The Trifle of Standard Usage

After much consideration, I picked up Journal of a Novel: The East of Eden Letters. (Steinbeck never disappoints.) The text is a posthumous collection of letters Steinbeck wrote to his editor every day he worked on Eden. It's raw Steinbeck—typed from his handwritten letters long after his death, and unrevised.

The publisher's note, however, states that there are a few corrections in spelling and the like: "Steinbeck was normally permissive with his editors on such points, though he strongly resisted what he called 'collaboration' on more important matters." There is a footnote that elaborates on the nature of those corrections:

Although Steinbeck's spelling in general was exceptionally good, he consistently spelled the word "rhythm" without the first "h"; usually inserted an apostrophe in the possessive pronoun "its" while omitting it from the contraction "it's"; omitted the apostrophe from "the day's work" and the like; tended to make two words of such compounds as "background" and wrote "of course" as if it were one. Only changes of this very minor order have been made here.

In the great shadow of East of Eden, its and it's is indeed very minor. But as a teacher of writing, my mind stalled on these minor points. That one of the greatest American authors couldn't be bothered to use an apostrophe correctly gave me pause. The American canon has no finer text than East of Eden, paradoxically simple yet complex, universal yet personal.

It's difficult to believe that Steinbeck was ever sloppy in his writing and thus relied on his editor to clean up his proverbial mess. His letters not only have remarkable grammatical correctness (far beyond the trifle of its and it's), but they also employ a level of diction and variety of syntax that suggest Steinbeck's raw is rather refined.

My devotion to Steinbeck is so strong, I find myself questioning the absolute value of standard usage. I doubt I would forgive a lesser writer for lacking such knowledge of his language; in fact, I'm sure I wouldn't. But good grammar does not a good writer make, and perhaps visa versa.