4065

John Steinbeck

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:NA Estimated At:1,500.00 - 2,000.00 USD
John Steinbeck

Bidding Over

The auction is over for this lot.
The auctioneer wasn't accepting online bids for this lot.

Contact the auctioneer for information on the auction results.

Search for other lots to bid on...
Auction Date:2016 Feb 18 @ 18:00 (UTC-5 : EST/CDT)
Location:236 Commercial St., Suite 100, Boston, Massachusetts, 02109, United States
ALS - Autograph Letter Signed
ANS - Autograph Note Signed
AQS - Autograph Quotation Signed
AMQS - Autograph Musical Quotation Signed
DS - Document Signed
FDC - First Day Cover
Inscribed - “Personalized”
ISP - Inscribed Signed Photograph
LS - Letter Signed
SP - Signed Photograph
TLS - Typed Letter Signed
Handwritten poem, unsigned, one page, 8 x 12.5, no date. Steinbeck pens a sixteen-line poem, in full: “Gull-screaming rock, Sea lion rock / Save my loneliness / From the tip toe / Creeping Correct, / From mouse footed Certainty / From whispering Rightness / From stealthy Virtue. / Sea lion—black cormorant, / And you—seldom monster / From the under deep, / Ora pro michi! / Let me be gentle—useful even, / But let me, as a favor, / Let me be me, / Black cormorant.” In fine condition.

Poetry by Steinbeck is extremely scarce—he was a writer of fiction and non-fiction, exploring poetry only occasionally and in private. Although he did enjoy reading poetry, he once declined to judge a poetry contest because he felt ‘unqualified’ and seemingly never published any poetry during his lifetime. In The Paris Review’s Art of Fiction ‘interview’ with Steinbeck, posthumously compiled from his letters and diaries, one of his suggestions for overcoming writer’s block is: ‘Write poetry—not for selling—not even for seeing—poetry to throw away. For poetry is the mathematics of writing and closely kin to music.’