I reread Of Mice and Men, and this time the pages blazed in my hands. Suddenly it was an illuminated manuscript. The migrant labourers wandering the spoiled earth of the American dustbowl were ...

John Steinbeck. | Hulton Deutsch/GettyImages. Although he was a Stanford University graduate and had published five books by the time he wrote Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck had more in common with ...