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John Steinbeck's Career and Books

Of Mice and Men

Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men was the most frequently banned books in the 1990s. The original working title for Of Mice and Men was "Something that Happened," to reflect the theme that that sometimes things happen that simply show the way life is.

Left alone one night, Steinbeck's new puppy, Toby, ate the original manuscript of Of Mice and Men after Steinbeck was about half finished with the novel. "I was pretty mad, but the poor little fellow may have been acting critically," he wrote his agent.