Short answers, pulled from the story.
John Steinbeck was born on the 27th of February 1902 in Salinas, California. He grew up in a frontier settlement in a small rural valley set in fertile soil about 25 miles from the Pacific Coast.
Ed Ricketts was a marine biologist who became a close friend and mentor to John Steinbeck during the 1930s and 1940s. Ricketts taught Steinbeck about philosophy and biology, and his ecological thinking strongly influenced Steinbeck's writing and characters in novels like Cannery Row and The Grapes of Wrath.
John Steinbeck won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1962 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in September 1964. He also received the King Haakon VII Freedom Cross in 1945 for his literary contributions to the Norwegian resistance movement.
John Steinbeck died in New York City on the 20th of December 1968 during the 1968 flu pandemic. His death was caused by heart disease and congestive heart failure, with an autopsy showing nearly complete occlusion of the main coronary arteries.
The Grapes of Wrath was banned in August 1939 by the Kern County Board of Supervisors for its negative portrayal of capitalism and sympathy for workers. Of Mice and Men has been removed from English Literature GCSE syllabi in Wales and England due to concerns about racist language, and The Grapes of Wrath was banned in Mississippi in 2003 for profanity.