East of Eden by John Steinbeck

 

 

August's book club selection was East of Eden, by John Steinbeck, with Yolk, by Mary H.K. Choi coming up next for September's pick. Once again, we held our meeting in a sheltered area at Paul Miller Park, we will plan to do the same for our September 13th meeting~ conclusive details to follow the closer the date becomes! 

Just a friendly reminder, book club members are encouraged to join us this next Tuesday, August 16th, at The Comet movie theater, for the 7:00pm showing of Where the Crawdads Sing. Tuesday night is bargain night at The Comet, with tickets being $5.00 each~ you are welcome to bring guests if you'd like (all attendees will be responsible for their own ticket and treat purchases). We are not planning to try to sit together, but if it shakes out that way, great!

Since the viewing of this movie comes a week after our August book club meeting, we thought we'd take the first few minutes of our September 13th meeting to discuss our Crawdad opinions and comparisons, and I'll also start a separate post on the library's blog directly following the movie, for anyone who would like an earlier discussion. We invite you to share your thoughts, on either avenue, afterwards!

To the goods!

 

Adam Trask came to California from the East to farm and raise his family on the new rich land. But the birth of his twins, Cal and Aron, brings his wife to the brink of madness, and Adam is left alone to raise his boys to manhood. One boy thrives nurtured by the love of all those around him; the other grows up in loneliness enveloped by a mysterious darkness.

In his journal, Nobel Prize winner John Steinbeck called East of Eden “the first book,” and indeed it has the primordial power and simplicity of myth. First published in 1952, East of Eden is the work in which Steinbeck created his most mesmerizing characters and explored his most enduring themes: the mystery of identity, the inexplicability of love, and the murderous consequences of love's absence.

 

The opening comment of our discussion was, "Does anyone else have the sense that people either loved this book, or hated it?" While I can't report that anyone actually said the word "hate" regarding their summations, there were definitely two separate camps of opinion. Those fond of the book said they liked long, generational sagas. They could appreciate the characters for what they were~ tortured, mentally ill (and certainly undiagnosed and untreated) and conflicted. They felt empathy for their plights and rooted for better things to come for them. Several mentioned they had read Steinbeck before and enjoyed revisiting his work.

Those in the opposing camp said they just liked it. They didn't love it, and they didn't hate it, but they liked it. A few members mentioned it was far too long, felt like the story was told twice, and could have been condensed down by at least 200 pages. Members of this camp weren't fans of Steinbeck's writing in general, they thought it too wordy and tedious. It was also pointed out that there were some loose ends left undone, for example, did Tom Hamilton actually kill himself after his accidental medical misstep concerning his sister? They couldn't be sure, and they didn't like that there was no more mention of him after the ominous bit of a reference of a gun directly followed by him writing to his brother, "Tell Mom I got kicked in the head by a horse"... no closure, no funeral in tribute to this good man's life. Lastly, it was thought that Adams seemingly blind, perpetual devotion and longing for Cathy was not believable... especially considering their parting just after the twins were born.

Maybe Steinbeck's The Winter of Our Discontent will favor differently? We'll surely see come March 2023!

Speaking of loose ends, did Cathy actually sleep with Charles early on, and therefor Caleb and Aron are his biological children and not Adam's? Did Cathy ever actually receive the inheritance from Charles's estate? Why did she leave everything to Aron in the end?

Let us know below!
 

P.S. Just a head's up, East of Eden has been made into both a movie and a mini series in the past~ however it appears Netflix has recently won the rights to begin work on a new East of Eden series after what was apparently a very intense bidding war. The woman writing and producing the series is the granddaughter of the director of the movie from 1955 with James Dean! Here's a link to the details: https://www.whats-on-netflix.com/news/florence-pugh-netflix-series-east-of-eden-what-we-know-so-far/

 

(Thanks for sharing Tracy!)

Did you enjoy East of Eden? Fans of the book also enjoyed: A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway, Slaughterhouse-five by Kurt Vonnegut, and The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. All of these titles are available in Viking~ reserve your copy today!   

 

At the conclusion of every book club discussion we ask three questions and track the average answers:
Would we recommend this to another book club for discussion?
"YES"
Would we recommend this to a friend to read? 
"NO"
Rate the book 1-5 stars, with 1 being the lowest rating: 
 3 stars