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east of eden by john steinbeck
1/25/2006 @ 6:41:23 PM | 1079 days ago | permanent link | posted in book | 2 comments
 Finished this in about 10 days, it crawls around the middle but it's all for a purpose. Like The Fountainhead, it was hard to finish but it's got some classic cachet to it
John Steinbeck (1952) - 3/5 The first 2 chapters are hard to get into with Steinbeck's beautiful and expansive descriptions of the Salinas Valley, a large portion of the novel takes place in King City, better known today for a place where you can easily get tickets on 101
Things get underway fast as we follow the Hamilton and Trask families at the turn of the 20th century, how their fate become intertwined and sealed with the strange Cathy Ames. The violent altercation which leads her to the Trask doorstep is gripping. She really lives up to her demon child mystique
I had such a feeling of satisfaction when I arrived at the end of Part One, it was a breeze. It coincides with a page spread layout for Part Two which flows very well. It's also a good division as far as plot
Cathy's first encounter with Samuel is very telling, he develops a physical discomfort around her.. "a goose walked over my grave"
Part Two turns out to be hard to read, it sure took longer, it's about the Trasks settling in California, the rise of Cathy/Kate as a truely evil character. The debate over naming the twins is probably very symbolic but kinda flew over my head
Part Three ends somberly in death, another generation passes
Part Four focuses on the Trask twins, and maybe the most advanced version of the Steinbeck hero in Cal (Caleb) Trask. He's complex, determined, but most of all loving (love for his father, his brother), which may be his most endearing quality. At the other end, there's Will who's the least lyrical of the Hamiltons. Cal finds out too soon the whereabouts of his mother and he becomes haunted about living up to his heritage
A very high point is the Cal and Abra conversation when they come true to each other
East Of Eden is largely a tale of redemption for Cal and the entire Trask family which seemed doomed. It has obvious reference to "the" Adam from the Bible and the Garden of Eden. It ends on a very hopeful note, that change is possible, that Man is master of his own fate, that happiness is to be gotten by anyone willing to grasp for it
Many of its characters read like relics for today, their actions and speech are hard to relate to. And yet Steinbeck makes them fascinating. The narrative reminds me of The Fountainhead (1943), also both book relate to each other on Chapter 13 which can be seen as a manifesto of sort, a praise to the individual (another Fountainhead theme)
Style
Steinbeck uses a very old school type of narrating, he had a way with prose and injected passion in his chracters and their surroundings. The descriptions sometimes lost me. One other thing is he would jump/cut from a scene (setting) to the next, he would just go to the next line and indent but the reader could use more caution (maybe skip a line or have transition phrase)
Sign of the times
"Hello, Ching Chong. Bossy here?", "What did the Chink say?" carefree racism against Chinese
"He opened it a crack and looked in and he saw her gay and smiling face" different use for "gay"
"They were handsome girls and they carried with them the glow of their descent from the kings of Ireland" use of "handsome" for women
"Stetson hat" fashion
"pompadour" hair
Vocab
- lean-to (lean-tos): structure with a single-pitch roof that is attached to the side of a building as a wing or an extension
- ng-ka-py: Chinese wine
Quotes
"Charles awakened on the stroke of four-thirty as surely as though the brass pendulum of the clock nudged him"
"Nobody knows why you go to a picnic when it's so easy and pleasant to eat at home"
"I eat stories like grapes"
"He tried to let weeping start but tears could not pass the hot iron in his head"
"The very rich are a poor bunch of bastards"
"Timshel! - thou mayest"
Movie
A movie starring James Dean as Cal Trask was made in 1955, IMDB. Ron Howard is set to direct a remake for 2006 (pushed to 2007..)
The edition I read was the Oprah book club selection (June 2003), it is major roughcut; 601 pages
East of Eden received the Nobel Prize of Literature in 1962
Steinbeck was a California native born in Salinas, he has a bust in the small town of Monterey (south of the Bay Area) which was the setting for anoher of his novel, Cannery Row. From Wikipedia The novel was originally addressed to Steinbeck's young sons, Thom and John (then 6 1/2 and 4 1/2 respectively). Steinbeck wanted to describe the Salinas Valley for them in detail: the sights, sounds, smells, and colors.
According to his last wife Elaine, he considered this to be a Requiem for himself - his greatest novel ever. Steinbeck states about "East of Eden": "It has everything in it I have been able to learn about my craft or profession in all these years." He further claimed: "I think everything else I have written has been, in a sense, practice for this."
Links
- reviews - East Of Eden
Comments I think the most difficult book for me to get through was Grapes of Wrath...I struggled...just didn't like it, but had to read it for school. Vicki on 1/25/2006 9:06:01 PM, 1079 days ago that one is supposed to be awesome! hehe daniel on 1/26/2006 9:44:10 AM, 1079 days ago
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