Prong's - Sixth Review - Cannery Row

This being my 'year of the classics,' I decided that it was time to begin easing myself into that great literary master known as John Steinbeck. It has been at least 7 years since I last picked up something by Steinbeck and I felt that it was best to just get my feet wet first before I plunged head first into the deep water of 'East of Eden'. I am going to attempt to keep this review short and sweet, much like Cannery Row itself. Enjoy.

"...a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light, a tone, a habit, a nostalgia, a dream."
Cannery Row
John Steinbeck

If you have ever heard me talk about my favorite literary works, you have probably heard me throw out that Winesburg, Ohio is one of my favorite short novellas of all time. After reading Cannery Row by John Steinbeck, there is a good chance that Sherwood Anderson has been dethroned. (Oddly enough both titles are simple names of places. Coincidence?) Set in the backdrop of the Great Depression, Steinbeck replicates an entire world within a world as he details the characters, homes, and events that took place along the street of Cannery Row in Monterey, California.

Cannery Row as a work of literature is centered entirely around the characters that inhabit it. The plot unfolds gradually, letting the characters reveal their ideas and intentions in their own time. Nothing is forced or dishonest and the plot is simple. A few of the main characters want to throw a party for one of the most enigmatic members of their small community, and the plot details the events leading up to and after the party. If I had to sum up this book in one word it would be 'refreshing.' Steinbeck gives a nice reminder to all writers that a good story does not have to revolve around plot twists, shock value, or historical achievements. Instead, I was absorbed by this tiny novel that consisted of characters so real and complicated that I could see bits of myself in every single one of them. Their pain was my pain, and their struggle for understanding and fulfillment rests within everyone. Cannery Row is a place where:

“…men in fear and hunger destroy their stomachs in the fight to secure certain food, where men hungering for love destroy everything lovable about them.”

One of my favorite literary devices that Steinbeck used constantly throughout the book was the personification of many different animals in comparison to the lives of the characters. Steinbeck would describe looking into a tide pool and seeing the movements and actions of the creatures below. Some would be agressive and some curious, some were fragile and others were compelling. What the reader could see from looking into the water of the tide pools was a reflection of their own lives.

“How can the poem and the stink and the grating noise—the quality of light, the tone, the habit and the dream-be set down alive? When you collect marine animals there are certain worms so delicate that they are almost impossible to capture whole, for they break and tatter under the touch. You must let them ooze and crawl of their own will onto a knife blade and lift them gently into your bottle of sea water. And perhaps that might be the way to write this book—to open the page and let the stories crawl in by themselves.”

There is of course a distinct beginning, middle, and end, without any real climax. Instead of feeling like a fiction, Cannery Row reads more like an autobiography -- that of the actual town. The story has a pulse, a heartbeat with the characters as the veins, winding and connecting, pushing the story along. When the story ends you feel as though a life has come full circle, and passes away naturally and without remorse. I would suggest this work for anyone who is just looking for a good old fashioned story. I could say so much more about this story... but what you take from these characters and their experiences is the real plot of the book, so I will leave it up to you, my readers, to figure it out. 4/5



(quotes)