Review: <i>Riding Like the Wind: The Life of Sanora Babb</i>, by Iris Jamahl Dunkle

Writer Sanora Babb has been largely unknown among general readers and literary scholars. Clearly, Iris Jamahl Dunkle’s mission in writing this thoroughly researched biography is to draw Babb out of the shadows and introduce her work to a wider, more appreciative audience. Dunkle succeeds not only in telling Babb’s remarkable story but also in locating this extraordinary life in a vibrant twentieth-century milieu. Babb emerges as a writer and activist sharply attuned to the artistic and political currents of the times. Always on the go, she circulated among writers like Ralph Ellison, Ray Bradbury, William Saroyan, Meridel Le Seuer, John Fante, and John Steinbeck. The fraught relationship with Steinbeck is a dramatic element in Babb’s under-acknowledged reputation as a writer.Early on, Dunkle explains the genesis of her biographical project: her grandmother’s vivid recollections of growing up in the Oklahoma panhandle during the Dust Bowl era. Impressed by Steinbeck’s classic, The Grapes of Wrath, Dunkle mentioned the book to her grandmother—who retorted that “Steinbeck got it all wrong.” Dunkle was instructed “not to mention the book ever again” (2). She did not. But her grandmother’s claim that Steinbeck had failed to tell “the truth about the Dust Bowl” haunted her.This incident, coupled with discovering Sanora Babb’s 1930s novel, Whose Names Are Unknown, spurred Dunkle to investigate Babb’s life and writings. “Babb’s was a story that humanized the experiences of those who had suffered through the worst natural disaster the United States had ever faced,” Dunkle explains. Babb’s version, she suggests, aligned more closely with her grandmother’s Dust Bowl experiences. Reading the long-delayed publication of Babb’s truth-telling novel raised questions that drove Dunkle’s research into Babb’s life and career.Although Babb was well connected with contemporary writers, her name is virtually absent from literary histories. This lack of recognition may be due to Babb’s own reticence in disclosing details of her personal life. Concealing a then-illegal interracial marriage to renowned cinematographer James Wong Howe as well as a fleeting affiliation with the American Communist Party, Babb was self-protective. She shied away from biographers and refused to write her own life story. But, as Dunkle notes, Babb left a “wide trail of materials”—now housed at the University of Texas—and a substantial catalog of publications. For this book, Dunkle has drawn upon these materials to forge a vibrant, compelling story of a writer deserving of wider, more attentive recognition.Especially notable is Dunkle’s close attention to her subject’s early life. In her writing, Babb drew often from this deep experiential well. She was born in Red Rock, Oklahoma, in 1907. Her family life was peripatetic. Father Walt farmed at times and ran a bakery. He was passionate about playing semi-pro baseball and gambling. Her dutiful, frequently abused mother Jennie kept the family and bakery running. In a restless moment, Walt uprooted the family and headed to eastern Colorado to raise broomcorn. The Babbs lived in a rough dirt-floor dugout house surrounded by beautiful but desolate expanses of prairie. There were no nearby schools and few, if any, neighbors. Sanora Babb and her sister managed to learn to read, thanks to walls papered over with old sheets of the Denver Post and an often-read biography of Kit Carson.After a discouraged Walt gave up “pioneering,” the family settled briefly in Elkhart, Kansas, where Sanora was enrolled in a public school. She was held back briefly because of her erratic education, but teachers quickly recognized her aptitudes. As a student, she thrived. A high-achiever in her Forgan, Oklahoma, high school, Babb was named valedictorian of her graduating class, only to be barred from delivering a brief speech she had prepared. When she later confronted the superintendent of schools, he told her that he had caved to pressure: He admitted that some believed it “would have been a disgrace to … have a gambler’s daughter so honored” (70). But Babb managed to garner a “glowing letter of recommendation” (79), which she forwarded to the president of the University of Kansas. In turn, she received a one-year scholarship.Despite her keen intelligence, Babb struggled at the university. She finally earned a degree in 1927 at Garden City Community College. After graduation, she plunged into work as a reporter for the Garden City newspaper and published poetry. At this time, she was “young and filled with passion” (93). She freely dated men and