Travels with Charley in Search of America
By: John Steinbeck / Narrated By: Gary Sinise
Length: 7 hrs and 58 mins
Wonderful Charley, wonderful stories. But the heartstopper is The South
Like, totally. Steinbeck and Charley’s tour of the South damn near made me sick. You’re going along, there are eccentric characters Steinbeck runs into, quaint ones, colorful ones, taciturn ones. So things are all happy and the book is a feel-good jaunt through America. Steinbeck waxes poetic about mobile homes; he deplores the use of plastics. We’re getting his thoughts and feelings about it ALL. But then:
A world so filled with fear and hate, I shuddered. Steinbeck captures the 60’s South as though it was a character in its own right.
But let’s leave that for a moment, shall we? Cuz Travels with Charley in Search of America is a brilliantly written work, and Steinbeck deserves every ounce of praise he’s received lauding his writing skills, his use of language and metaphor.
Writing? Great! Charley? Even better!
Charley has got to be one of the most laid-back dogs on the planet, sitting beside his buddy, Steinbeck, for days on end, meeting all sorts of people with much aplomb (Just don’t let him go near bears! “Laid-back” dog + Bears = Noisy, noisy, chaos!). And since I’m a bumpkin and am unfamiliar with most of Steinbeck’s books, I almost thought Charley was going to wind up dying at the end of the story. He gets so sick and all, whadda ya expect me to think?!? Plus, Charley’s the best icebreaker around.
And he’s witness to all that Steinbeck sees, and the listener of all Steinbeck muses… and Steinbeck muses A LOT. Whether he’s pondering the silence of men and waitresses, or he’s noting the garb of rich cattle ranchers, he’s telling stories. MANY stories, and all of them make for a terrific experience. He describes life as he knew it and life is it is “now” lived in 1960. Time changes everything.
Except for hatred. I don’t live in the South, so I can’t say what it’s like today. Perhaps it’s much, much better, I dunno? But the violence Steinbeck conveys, the willingness to do harm, especially as it pertained to a little mite of a girl just trying to go to school, seems to live on in some individuals to this day. That the book winds down with such images made Travels with Charley in Search of America a bit of a haunting experience.
I had to hit Wikipedia after I listened to it cuz, as we all know, if it’s in Wikipedia, it’s GOSPEL, and apparently there’s some hoopla about it being true. Some say it’s balderdash, including Steinbeck’s own son. I dunno; even if it’s fudged, it’s brilliant writing, and so much of it seems to be a universal experience: That looking back at the Old Days, what the world used to be like and how much better, how much worse it is now.
No matter what, coupled with Gary Sinise’s masterful narration, I very much enjoyed it as an audiobook. Sinise managed to make a MULTITUDE of people sound unique and true unto themselves. A young and audacious black man sounds completely different than an older black man who’s lived through the worst. An aging actor of the stage, unwilling to give up his secrets, sounds completely different from a man sitting in the diner, unwilling to answer in anything but monosyllabic grunts followed by complaints. Sinise also captures wonder, woe, and every sense of emotion in between.
Whether true or not, I truly enjoyed the audiobook.
Just be ready for the sucker punches in between charming anecdotes…
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