John Steinbeck's philosophical ideas, which he often explored in his novels, wrestled with the role of the individual and the power of community.

John Steinbeck spent 6 years studying at Stanford, but never earned a degree.

Watch writer John Steinbeck's Nobel Prize acceptance speech.

John Steinbeck's 'Sea of Cortez,' a travelogue through the Gulf of California, is still used by ecologists today.

The FBI investigated John Steinbeck, believing he might be a communist.

John Steinbeck often drew a pig with wings next to his signature, a character he affectionately called 'Pigasus.'

Existentialist literature explores the philosophy's ideas

Existentialism isn’t confined to philosophical texts. Some of the movement’s figureheads, like Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre, were also novelists. Christina Howells, Professor of French at the University of Oxford, suggests this is because existentialism, as a philosophy, requires human stories to be fully understood, and literature makes the experience of the human condition more present and immediate.

Steinbeck's novel 'The Grapes of Wrath' was inspired by a series of newspaper reports he wrote about migrant farm workers.

A beginner's guide to the books of John Steinbeck, one of America's great novelists.

The first draft of the classic American novel 'Of Mice and Men' was torn to shreds by John Steinbeck's dog.

An academic on why the animals in 'Animal Farm' matter

Although Orwell intentionally wrote his 1945 novella as an allegory of the Russian Revolution, Charlotte Sleigh—an associate professor of science and technology—argues that the text can also be used to understand (and complicate) our relationship with the nonhuman world.

The political theory of Henry David Thoreau

The two years, two months, and two days that Thoreau spent living in a modest cabin at Walden Pond informed his beliefs that people should live simply, deliberately, and become self-reliant. Those beliefs were later articulated, in a political sense, in his landmark essay, "Civil Disobedience."

Joan Didion's 1975 commencement speech at UCR encouraged graduates to think outside of themselves

Filled with many widely circulated quotes, the talk addresses people's tendency to focus only on their personal ideologies and perceptions of the world. Didion advocates for being an active participant in the world, rather than existing only in our own bubbles.

Why one runner believes Stoic philosophy is important for marathoners

There's plenty of time for thinking while training for a marathon, and Matt Fitzgerald suggests it'd be wise to study the Stoic philosophers to navigate the many frustrations that come with that training. Fitzgerald may be talking about running, but his advice can apply to any seemingly impossible goal.

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

Before Dawkins, other biologists proposed the power of mutating ideas

Nobel Prize winner Jacques Monod proposed, “Ideas have retained some of the properties of organisms. Like them, they tend to perpetuate their structure and to breed; they too can fuse, recombine, segregate their content; indeed they too can evolve, and in this evolution selection must surely play an important role.”

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

'My model for business is The Beatles: They were four guys that kept each others' negative tendencies in check; they balanced each other. And the total was greater than the sum of the parts.'

-Apple co-founder Steve Jobs (1955-2011)

How to bridge political divides

Can people who believe in opposing ultimate views of the world really live in peace together? That's a core requirement of individuals living in pluralistic societies. Law professor Samar Ali and public affairs strategist Clint Brewer don't agree on much, but they're great friends. In this TED Talk, the two share why political polarization in the US isn’t as intractable as we might think. Learn some tips for getting along in the free world here.

Hear Carl Sagan reflect on the smallness of humanity

The Beat Generation inspired significant parts of 1960s counterculture

The Beat Generation championed the transformative power of psychedelics, rebelled against the post-war social order, and called for more radical politics. With a strong foothold in San Francisco, it's no surprise these themes were carried over to the city's 1960s counterculture, informing the larger national hippie movement.

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well

In today's society, SpongeBob's life as a single man, line cook, and town fool may not seem appealing. But SpongeBob is perhaps the happiest creature in Bikini Bottom, because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

What we can learn from animal societies' ethics

The free will versus determinism debate: major thinkers weigh in

Do we have free will in our actions or are we totally determined? An all-star cast of contemporary thinkers share insights on the crucial debate.

Carl Jung proposed the controversial idea of the 'collective unconscious'

The famed psychologist proposed the idea in 1916, referring to a hypothetical universal part of the unconscious mind shared by all humans. It contains innate elements called archetypes—such as the Hero, the Mother, or the Shadow—that shape human behavior, dreams, and myths across cultures.

Rockwell worked with psychoanalyst Erik Erikson

In 1953, the painter and his family moved to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, to be closer to the Austen Riggs Center, where his wife was undergoing treatment for alcoholism and depression. Rockwell began treatment, too, working with Erikson—famous for coining the term “identity crisis”—on his anxieties about his art.

Shakespeare’s storytelling uses intricate, intertwining narratives

According to one professor, readers return to Shakespeare’s plays, not for his storylines, but to learn how things unfold. In the process, they often use his plays to understand why humans act the way they do.

How American politics influenced 'Star Wars'

George Lucas believed that myths were how societies communicated notions of good and evil, and that modern myths were found on movie screens. This deep dive from the Los Angeles Review of Books explores how Lucas' disillusionment with the Vietnam War and his disgust with President Richard Nixon informed some of the themes in "Star Wars."

After NASA's Voyager 1 captured Earth as a single pixel as it left the solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan used the image to reflect on humanity's fragility and the responsibility to protect 'the only world we've ever known.'

American short story writer Flannery O'Connor raised 40 peacocks, which became potent symbols for her fiction's elegant violence

A researcher recently discovered an interview from 1967 between groundbreaking journalist Joan Didion and the Grateful Dead, years before the band became an institution.

Before writing 'Walden,' transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau nearly burned down his hometown with a campfire that grew out of control.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

Salvador Dalí believed he was his own dead brother, who had died nine months before he was born

Explore a list of the 100 best novels of all time, compiled by some of the world's best living writers, including Salman Rushdie, Stephen King, and Jennifer Egan.

The first robot in literature may have been a 'mechanical man' in 1907's 'Ozma of Oz,' a book in L Frank Baum's 'Wizard of Oz' series.

Read a deep dive on the 'all-purpose healing' peptide BPC-157.

The rivalry between Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson centered on federalism—the question of how much power the federal government should hold relative to the states.

The Dracula character, now seen as the vampire archetype, was inspired by a seafood-induced nightmare its creator experienced.

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

How Amazon operates a 'flywheel' business model, a self-reinforcing cycle that drives continuous growth

In 1939, baseball star Lou Gehrig delivered his inspirational 'Luckiest Man' speech after retiring due to the health condition that now bears his name.

In 2018, 26-year-old missionary John Allen Chau was killed by tribesmen after attempting to reach and evangelize on India's isolated North Sentinel Island

Indefinite cloning of some endangered species may not sustain their longevity because cloning success rates decrease as genetic mutations accumulate.

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.

Chaos theory—informally known as the butterfly effect—is the reason why weather forecasts are presented with probabilities rather than certainties.

Lesser-known phobias include turophobia, or the fear of cheese, and nomophobia, the fear of being without your cell phone.

The use of fungi to detoxify land and water—a process known as mycoremediation—has been used to clean up natural resources affected by the 2025 California wildfires.