nurtured her career as a credentialed journalist. Confident and ambitious, Babb boarded a train to Los Angeles, which became a home base for the remainder of her life. There, she met a Chinese cameraman—James Wong Howe—whom a matchmaking friend had described as “hot copy” (103). Dunkle captures the heady excitement of Los Angeles, its ethnic diversity, and its liberated atmosphere. But the city was also a “toxic” environment for an attractive young woman serious about writing. During a brief stint at Warner Brothers, Babb rejected the “casting couch” as a path to success.At times, Babb was homeless, sleeping on park benches and spending hours reading in the Los Angeles Public Library. In 1934, she began work on Whose Names Are Unknown, a novel that piqued the interest of several publishers. Bennett Cerf of Random House read four chapters and encouraged Babb to complete the project and offered the possibility of a contract. But things went awry.Seeking firsthand observations of the ravages of the Dust Bowl, Babb contacted a friend organizing and managing Dust Bowl refugee camps for the Farm Security Administration (FSA). Notebook in hand, Babb visited camps populated by displaced farmers and their families, immersing herself in the daily lives of migrants. Observations of over three thousand individuals provided material for articles and the novel-in-progress. She also worked actively to improve conditions and educational opportunities for camp residents.At the same time, John Steinbeck was struggling to compose his fictional representation of the Dust Bowl catastrophe, The Grapes of Wrath. Riding a wave of success with Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck was assured of publication; but he was stuck. He, too, was a regular visitor to the FSA encampments as a means of capturing the poverty and despair of the Dust Bowl migrant. In 1938, Steinbeck met Babb, and he occasionally conferred with her to discuss the camps and political attempts to address migrant needs. Supportive of Steinbeck’s project, Babb handed over the copious field notes she had amassed. This act of generosity had profound consequences. Steinbeck’s writer’s block soon dissipated, and he “began his third and final attempt at writing his Dust Bowl novel” (173). Babb’s project was overshadowed, if not doomed.Both Babb and Steinbeck were committed to exposing the ravages of the Dust Bowl. Although their two novels differed radically from each other, Steinbeck already had a publishing track record. Babb was an unknown. Timing was also a factor. Likely enriched by Babb’s copious field notes, The Grapes of Wrath—published in 1939—became a runaway bestseller. Reluctant to publish another Dust Bowl novel, Cerf canceled the contract with Babb, claiming that it was unwise to publish “two books about the same event” (180). He advised her to shelve the manuscript until the market was receptive to another account of the disaster. But a looming war, coupled with the stunning success of The Grapes of Wrath, rattled publishers who had considered Babb’s work impressive and realistic. One editor suggested that Babb “prove herself with some other novel first” (181).John Steinbeck never acknowledged Sanora Babb’s contribution to the development of The Grapes of Wrath, nor did he ever admit to knowing her. The silencing of Whose Names Are Unknown is a bitter aspect of Babb’s otherwise productive literary career. Undaunted, Babb plunged into war work and maintained regular contact with a supportive Los Angeles. A disciplined writer who kept regular hours for writing, Babb frequently drew upon her early experiences in eastern Colorado, Kansas, and Oklahoma in composing a range of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. Finally, in 2006, the University of Oklahoma Press published Whose Names Are Unknown. Babb’s fiction, in particular, captures the introspective life shaped by proximity to nature. Having grown up on “empty land” on the prairie, far from the usual human communities and regular social interactions, Babb developed an active life of the mind that enhanced her sensitivity to new places, cultures, and people.Dunkle asserts that “Babb is a ghost who is never acknowledged, her name nearly erased from the mostly male authors who are remembered from the 1930s in Los Angeles” (158). But in this lively, readable biography, Sanora Babb is far from ghostly. She traveled widely, supported social causes, and worked cooperatively with important writers of her time. Above all, through her writing, Babb succeeded in giving names, voices, and identities to Dust Bowl migrants. Dunkle tells Babb’s story well. Babb is no longer a “ghost.”