John Steinbeck had already received critical acclaim for Of Mice and Men when, in 1938, he began to write The Grapes of Wrath.
Not one to rest on his laurels, the author was more driven than ever to create his best work. To that end, he kept what he called “the diary of a book,” later published as Working Days.
Full of dogged determination and inspiration, as well as stinging self-doubt and self-reproach, the diary reveals the creative process throughout the 100 days Steinbeck spent writing the novel. He constantly reminds himself to keep going, to write each day no matter what, and to accept doubt and forge onward. “I am sure of one thing — it isn’t the great book I had hoped it would be,” he wrote in the diary. “It’s just a run-of-the-mill book.”
He was wrong, of course. The Grapes of Wrath won a Pulitzer and earned Steinbeck the Nobel Prize.
