BIB_ID
270059
Accession number
MA 6426.22
Creator
Steinbeck, John, 1902-1968.
Display Date
[1938 May].
Credit line
Purchased on the John F. Fleming Fund, 2007.
Description
1 item (1 p.) ; 27.9 cm
Notes
Part of a collection of letters and telegrams primarily between John Steinbeck and Pare Lorentz.
Steinbeck is believed to have destroyed the manuscript of "L'affaire Lettuceberg" before beginning "The Grapes of Wrath," which he wrote between May and October, 1938.
The present item (MA 6426.22) was probably written in May 1938, before the 16th, based on its relationship to the related telegram (MA 6426.23) and also Steinbeck's reference to a forthcoming visit from Harold Clurman (a letter (MA 6426.26) from Clurman to Lorentz, mentioning his visit to Steinbeck, is dated June 1, 1938). The present item (MA 6426.22) also refers to a letter (MA 6426.18) from Lorentz to Steinbeck, dated April 9, 1938.
This letter was stapled to a telegram (MA 6426.23) from Pare Lorentz to John Steinbeck, dated May 16, 1938, which was cabled probably in response to MA 6426.22. When stapled, MA 6426.23 appeared as p. 1.
Steinbeck is believed to have destroyed the manuscript of "L'affaire Lettuceberg" before beginning "The Grapes of Wrath," which he wrote between May and October, 1938.
The present item (MA 6426.22) was probably written in May 1938, before the 16th, based on its relationship to the related telegram (MA 6426.23) and also Steinbeck's reference to a forthcoming visit from Harold Clurman (a letter (MA 6426.26) from Clurman to Lorentz, mentioning his visit to Steinbeck, is dated June 1, 1938). The present item (MA 6426.22) also refers to a letter (MA 6426.18) from Lorentz to Steinbeck, dated April 9, 1938.
This letter was stapled to a telegram (MA 6426.23) from Pare Lorentz to John Steinbeck, dated May 16, 1938, which was cabled probably in response to MA 6426.22. When stapled, MA 6426.23 appeared as p. 1.
Provenance
Sale (New York, Bonhams, 20 June 2007, lot 5233).
Summary
Concerning the delayed publication of his article ["Starvation Under The Orange Trees"], noting that the Simon Lubin Society never received any money, and wondering whether the article has been entirely dropped. Mentioning the completion of ["L'affaire Lettuceberg"]: "Just finished a little book. I don't know whether it is any good or not. Have to get to the rewriting. It has a job to do and I don't care if it isn't good literature. In fact I don't want it to be . . . It is a burlesque of strike breaking tactics told entirely from the employers viewpoint and tries to be funny. Probably is very sad. I don't know. That isn't for publication anyway because I may burn it up if it isn't good enough to be funny."
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