Mad at the World: A Life of John Steinbeck by William Souder

A resonant biography of America’s most celebrated novelist of the Great Depression.

The first full-length biography of the Nobel laureate to appear in a quarter century,
Mad at the World illuminates what has made the work of John Steinbeck an enduring part of the literary canon: his capacity for empathy. Pulitzer Prize finalist William Souder explores Steinbeck’s long apprenticeship as a writer struggling through the depths of the Great Depression, and his rise to greatness with masterpieces such as The Red Pony, Of Mice and Men, and The Grapes of Wrath. Angered by the plight of the Dust Bowl migrants who were starving even as they toiled to harvest California’s limitless bounty, fascinated by the guileless decency of the downtrodden denizens of Cannery Row, and appalled by the country’s refusal to recognize the humanity common to all of its citizens, Steinbeck took a stand against social injustice—paradoxically given his inherent misanthropy—setting him apart from the writers of the so-called "lost generation."

A man by turns quick-tempered, compassionate, and ultimately brilliant, Steinbeck could be a difficult person to like. Obsessed with privacy, he was mistrustful of people. Next to writing, his favorite things were drinking and womanizing and getting married, which he did three times. And while he claimed indifference about success, his mid-career books and movie deals made him a lot of money—which passed through his hands as quickly as it came in. And yet Steinbeck also took aim at the corrosiveness of power, the perils of income inequality, and the urgency of ecological collapse, all of which drive public debate to this day.

Steinbeck remains our great social realist novelist, the writer who gave the dispossessed and the disenfranchised a voice in American life and letters. Eloquent, nuanced, and deeply researched,
Mad at the World captures the full measure of the man and his work.

Why I Picked It Up

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In case you haven't been able to tell from my reading list this year, I've been on a huge kick in which I'm devouring everything by John Steinbeck. When I find a writer I connect to on all the unsaid—the rhythms, proportions, a certain turn of phrase instinct that you can't replicate—I can't get enough: one of my absolute favorite feelings.

This year, I've also found a lot of pleasure in building out a lexicon and context in which a lot of my books are building on one another. This happens for me a lot on the nonfiction front i.e. psych and whatnot, but my brother and I were talking on vacation about how this pattern-making is a bit easier to find in older books and classics because they're more likely to reference each other directly.

Prime example: I recently read Figuring by Maria Popova, which talked a lot about Rachel Carson, and John Steinbeck told his wife (as reported in the introduction to The Portable Steinbeck) that Silent Spring is the book he most wishes he'd written because each American writer's job is criticism. Meanwhile, Rachel Carson read Thoreau every night before bed, so there adds in my read of Walden, etc.

It's just easier to trace the inspirations in a way that builds the satisfaction of a web, and that pulls me in more deeply at the moment.

So—I'm not a biography person. I find them a little boring. I'd rather read a social history of whatever the writer, musician, etc. is referencing and just learn about them along the way: parallel, rather than the main focus. I respect what they do, of course, and I also think a lot about the angle, positioning, etc. and what proportion of someone's legacy we're really allowed to crystallize. Steinbeck is a good candidate for that.

My Encounters with Steinbeck So Far

Mad at the World of course traces the portrait of his life—like all biographies—and charts Steinbeck's childhood in California, his tenure as a student, his three marriages, and of course, his many books. Since I'm not well-versed in what makes a great biographer, it's likely more effective for me just to talk about what I enjoyed learning throughout the book rather than analyzing the portrayal overall. Each of the introductions of his works I've read has an explanation of his work and philosophy, so those are my only basis of comparison.

At this point, I'm partway through Steinbeck's oeuvre (my latest vocabulary word obsession.) I've read East of Eden, The Winter of Our Discontent, Of Mice and Men, and am partway through To a God Unknown and bits of The Portable Steinbeck. Travels with Charley is loaded up in my library queue (which I talked about with my dad) and The Grapes of Wrath is on my bedside table (which both of my parents found unbearably depressing.)

I'm sure my thoughts on Steinbeck's intentions, execution, etc. will shift and warp as I work my way through. I have the sense that I'm hungry to finish the list, but also that I'll be sad when I get to the end. I most want to buy myself a copy of Journal of a Novel, which compiles his notes while working through East of Eden, but I need to wait until I've finished some other books I've bought recently!

Introducing John Steinbeck in the Book

I studied history, so I love when names, books, etc. start assembling themselves within my head. I know Steinbeck's contemporaries by virtue of their release dates, but I did love that the timeline started building in a way in which I could trace references, fingerprints, shifts, etc. The tough part about a packaged "portable" reader is that you don't always know if someone's contradicting themselves because they shifted their opinions, or whether they're just inconsistent.

