In September 1960, John Steinbeck embarked on a journey across America. He felt that he might have lost touch with the country, with its speech, the smell of its grass and trees, its color and quality of light, the pulse of its people.
To reassure himself, he set out on a voyage of rediscovery of the American identity, accompanied by a distinguished French poodle named Charley; and riding in a three-quarter-ton pickup truck named Rocinante. (Don Quixote's horse's name, and must be the source of the name for the spaceship in the tv show The Expanse)
His course took him through almost forty states: northward from Long Island to Maine; through the Midwest to Chicago; onward by way of Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana (with which he fell in love), and Idaho to Seattle, south to San Francisco and his birthplace, Salinas; eastward through the Mojave, New Mexico, Arizona, to the vast hospitality of Texas, to New Orleans and a shocking drama of desegregation; finally, on the last leg, through Alabama, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey to New York.
Steinbeck wrote that he was moved by a desire to see his country because he made his living writing about it. He wrote of having many questions going into his journey, the main one being "What are Americans like today?" However, he found that he had concerns about much of the "new America" he saw.
According to Thom Steinbeck, the author's oldest son, the reason for the trip was that Steinbeck knew he was dying and wanted to see his country one last time. The younger Steinbeck has said he was surprised that his stepmother allowed his father to make the trip; his heart condition meant he could have died at any time.
Steinbeck was almost never alone on his trip. Out of 75 days away from New York, he traveled with, stayed with, and slept with his beloved wife, Elaine, for 45 days.
On 17 other days he stayed at motels and busy truck stops and trailer courts, or parked his camper on the property of friends.
With Elaine he stayed at some of the country's top hotels, motels, and resorts, not to mention two weeks at the Steinbeck family cottage in Pacific Grove, California, and a week at a Texas cattle ranch for millionaires.
Based on research on Steinbeck's travels, the book is not non-fiction as it was marketed, as it was not a solo journey with the dog. So, that was possibly deliberately misleading, for reasons known only to Steinbeck, but, he won the Nobel Prize for Literature months later.
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