Having just completed Steinbeck's East of Eden late last evening, there hangs over me still the rush. One thing about finishing a book that is forever exciting is the prospect that finishing it is just around the corner, especially when said book pushes 600-pages. During such times, in the waning moments of the book, a new fury takes over and I read at a ridiculuous rate. It is a fault at times because I read almost impatiently, pining more to "complete" than for the story to complete itself on its own terms -- not on my own. Still, it's a furious urge to resist. For this particular novel, the exercise caught up with me and has left me unutterably winded this morning.
It seems that this particular novel is not considered his greatest. I can grant that argument. It is more refined, more particular and inevitably less a commentary than an actual story. Where Grapes of Wrath was an effort to summarize a movement, a situation, a profound hope in the human spirit -- this novel is about the human spirit itself. What it is and what makes it. How it is formed and molded and changed and yet somehow immutable since the days of Adam and Eve. It contains characters as old as time, as human as all of us; as close and familiar as a look in the mirror. Laughter and love is at its core. The sing-song of the Irish Samuel Hamilton. The cold and menace of Cathy Trask. The wisdom and strength of Lee. The naked and cold and ever human Cal Trask. And the undeniable choice before all of them.
This novel is about characters. It is about a story. It is an old story. One we are all familiar with. Yet one that seems strangely new and fresh and ancient all at once. Like a warm rain in December.
It will now sit on my bookshelf. I will walk by it often and remember it.
I will read it again. Thou mayest, at the very least.
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