John Steinbeck Proposal

The author I decided to write my American literature essay on is John Steinbeck. Steinbeck lived in California but moved to New York but moved back to California to start his life as a writer. His first couple of novels was memories that he had growing up In California. I chose this author because, back in 7th grade we read the book The Pearl but I didn’t really get a chance to read it since I didn’t want to read it and I was immature. I do regret not reading it because John Steinbeck is a well known author, he wrote twenty five books which include 16 novels six non fiction books, and a couple of short stories. He also won a Nobel prize. I think I have more respect for him then I did back in 7th grade. I read a little bit about his history and he seems like we went through a lot and earned a lot of respect and success. I noticed that he didn’t write like other authors did, he seemed to write fictional books but made it seem as if they were realistic. I didn’t know that he wrote books about characters that would struggle and later on his writing changed to subjects about politics and religion and history. Which I found interesting because he didn’t stick to one subject. His writing was great, from what I can remember, he detailed a lot of things like using similes and metaphors in the book The Pearl. Since its been a while, trying to remember his work I really don’t know what my argument is going to be about, I think ill figure it out when I start to get into his books. The books I think I would want to read would be of coarse The Pearl since I didn’t really get a chance to read it. I would also read Mice of Men and maybe read Grapes of Wrath. But I’m not entirely sure that I’ll read those books because he has more books that I can choose from, such as Travels with Charley. I’m highly thinking about that book also since it ties into “What is an American?” and its about him traveling with his dog to find what actually is it like to be an American and what was interesting about that was that it didn’t live up to his expectation. He did write a lot of short stories but I’m going to read about 3 or 4 of his books to get an understanding of how is his style of writing made him an important American author, and if he has a certain writing style.
Earlier I mention that he won the Nobel prize what I found interesting was when he won, he felt that he didn’t deserve it. His acceptance speech he said "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. In the endless war against weakness and despair, these are the bright rally flags of hope and of emulation. I hold that a writer who does not believe in the perfectibility of man has no dedication nor any membership in literature."
I think I chose an interesting author, its not because of his success and because he’s a well known author but because there has to be a reason to why his writing makes him so interesting, his books have a story to tell and from what I think his books have lessons or a point which makes them realistic.