Was John Steinbeck acting as a CIA informant in Paris the summer he wrote the satirical short story for Le Figaro, published in English for the first time in the current issue of The Strand, about a haughty French chef and his hyper-finicky cat? That’s the question raised in a provocative Daily Beast piece by Christopher Dickey, the Daily Beast’s Paris-based world-news editor. Working his way to a firm maybe, Dickey quotes John Steinbeck’s contemporaneous correspondence with his New York agent, Elizabeth Otis, and Thom Steinbeck’s eye witness account—first cited by Brian Kannard in his 2013 book Steinbeck: Citizen Spy—of daily visits to the Steinbeck’s residence at 1 Avenue de Marigny by a man from the U.S. embassy with an attaché case. The son of a famous father, like Thom Steinbeck, Christopher Dickey is a frequent contributor to Foreign Affairs, Vanity Fair, The New York Times, MSNBC, CNN, France 24, BBC TV, and Al Jazeera.
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I read the book, Steinbeck Citizen Spy and found it very interesting. I wondered why this theory wasn’t mentioned elsewhere. After all, the presenter of television’s “The Gong Show” Chuck Barris claimed he too worked for the CIA. Such claims are almost impossible to support since the agency will neither deny or confirm such working arrangements. I suppose such is the nature of the spy game.
I suppose one may question why would such a secretive agency seek a working relationship with the American writer? I suspect they would for his international appeal. After all, he was granted free, courteous, and welcoming access throughout the normally distrusting Soviet Union as described in his “A Russian Journal”. Many Americans believe he was a communist because of his socially responsible bearing. He was a front-line war correspondent during World War II who landed with troops on the beaches of Sicily. Meanwhile the delusional American war hero, John Wayne was reportedly doing his best to avoid the draft.
From the early 1980s I was aware that the CIA used the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) during their new employee (or asset, LOL) hiring assessment. In the pseudo-acronym of MBTI he would have been an ISTP. I don’t know if they still use the instrument. Based upon my conclusion about Steinbeck’s psychological style, which is a level four Introverted Sensing Thinker who is able to coldly, without unconscious emotional influence or spin, (non-teleogical) observe and recall details that other styles would miss or ignore. A Steinbeck style spy would be my perfect choice. This is just my opinion.