Read as a teen and enjoyed reading about different parts of the US

I read this book in my youth 50 years ago and remembered nothing (no surprise, since I forget books I read last week) except that I loved it. So I thought I'd try it again.

The trip was as much his inner musings as his travel experiences, which was fine. His details about places and people were rich and interesting, though I yearned for more. His comments on the urban/suburban sprawl were an interesting history from 1960 and could have been written today, except that it's much worse now.

Throughout the book, I vacillated between 4 stars and 5, but the latter part in New Orleans was so engaging, I landed on 5 stars. New Orleans is an important city to me as my grandmother was a light-skinned mullatto in that city, born and raised. But she left in the 1920s and passed for white, so she had no experience with the civil rights movement. Still, the city is part of my roots and close to my heart, and what he witnessed there in 1960 was disturbing.

I really felt the ending when his trip was done and he was still not home... I know that feeling of burnout from my own long trips, and really felt his eagerness for home. And I enjoyed the humor he left the reader with.

Very recommended! ( )

My disclaimers about not reading fiction notwithstanding, I occasionally do, this one included. I'd just finished Jack Kerouac's non fiction "On the Road", my second reading, and was hungry for another road book. You can't go wrong with Steinbeck and Charley and I wasn't disappointed. ( )

John Steinbeck writes brilliant fiction, but this was my first foray into his nonfiction. I am pleased to say that Travels With Charley is just as well written and topical for today as it was written it was written in 1960.

It’s an older Steinbeck who decides to travel America coast to coast and back again to see what the country is like now. He feels a bit out of touch with what the American people are thinking and takes his ute with a caravan on the back and his dog Charley on a trip. He aims to stay off the huge highways and away from the big cities, exploring the back roads and talking with everyday people. Of course, sometimes he deviates (for example when he’s just wanting to get home or when Charley is ill) and sometimes he stays in highway motels. What Steinbeck aims to do is to take the temperature of America politically and culturally. He somewhat succeeds, finding that the differences between the states is becoming less and less from news to accents. The people are generally becoming a homogenous mix and the radio and newspapers state the same thing. But he perseveres and meets some interesting characters, with views that vary from the old to the modern. His descriptions of the landscape are phenomenal and his joy in finding out that Wisconsin is the cheese state would bring joy to anyone’s face! (As an Australian, I did not know that).

Steinbeck arrives in his old stomping ground in California and the mood turns melancholy. Everyone is older, some friends are no longer around and things have changes but in Steinbeck’s head, they are still as they were during his youth. It’s there that the narrative and the author are ready for home and the familiarity that goes with it. He moves on to Texas and Thanksgiving with his wife and friends (I have no idea if his comments about the state have truth to them, but they are amusing at times). He then travels to New Orleans to see for himself the ‘cheerleaders’ – women who yell abuse at the desegregation of schools and the Black children who attend. It’s a sobering experience for both Steinbeck and the reader and the book closes relatively quickly after that.

I feel that Steinbeck’s writing captures the issues of today just as well as those of yesteryear. People are over politics, full of hate or genuinely trying to do their best in a world that is change. His writing is just as eloquent in Travels With Charley as in his novels, capturing the mood and painting the scene clearly as if it was the modern era. It’s full of wit but also doesn’t sugarcoat the country’s problems. I recommend it just as highly as Steinbeck’s novels.

http://samstillreading.wordpress.com ( )

Really enjoyed this travelogue narrated by the late, great Ron McLarty. Made a nice break from my regular fiction. Ya gotta like Steinbeck. Surprising how timely it is now since his trip took place in 1960. Recommended ( )