#1667 Lunch With America’s Leading Steinbeck Scholar

Listening to America

History, Politics, Unitedstates, Society & Culture, American

4.6 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 1 September 2025

⏱️ 51 minutes

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Summary

Clay and his friend Russ Eagle interview Robert DeMott, one of the greatest living Steinbeck scholars, at his fishing cabin on the Madison River, south of Bozeman, Montana. DeMott is the author of three important studies of Steinbeck’s novels, the editor of the journal he kept while writing his classic, The Grapes of Wrath, and also the editor of the four-volume Library of America edition of Steinbeck’s work. Russ Eagle has been enamored of Steinbeck for decades, particularly his 1945 novella Cannery Row. Dr. DeMott was incredibly generous with his time and his insights into Steinbeck. An avid fly fisherman, DeMott spends five or six weeks each summer in Montana’s Madison River valley, where we met up with him. DeMott regards the Grapes of Wrath as a top-five American novel, and Cannery Row, though underappreciated, is nearly as great. Over sodas and sandwiches, we had the honor of listening to one of America’s most significant literary critics. This episode was recorded on August 1, 2025.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome listeners to this episode of listening to America with Clay Jenkins.
0:08.5	My name is Nolan Johnson. I am the producer and editor of the program. On today's show,
0:13.8	we have a special lunch table conversation with Professor Robert DeMott, one of the leading
0:19.8	experts and Steinbeck scholars.
0:22.6	Clay and Russ Eagle got to sit down while they were fly fishing in Montana while Clay is out on the Lewis and Clark Trail
0:29.6	for this special discussion where they learned about Professor DeMott's early education,
0:34.6	what got him into Steinbeck originally, and even got him to pick
0:39.3	his favorite of the novels by John Steinbeck.
0:42.3	We pick up this conversation as they were talking about his early days in college, headed
0:47.3	down the road of becoming a Steinbeck scholar.
0:50.3	I went to Assumption College.
0:52.3	It's now Assumption University, and it was strongly indebted to the Kennedy family.
0:59.0	So the death of JFK was particularly meaningful for us because his family was heavily endowed in our college.
1:09.0	I know you're a literature scholar, but you're also a humanity scholar, but not a formal
1:15.1	historian.
1:16.1	How pivotal do you think the Kennedy assassination is in American life?
1:20.6	I mean, some people say it's the loss of innocence.
1:22.6	I agree with that.
1:24.6	I think that's absolutely true.
1:26.6	He had his flaws, and those have come out, certainly in the past.
1:30.4	But there was something about an optimistic worldview that he represented, I think, that was profound from my generation.
1:41.0	You know, I mean, I was just out of high school for a couple of years of college,
	...

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