The winter of our discontent

 
 
Literary heritage of J. Steinbeck and his novel 
“The Winter of Our Discontent” 
 
The literary heritage of the well-known American writer John Steinbeck is 
voluminous and versatile. One of his critics gives an accurate characterization of this 
versatility: 
“
Like America itself, his work is a vast, fascinating, paradoxical universe: 
a brash experiment in democracy; a naïve quest for understanding at the 
level of the common man; a celebration of goodness and innocence; a 
display of chaos, violence, corruption and decadence
” (Watt, 1962: 2). 
Another critic (Wilson, 1951: 36) remarks about Steinbeck's versatility that 
“when his curtain goes up,he always puts on a different kind of show”. 
Steinbeck wrote in various fictional modes. His works include, for example, 
historical romance (“Cup of Gold”), myth (“To a God Unknown”) ,ironic realism 
(“The Pastures of Heaven”), mock- heroic (“Tortilla Flat”), a kind of folk epic (“The 
Grapes of Wrath”), parable (“The Pearl”) and farce (“The Short Reign of Pippin the 
Fourth”). “The Winter of Our Discontent”
 
is Steinbeck's last novel. It was published 
in 1961. Critics argue that this book generalizes Steinbeck's impressions of America 
and Americans after his returning home from Britain in 1959. It is also the 
embodiment of the author's deep concern over the moral health of his compatriots 
and the spread of violence, cruelty and hypocrisy among them. In one of the letters 
to his friends Steinbeck (Steinbeck and Wallsten, 1975: 651) described the above-

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mentioned phenomena as “symptoms of a general immorality which pervades every 
level of our national life”. 
This novel elicited controversial responses from the critics. They 
characterized the book as timely and perceptive, but lacking the familiar California 
locale and revealing various flaws (McCarthy, 1980). One of the critics analysed 
“The Winter of Our Discontent” along with other works by J. Steinbeck in the light 
of writer's 'non-teleological' approach to life. This means that Steinbeck is more 
interested in the 'as is' of our existence than in 'why'. As he himself explains: 
“There are ample difficulties even to understanding the conditions 'as is'. 
Once that has been accomplished, the 'why' of it (known now to be simply 
a relation, though probably a near and important one) seems no longer to 
be preponderantly important. It needn't be condoned or extenuated. It just 
'is'. It is seen merely as part of a more or less dim whole picture”
(Steinbeck, 1975: 146). 
The critics' analysis ended in some rather debatable conclusions about 
Steinbeck's disbelief in social progress and his failure to give the whole picture of 
life in his works. But pointing out the novel's “awkward and obtrusive symbolism, 
an unsatisfactorily-resolved mixture of moods, an unconvincing з plot blending 
fantasy and realism”, the critics (Watt, 1962: 102–103) nevertheless perceived “a 
new troubled, unchannelled power beneath its smooth surfaces ...”. 
In spite of the disparity in critics' opinions, the Nobel committee cited “The 
Winter of Our Discontent” among those literary works for which Steinbeck was 
awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. This novel definitely has its virtues and 
provides a lot of material for linguo-stylistic analysis.