Character-wise, I loved the immediate image of Steinbeck as a boy that Souter dropped from the get-go. People said he was solitary, and always looked like "an unmade bed." He always had a dog. He occasionally descended into periods of darkness from spending so much time within himself; a striking image at the end of the childhood chapter showed his identity was always writer, but often in secret.

This might be another reason I feel such fondness for Steinbeck. There's something rare and special to me about those who've always known who they are and what they're supposed to do, and I'd consider myself in that camp (people who have the singularity of a calling) too. There’s certain kind of kinship I hope translates into legacy, and Steinbeck’s version ripples into certain other curiosities—limitation, focus, isolation vs. community, the texture of living and writing at the same time.

Throughout the course of his lifetime, he loved Walt Whitman, Arthurian legend, and Roman history. He had a small, infected tattoo of a small heart above his left elbow inked during his time at Stanford; he never cared to graduate. He also, strangely enough, lied in odd ways; at one point, he claimed he didn't like kissing because he didn't have nerve endings in his lips. (There's an assortment of weird but entertaining mistruths scattered throughout the biography.) "He was always his own main character."

Mad at the World follows his mid-twenties failures (starving, suffering) in New York City, his move back to California, the desperate attempts to publish his first book at the expense of all else. By the time he eventually debuted at 27, the book didn't do all that well, but he'd found a rhythm as a seasonal lodge caretaker in Lake Tahoe and was prolifically writing his next. The California era when he was first married was vivid—all broke, dinner parties, sunbathing nude on mattresses in the backyard, etc. It reminded me a lot of Patti Smith or the Beat Generation.

Then, later: his life shifts a whole lot more once he was known. It was in two extremes (common in book publishing); once a book took off for him, that was it. He was inundated with book sales, and grappled with the pros and cons.

On a personal level, Steinbeck was pretty self-absorbed when it came to himself and relationships, but seemed to figure that out more by wife number three. He, of course, was a staunch advocate for social and environmental causes on a macro level, with books speaking to his frustration about various injustices around him. I joked at one point I had a crush on Steinbeck; after learning all about him—no. But, I do adore a lot of his brain.

Steinbeck was "preoccupied with the passing of time," a fascination echoed in the introduction to The Winter of Our Discontent. He wondered if he was destined to always dwell in the past, and always felt in tandem like time was running out on him. His fascination with how groups take on completely different traits than the individuals within them makes so much sense as a lens of viewing his works.

I empathized a lot with how an individual story would consume him so entirely—but didn't relate at all to how, once he submitted a book, it was dead to him, no longer occupying his fancy. (This novelty factor may parallel his womanizing for similar reasons. All-in until an unpredictable point, and then when he's done, he's done and never wants to hear of it again.) That particular process, though, makes so much sense in seeing what seeped into his living and writing at a given time, how each of his works end up being slightly different, and how each is such a distinctive fingerprint of his latest philosophies, questions, and most enduring emotion. Time capsules, of a sort, and here, we can dissect some of the influences.

Steinbeck's relationship with success was also rather fascinating. He wanted the accolades for his work and to achieve greatness (cue the conversations within East of Eden about whether man always has to be alone to do so), but also seemed to resent anyone perceiving him. Hell yeah, visibility complexes. At certain points, he made exorbitant amounts of money, but always ended up in debt by tax time.

Craft & Positioning of the Biography

I didn't quite get "mad at the world" from his characterization within the biography, and the synopsis of the book itself makes the narrative sound somewhat more dramatic than it is. I enjoyed it for plenty of reasons, especially because the amount of passion and effort he poured into his work was so clear, but those seeking bigger drama might not appreciate the trajectory in the exact same way.

It did feel slow in some sections, but in fairness—like I said, it's not my usual genre, so I'd need to read more to be able to speak to whether that's a fault of the pacing or just me venturing outside my literary comfort zone. Occasionally, a zoom-out line felt out of place, too much like Souder randomly decided to be stabbingly poetic about something. I love some human nature commentary, but the few "we"-type phrases I noticed didn't feel natural.

Overall Thoughts

Mad at the World did an incredible job showing which curiosities of the author simmered over time, and which facets of John Steinbeck's work were specific to particular books versus consistent within his personality and overall life fascinations. That seems to me like the goal of a writer-centered biography, so I enjoyed it a whole lot. Mad at the World depicted his flaws and his quiddity, which made me deeply appreciative of the context of his books.

Steinbeck was a literary powerhouse. He was insecure in many ways while insisting that he wasn't—so you can sift through a lot of information in putting together the pieces of his life that might make you appreciate his many questions about performance, authenticity, honesty, morality, etc. What makes it onto the pages of his novels is so sharp and enduring that I find myself constantly in awe.

This biography seemed well-done, and I loved what I learned—exiting with even more appreciation.

For fans of:

Just Kids by Patti Smith; Figuring by Maria Popova; East of Eden (obviously) by John Steinbeck; etc.