Author Profile: John Steinbeck

Among the blue chips of Twentieth Century book collecting, John Steinbeck is a standout. His works have continuously performed well in the market and by the basic free market economics principle of supply and demand will continue to perform well. Increasing demand for collectible first editions of his works is weighed against diminishing supply, thus continuously driving up the values.

THE GRAPES OF WRATH, his 1940 Pulitzer Prize winning novel, is an American classic whose value for first edition dust jacketed copy has risen from $50 in 1975 to $2500 in 1995. His earliest novels: CUP OF GOLD, THE PASTURES OF HEAVEN, TO A GOD UNKNOWN, and TORTILLA FLAT are elusive and highly prized. Steadily increasing prices are found on his beloved later novels such as EAST OF EDEN and CANNERY ROW as well.

Reading Steinbeck is not a journey down the same path of same plot, same style, same form. His writing takes many twists and turns from his first book, CUP OF GOLD, a fictionalized life of the pirate Henry Morgan to OF MICE AND MEN, a Greek tragedy story of farm workers in the Salinas Valley which he intended to be staged, to THE SEA OF CORTEZ, a non fiction title, to TRAVELS WITH CHARLEY, a revealing journal of his mid life cross country sojourn with his dog.

Steinbeck was born in Salinas, California in 1902 and attended Stanford, specializing in marine biology but dropping out. Wandering about and supporting himself as a laborer, John's success did not come until the mid 1930's following TORTILLA FLAT. For much of his life, home base was Central California from the Salinas Valley farming area to the Monterey Peninsula. Settings and characters for several of his finest works on the lives of simple working people were drawn from this home base. In 1962, Steinbeck won the Nobel Prize for literature. Many issue points and special editions and little known titles exist among Steinbeck's works. He is a fascinating and profitable Modern First author to collect.

Copyright 1996 - 2001 C. Dickens Fine, Rare and Collectible Books, Atlanta, Georgia