Travels with Charley in search of America

The Viking Press – New York, Steinbeck records his emotions and experiences during a journey of rediscovery in his native land – the USA. The John Steinbeck's best–known work of nonfiction, Travels with Charley, is in the list of the top travel books. It is about a man driving across the United States in a camper named after Don Quixote's horse in the company of a poodle named Charley. On the face of it, that doesn't sound like a work to be taken seriously. But "Travels with Charley" is no Marley & Me. The dog, for the most part, remains in the background, and the Salinas, California–bred Steinbeck trains his Nobel Prize–winning eye—he was awarded the Literature Prize the same year "Charley" was released—on what he believed to be a decaying America. Beginning in Long Island, New York, Steinbeck rolls to the west and, eventually, into the south, sticking to backroads and reflecting on life, politics and the places and people he meets along the way. In lesser hands, such a book could turn into a rambling mess. But Steinbeck, one of America's most treasured writers, holds it together. The result is a vivid snapshot of "this monster land" between two of its most significant and tragic events, World War II and the Vietnam War, as well as an engaging meditation on the power of travel.