According to his biographer
Jay Parini and the New York Times, Steinbeck
in the mid-1990s was the most popular deceased American writer, with
750,00 copies of his works selling annually. His popularity has not
diminished over the years but has rather increased, particularly after
Oprah Winfrey made his "East of Eden" the first selection of her revived book
club in 2003. The book immediately became the #2 bestseller on
amazon.com, and Steinbeck's publisher, Penguin Group USA, printed
600,000 new copies. Normally, the book sells fewer than 50,000 copies
annually. It is a remarkable phenomenon considering that the book
originally was a #1 best seller when it was published in 1952!.