Travels with Charley: In Search of America (1962)

“I saw in their eyes something I was to see over and over in every part of the nation- a burning desire to go, to move, to get under way, anyplace, away from any Here. They spoke quietly of how they wanted to go someday, to move about, free and unanchored, not toward something but away from something. I saw this look and heard this yearning everywhere in every state I visited. Nearly every American hungers to move.”



Around the year in 52 books challenge notes:
#40. A book with a place name in the title ( )

[Audiobook version]

I listened to the audiobook narrated by Gary Sinise which was amazing. If you can I highly recommend getting an audio copy.

Travels with Charley is a glimpse into an America that was. It is about America when it was passing out of the 'good old days' into a present were we are forced to recognize its flaws and shortcomings, as well as it greatness. And a reminder that more times change, the more they stay the same.

I will note I had originally rated this 5 stars until I learned Steinbeck had made up elements of his journey. As I know it is no longer a work of whole non-fiction, I have to drown grade it for presenting itself as otherwise.

There were two specific sections of this book that haunt me monsters after reading it. The first (and likely the one for most) are the 'cheerleaders' in New Orleans; crowds of white women (and men) scream invectives at black children and the parents of white children who defied segregationists. Reading it two years after the 'Unite the Right' Charlottesville madness of white supremacists standing in front of a synagogue screaming 'jews will not replace us' is chilling reminder that we as a people have not moved nearly as far as we like to think we have.

The second section that I cannot shake is where Steinbeck talks to the couples who renovate buses into homes, live out of RVs and talk about how wonderful mobile homes are. This piece resonated deeply with me because days before I hard read that section I had heard a new report on the radio about the rising numbers of millenials deciding to live in vans, converted buses, RVs and the like. They people they inview that were remarkably similar to what those couples gave in the 1960s.

Likely there are sections that will resonate with you that did not for me because of differing backgrounds. I highly recommend you pick book, you'll see how much America has changed and how much it has stayed the same. ( )

I really liked this narrative of John Steinbeck's 3 month long trip across America in 1960 to see and talk to Americans. There is so much in here but what strikes me is his honesty about himself. He is oh-so-human and he puts that down in words.

The beginning of the journey is so funny. He is very deadpan so you can miss the funny at times. I had to re-read paragraphs at times just to fully absorb the humor. He comes across as a likeable guy and of course we love Charley.

In the middle of the book, crossing the desert, he seems to sink into a bit of a funk that he never appears to come out of. He waxes philosophical (yes, that's very cliche) as he traverses the Mojave.

Then the end. The South. 1960. Being as I'm not from the South, these are things I have only read about or seen in movies. There's a sense of OMG and sheer horror as he describes his sojourn there.

Three months was a bit too long for a solitary road trip but I'm glad he and Charley went and that he left a record of it. Much food for thought here. ( )

Autobiographical

5722. Travels with Charley In Search of America, by John Steinbeck (read 3 Dec 2020) This is the 10th Steinbeck book I have read. Steinbeck was born in Salinas, Cal, in 1902, when the population of Salinas was less than 4000, when he died it was about 80,000, and now it is some 180,000. This book, published first in 1962, tells of a trip Steinbeck made in 1960 with his dog Charley from his home in New York, up into New England and then through Buffalo, Pennsylvania, Ohio, through Wisconsin, Minnesota (where he made a point of going to Sauk Center, made famous by Sinclair Lewis's Main Street), then to Montana, the Pacific Northwest, down to California, Texas, Louisiana, and through the South and essentially ends his commentary in Virginia , and drives back to his New York home. He tells of his adventures and troubles, (Charley gets sick, twice, and he has trouble with the tires on his vehicle, etc. Probably the most interesting event is when in the South hehe sees some women screaming at a little Negro girl who goes to a school and at a white father who takes his daughter to the school which is ending its segregation. After that he picks up a white guy and they get to talking and the guy he picks up lauds the screaming women and Steinbeck dumps him out of his truck and is berated as a n----- lover. The trip was in 1960--sixty years ago now and one sees progress in human relations which Steinbeck did not foresee. In retrospect, the book seems more interesting than I found it as I was reading it. ( )