Blood Donation

Mask

Counsel

Review of John Steinbeck's Cannery Row

A very simple, straight forward book that disarms the reader with its slight size and bursts of blind humor. There is something very tender going on here that has something to do with friendship, time and the brevity of all things. None of which are to be lamented but celebrated. There is a great deal of heartbreak and plenty of sudden violence here, but it all feels contained within a blanket of human goodness. In the end, all the nerdowells Do Well. That sort of thing. As far as writing style goes, Steinbeck has this very--I don't know if this is the right word--"wholesome" way of putting things that doesn't feel crass, rushed, or banal yet is at the same time far from scholastic or proper. He spent his youth as a laborer and kept himself untainted with the reek of academia and his compassion for all types of minds/ways and means shines through in every passage. The wine-guzzling drunks are treated with just as much respect as the post-doctorate researcher and they very often trade social places. Maybe that is what I really like about this story: It is a portrait of human beings at their finest. When people are not separated from each other because of class, but are held together because of their merits. Regardless of education, elucidation or diction; all people look on everyone else as equals capable of experiencing the same limitless depths of fear, pain, happiness, pleasure, sadness, boredom, etc., etc. All beings are deserving of the same amount of consideration and Steinbeck considers them all. This book is also Goddam hilarious. The metaphors are often punch-lines: Not the shitty non-sense you would find in something like Chuck Palaniuk, or however the fuck you spell that guy's name, but something with class and thought put behind it. At this point in his career, Steinbeck was an expert whose mindless flourishes were on par, or if not better, with some of the most brilliant efforts committed to page by writers who I would consider to be legends, (i.e. Ken Kesey, Joseph Heller), yet it feels completely off the cuff as if he wrote it while he was waterskiing or drinking beer and playing darts. The result is that none of this feels desperate. It reads like writing that is not at all worried whether ten people read it or 300 billion. It also doesn't worry about whether it gets to the point or reaches some kind of cathartic crescendo that makes you stare at the ceiling for thirty minutes. Yet it DOES do all these things. Shitloads of people read this book. It does build into something bigger than itself and I had to gather myself at end. It is the kind of book that you can throw away and the kind of book that you dig out of trash. It should be read several times a year and should never be taken more seriously than the people who inhabit it would take it. Dammit! What more can I say. This book fucking rocked. It won't take long to read. Do it.