Steinbeck manuscript goes unsold at Pacific Book Auction Gallery
Sweet Thursday proved to be not-so-sweet for the owner of the 490 handwritten pages of a draft of Sweet Thursday, Steinbeck’s sequel to Cannery Row. Thursday seemed a double whammy for manuscript owner Twyla Martin, a Los Angeles wedding dress designer, and widow of Ernest Martin, a theatrical producer and long-time friend of the California born Steinbeck. The manuscript failed to achieve an opening bid of $300,000 in the Pacific Book Auction Gallery sale ironically last Thursday, May 24th.
The manuscript was discovered in a box in a closet three years ago, where it had spent the last 50 years or so. Also in the carton were copies of Steinbeck letters and an original manuscript for The Log from the Sea of Cortez, an unpublished short story. The Sea of Cortez manuscript brought $80,000- $50,000 more than the opening bid.
The sale that had been touted as “picture window into the mind and soul of John Steinbeck” fell flat, but the owner wasn’t completely disappointed. “For me, I didn’t know I had anything to begin with,” Martin said. A buyer may come forward, she says, or she may donate the 490 handwritten and 113 typed manuscript pages to the National Steinbeck Center, The Library of Congress, or UCLA.
