eBook, 208 pages
English language
Published May 27, 2008 by Penguin Books.
Steinbeck’s tough yet charming portrait of people on the margins of society, dependent on one another for both physical and emotional survival.
Published in 1945, Cannery Row focuses on the acceptance of life as it is: both the exuberance of community and the loneliness of the individual. Drawing on his memories of the real inhabitants of Monterey, California, including longtime friend Ed Ricketts, Steinbeck interweaves the stories of Doc, Dora, Mack and his boys, Lee Chong, and the other characters in this world where only the fittest survive, to create a novel that is at once one of his most humorous and poignant works. In her introduction, Susan Shillinglaw shows how the novel expresses, both in style and theme, much that is essentially Steinbeck: “Scientific detachment, empathy toward the lonely and depressed . . . and, at the darkest level . . . the terror of isolation and nothingness.”
Steinbeck's prose is so amazingly well-crafted. It's interesting without being flowery.
When Steinbeck is at his best, he is one of my favorite authors. He has a way of layering in detailed descriptions and feelings that should seem complex but somehow come across very simple and direct. This book is almost like a collection of inter-related short stories, with each chapter a short scene of life in a time and place. About 3/4 of the chapters build upon one another to tell a kind of loose plot, but a quarter are unrelated and just set a tone or mood -- these stand-alone chapters are some of my favorites.
"...the things people admire in men, such as kindness, generosity, and honesty, are often seen as signs of failure in society, while traits like greed and self-interest are seen as signs of success."
Now I want to take the two hour drive down to Monterey and walk around Cannery Row.
