An overview of Steinbeck’s critical reputation that reasseses negative claims that Steinbeck is a middlebrow writer whose work is marked by unself-conscious nostalgia and sentimentalism. Turning to examples from The Grapes of Wrath and The Long Valley, the introduction argues that Steinbeck is a complex, varied, and experimental writer whose work is marked by metafiction and provocative contradiction that make it capable of unpacking and critically reexamining the very “faults” of which it is accused. Against claims that Steinbeck’s value lies in the past, I outline the many ways that his work is of urgent relevance today.