academic conference i ever attended was here on nantucket when susan beagle and west tiffany who used to be at the umass field station organized a steinbeck and the environment conference and i delivered a paper on steinbeck s last novel the winter of our discontent by that time steinbeck. we all associate him with california and great to breath had settled in sag harbor a whaling port. old whaling port in long island and the winter of discontent is about that town meeting the challenges of development of historic town, you know dealing with all that and it s it just resonated and i got into you know, steinbeck s connection to moby - steinbeck was on nantucket in 1951 for the centennial celebration of moby -. he wrote to his editor. i have never been in a place with so much energy. he would write a significant portion of east of eden while out at sanctity. he was good friends with a bench lease and you know, yeah all this kind of thing and so, you know, so when he was back an