When journalist Bill Steigerwald set out to follow John Steinbeck’s route in “Travels with Charley in Search of America,” he did it as a kind of tribute to the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer.
Fifty years after the first publication of “Travels with Charley,” Mr. Steigerwald said, “I simply wanted to go exactly where Steinbeck went in 1960, to see what he saw on the Steinbeck Highway, and then to write a book about the way America has and has not changed in the last 50 years.”
He didn’t find what he set out to find. After nine months and more than 11,000 miles, Mr. Steigerwald conclusively determined that “Travels With Charley” is “not just full of fiction; it’s also a dishonest account of [Steinbeck’s] iconic journey and what he really thought about America.”
That’s disappointing, isn’t it?
I first read about this in A Reality Check for Steinbeck and Charley in last Sunday’s New York Times, and I felt incredibly let down, even kind of heart-broken about it. “Travels with Charley” meant something to me. When I first read it, I believed I was reading a true story by and about Steinbeck who wanted to see his country a final time before dying.
I knew it was written by Steinbeck, a fiction writer, and I knew some of it came off as a little too perfect to be completely true, but to find out that it’s mostly fabrication just felt wrong.
It felt so wrong I had to research further. I never heard of Bill Steigerwald. For all I knew he was some kind of publicity seeking conspiracy theorist who found his magic bullet in “Travels with Charley.” After reading his blog, Travels without Charley, in particular the post announcing his trip, I knew that wasn’t the case. His early posts are so filled with excitement about the road ahead of him, it’s hard not to be taken with the sincerity of it. But I held on to my skepticism because I was, after all, exploring dishonesty in writing. As I read later posts and all the details, it became clear that Mr. Steigerwald was documenting facts. Facts, not fiction.
James Frey’s false memoir, “A Million Little Pieces” and the whole Oprah incident comes to mind, but that doesn’t begin to compare with this. Who’s James Frey, right?
This is John Steinbeck. “Of Mice and Men” Steinbeck. “Grapes of Wrath” Steinbeck. “East of Eden” Steinbeck! If “Travels with Charley” was fiction, it should have been labeled and sold as fiction. That it wasn’t, diminishes John Steinbeck. At least it does for me.
When asked about the authenticity of characters, Susan Shillinglaw, scholar in residence at the National Steinbeck Center in Salinas, California, said, “Does it really matter that much?”
Ignoring the astonishing arrogance of that response, I will volunteer an answer to the rhetorical question. The answer is yes. It really does matter that much.
It’s a question of trust and the integrity of words.
Steinbeck knew it, too. He said so himself in the final words of his Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech in 1962.
“Having taken God-like power, we must seek in ourselves for the responsibility and the wisdom we once prayed some deity might have. Man himself has become our greatest hazard and our only hope. So that today, saint John the Apostle may well be paraphrased: In the end is the word, and the word is man, and the word is with man.”
Away with Words 
Oh! Heartbreaking news Olivia! I too am a big Steinbeck fan and to hear Travels with Charley is….not….it makes me want to cry. But, it can’t change my opinion of Steinbeck’s writing. The man was simply too brilliant to allow that.
Great post, disillusioning news. It certainly does affect my opinion and memory of Steinbeck, even if the truth is so cynically dismissed by the “scholar.” Somewhere in my memory there was a satirical poem about scholars, and some research revealed that it was by Yeats and included this line: “all think what other people think” which is probably why most academics simply footnote what they have heard somewhere and don’t have the guts to revise false history, or yell “fake!” which is certainly what ought to be done in this case.
A beautiful column — smart, perceptive, honest. Not surprisingly, I agree with every word. It is the best reaction to what I have found out about “TWC”/Steinbeck’s trip that I have seen. Thank you very much.
[I made a similar comment on Mr. Steigerwald’s facebook posting]:
Though much of Travels with Charley is a fabrication, it meant (to me at least) a whole lot more than just a story about some guy who got in a truck and drove across the country. It has been mentioned, but he was indeed a fiction writer. And of course he didn’t see all of the country, nobody would be able to do that. But what he did do was show how a rash idea could turn into an adventure of sorts, one that would inevitably lead to self-reflection.
I knew the events weren’t real, and yes he should not have listed it as non-fiction. But my views of Steinbeck will never change because the book inspired me to take a similar trip. I cashed in my retirement (I’m 31), bought a van, and drove in a very similar loop over 60 days. I had never needed anything more. My life is better for it.
Thank you, Mr. Steinbeck.