The book that he read as a child that had the most profound affect on his writing was Morte d"Arthur, by Malory. Steinbeck wrote for the school papers in Salinas and Stanford. He could never quite obtain a degree from Stanford but during the period of his sporadic efforts to obtain a degree he found a lot of action. He had many odd jobs. He worked as a ranch hand, joined a road-building gang, worked in a sugar beat factory, and even helped in the construction of Madison Square Garden.
After a couple more tries at getting some his work published Steinbeck returned to California in order to write his first novel. He worked at a Lake Tahoe Lodge, because that meant he would have plenty of time to work on his writings. That is where he finished the historical epic Cup of Gold. This book never really had a chance because it was released only two months before the stock market crash.
Again Steinbeck sat down to begin writing a novel, but this time he would add a simple idea in it that would completely change his career. He made the setting of the book his boyhood home of the Salinas Valley. The Pastures of Heaven is widely known as one of his better California books, but the first two companies that tried to publish it fell under before they could make bound copy, but unbound copies were still in rotation. The book made more money than both his first and third novels neither of which made more than the two-hundred and fifty dollar cash advance from the publisher.
During this time Steinbeck met a person who changed him into a much more profound person. Ed Ricketts, an owner of a biological supply company in Monterey, just a couple miles north of Salinas. "Rickett's helped Steinbeck to start taking on more philosophical correlations in all of his works." (Magill, 1888) Rickett's was the hero in many of Steinbeck's books most notably, Doc in Cannery Row. He was always the first person to read Steinbeck's manuscripts and his opinion was held in Steinbeck's highest esteem.