Me and John Steinbeck

Oregon still has plenty of storefront booksellers with current hits on display out front and shelves of used books in the back that emit a wonderful musty odor and create inviting labyrinths in which literature lovers can become lost.

The second such store I visited last week had a pristine paperback copy of John Steinbeck’s “Travels with Charley” that was mine for around six bucks. No sales tax in Oregon.

I had been more than a little disappointed late last year when I checked a copy of the book out of the Merced County Library. After skimming and scanning the contents, I concluded that by the time he wrote this book, the great writer was at least a borderline alcoholic.

As has apparently been the case with other novelists who have suffered from the curse, liquor didn’t keep Steinbeck from creating prose at levels this poor writer will never reach; but, when it came to “Charley,” I suspected that booze affected the writer’s judgment a bit and his objectivity more than a bit.

I thought I also detected a slant in the message – it seemed to me that Steinbeck took a load of biases and preconceptions on the road with him and that his writing provides pretty clear evidence that those lenses distorted his observations and conclusions.

Mostly, however, I was saddened by the fact that getting out among the people failed to bring the author out of his funk. He was not, as Labor Day and the start of his trip approached in 1960, a very optimistic student of the human condition. In fact, much of the optimism reflected in earlier works of fiction seemed to be missing; he displayed strong and uncomplimentary opinions about changes that had taken place over the intervening two or three decades. He seemed to me to be more than a little disgruntled, even at the outset of his trip.

By the end of his journey, an ending he rushed through as if he had given up all hope of finding the true-blue American spirit that he sought, it seemed to me that Steinbeck was more cynical and pessimistic than ever.

I repeat that I rushed through the book – particularly the last chapters. I felt as eager to be done with it as the author seemed to be. And, in my haste, I no doubt missed all nuance and any subtext that may have offered avenues for a brighter interpretation than the broad strokes seemed to be describing.

Now, with a personal copy in hand, and time available to do it more justice, I’ve begun a new study of the popular, but not highly acclaimed little book that isn’t really a travelogue nor is it purely a social commentary, nor an autobiography.

At the beginning of this re-evaluation, I can already conclude that the work offers much more to me than I initially believed; it is a font of ideas. Steinbeck sees a wide landscape and often packs an enormous amount of content into very few words; a more deliberate reading is giving me a lot to think about.

Whether he managed to find meaning from his search or not, the master has identified many interesting questions. Within and between the lines are listed dozens of topics and even whole areas of inquiry; Steinbeck seems to be inviting me to take my own look, in my own time – through my own lenses.

As a fellow writer, albeit of far less skill and accomplishment, I feel challenged to use my own journey and my own context and my own little voice, to share what I find with any who are willing to give me a read.

Six weeks ago, I decided that Wandering Dave is not a new invention, that my job was not to portray a character; but rather that the man portrayed in the cartoon is the same person also known as David Burke.

Today, I’m committing myself to accept the challenge that seems to me to have been laid down by John Steinbeck when he was my age and arrived at the following conclusion:

I did not know my own country. . . I had not heard the speech of America, smelled the grass and trees and sewage, seen its hills and water, its color and quality of light. I knew the changes only from books and newspapers. But, more than this, I had not felt the country for twenty-five years. In short, I was writing of something I did not know about, and it seems to me that in a so-called writer this is criminal.

I believe that Steinbeck knew, but didn’t say that a big part of the pulse he wanted to take at age 58 was his own. By understanding where and from whom he came, he thought he would gain valuable insight into whom and what he was as a person. I know my own search is at least as much a search for myself as for what I’ll see along the road.

Speaking of the road, I don’t believe this sharpened focus represents any kind of detour from the path set forth at the beginning. As I see it, we’ve just picked up another Travel Partner, admittedly without his agreeing to serve in that capacity.

Those of us who put words on paper (or in cyberspace) risk creating followers, emulators and others who hopefully carry our ideas to higher levels. With no delusions about the likelihood of anyone concluding that I may be able to build on John Steinbeck, I still claim the right to try.

And I hope you’ll ride along and be part of that attempt.

If you are interested and willing, you can play an active part in developing the “Steinbeck Connection.” Participate in a discussion thread set up for that purpose on the Wandering Dave Forum: http://daveburke.proboards89.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=blog&thread=1174537898