John Steinbeck's 'Texas State of Mind'

March 31, 2020

from

"Texas is a State of Mind – How the Famed Quote by John Steinbeck Came to Be"

by Spring Sault for Texas Hill Country, August 2017

“Travels with Charley: In Search of America” was written by U.S. author John Steinbeck as a travelogue on a 1960 road trip throughout America made by him and his standard poodle, Charley. The author wrote the book upon realizing he had a desire to see his country face-to-face, so-to-speak. Considering he made a living writing about it, he wanted to experience it on a personal level. He referred to having a number of questions at the outset of his travels, chief being “What are Americans like today?” But, he discovered that he had worries about what he referred to as the “new America” he perceived. Yet from it, he gleaned a great sense of national pride, not the least of which was found in Texas, on which he wrote the famed quote, “Texas is a state mind. Texas is an obsession. Above all, Texas is a nation in every sense of the word.”

Steinbeck told of his travels through America in a camper that was specially made for this trip, which he aptly named Rocinante, for Don Quixote’s horse (from the classic novel by Miguel de Cervantes). His journey commenced in...

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