh Opera in 2008. (Abstracted from "Ricky Ian Gordon's Opera Grapes of Wrath to Get New York Preview Tonight," by Matthew Westphal. Posted December 8, 2006, in Playbill .)

—submitted by Greta Manville

"I reread The Grapes of Wrath and wondered why our generation grew up believing that Ernest Hemingway was the great American writer of the 20th century when, at this historical distance, John Steinbeck seems so much richer." Mary Schmich, "Pass The Butter, Turn on the TV; Summer's Over" Chicago Tribune 3 September 2006: Sec. 4, Metro Chicagoland, I.

—Submitted by Michael J. Meyer

"I would still go back to 'The Grapes of Wrath,' John Steinbeck," said Grisham, whose senior year English teacher assigned him several Steinbeck novels. "He's my all-time favorite author." John Grisham, as quoted in the Chapel Hill News & Advocate for November 15, 2006.

—Submitted by Greta Manville

Notes from Avalon

While in England, the Steinbecks were frequent visitors to Bruton, the closest town to Discove Cottage. The Bruton Museum located at Dovecote Building, 26 High Street, Bruton, Somerset, BA10 0AA. These are excerpts from messages of May and June, 2006, from Douglas Learmond, Chairman of Bruton Museum:

We are planning a display on John Steinbeck and the time he spent in Discove. David Whigham is very kindly lending the museum the architect's table that Steinbeck used. This will accompany a talk given by one of our committee, Andrew Pickering, who is a great Steinbeck fan at the Bruton Festival of Arts on May 25. The subject of the talk is "John Steinbeck, King Arthur and Bruton."

I have been speaking to quite a few people who have clear memories of Steinbeck. There is no doubt he was well liked and considered generous. There is also a modest sense of pride in the success Bruton had in obstructing media and fans who wanted to track him down. I am glad to say that memories are still clear and I have...