1. John Steinbeck and Of Mice and Men The Voice of the Migrant Experience

2. John Steinbeck - Biography Born 1902 in Salinas, California Gained a love of reading from his mother Worked on ranches and farms during his vacations from school King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table by Roger Lancelyn Green, reprinted 1955. Cover and illustrations by Lotte Reiniger. http://msdadmin.scican.net/mhs/mhs_area_imc/webquests/Mice%20and%20Men/index.htm

3. Education Attended Stanford University sporadically – Studied marine biology even though he loved to write. – Never graduated In the 1930s, Steinbeck met Edward Ricketts, a marine biologist. – Ricketts believed in the interdependence of all life forms

4. Early Writings Tortilla Flat – story about Mexican migrants, influenced by adventures of King Arthur – Made into a film in 1935 Dubious Battle – 1936 – migrant strikes The Red Pony – 1937 – semi-biographical novel Of Mice and Men – 1937 – first huge success The Grapes of Wrath – about a family of Okies who travel to California during the Dust Bowl – Attacked by the U.S. Government as a lie – Steinbeck won the Pulitzer prize for this novel – Made into a film in 1940

5. Other Writing Endeavors War correspondent for WWII Vietnam War reporter Received Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962 http://militaryanalysis.blogspot.com/2009/03/youth.html

6. The Dust Bowl and the Great Depression Took place in the 1930s in America. – Economic hardship – Dust Bowl: poor farming practices and severe drought brought about severe dust storms and agricultural damage Okies – families who migrated to other regions to work on more successful farms in order to survive A farmer and his two sons during a dust storm in Cimarron County, Oklahoma, 1936. Photo: Arthur Rothstein http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_BowlCimarron CountyOklahomaArthur Rothstein

7. Other Art of the 1930s – What is the first thing you notice about this picture? -What is the mood captured? -What statement do you think the artist is trying to make? -Dorothea Lang: photographer, Calif. & Federal Resettlement Administration Migrant Mother, 1936. Photographer: Dorothea Lange. http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://jmecelabblog.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/migrant- mother.jpg&imgrefurl=http://jmecelabblog.wordpress.com/2008/11/04/illegal-immigrants-at-work-meps-take-crucial- vote/&usg=__NsV3zj55rw6DgPSeB9FezYEO57o=&h=454&w=350&sz=28&hl=en&start=2&tbnid=pp8fFhZWVyj59M:&tbnh=128&tbnw=99&pr ev=/images%3Fq%3Dmigrant%2Bmother%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Dactive%26sa%3DG

8. Woody Guthries Dust Bowl Refugee I'm a dust bowl refugee, Just a dust bowl refugee, From that dust bowl to the peach bowl, Now that peach fuzz is a-killin' me. 'Cross the mountains to the sea, Come the wife and kids and me. It's a hot old dusty highway For a dust bowl refugee. Hard, it's always been that way, Here today and on our way Down that mountain, 'cross the desert, Just a dust bowl refugee. We are ramblers, so they say, We are only here today, Then we travel with the seasons, We're the dust bowl refugees. From the south land and the drought land, Come the wife and kids and me, And this old world is a hard world For a dust bowl refugee. Yes, we ramble and we roam And the highway that's our home, It's a never-ending highway For a dust bowl refugee. Yes, we wander and we work In your crops and in your fruit, Like the whirlwinds on the desert That's the dust bowl refugees. I'm a dust bowl refugee, I'm a dust bowl refugee, And I wonder will I always Be a dust bowl refugee? http://www.metrolyrics.com/dust-bowl-refugee-lyrics-woody-guthrie.html

9. Of Mice and Men Depicts life of migrant workers Setting: Soledad, CA, in the 1930s.

10. Excerpt from John Steinbeck's Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech Literature is as old as speech. It grew out of human need for it and it has not changed except to become more needed....the writer is delegated to declare and to celebrate man's proven capacity for greatness of heart and spirit - for gallantry in defeat, for courage, compassion and love. - 1962 What do you think Steinbeck is trying to tell his audience through Of Mice and Men?