Nothing good gets away

John Steinbeck writes to his lovesick teenage son

Elaine and John Steinbeck, 1962. Photo: Bettmann/Getty.

Born in California in 1902, John Steinbeck remains a giant in the world of fiction thanks to his classic novels The Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden and Of Mice and Men. Additionally, when he reached sixty, his standing was further cemented when he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, an honour…