Penguin Classics, 602 pages, 1952
Like most Americans my age, I read my fair share of Steinbeck in school--Of Mice and Men in the 9th grade (which was a total waste of time with the teacher I had) and The Grapes of Wrath in the 11th--but I must have been too young to appreciate it because I don't remember either of those novels being anywhere close to this stunning. Giants like this are hard for me to write blog posts about because I don't feel like I can say anything about a book so great and ambitious, but I can say that it made me so, so homesick for California, and proud to be from a state with such a rich and varied heritage, not to mention its literary tradition (Steinbeck! Henry Miller! The Beats! Just about every Asian American author I can think of!). Steinbeck is a master of the grand and the epic, and I think East of Eden also shows how well he knew and loved California and its history--the towns that sprang up out of nowhere overnight, the whorehouses, the character of its inhabitants. I loved Lee as a character--his insistence on being a servant for the Trask family despite other opportunities makes him less than ideal as a token minority, but what the hell, Steinbeck understood Asian Americans and their place in California history better than most white authors today. As he puts it: "Maybe it's true that we are all descended from the restless, the nervous, the criminals, the arguers and brawlers, but also the brave and independent and generous. If our ancestors had not been that, they would have stayed in their home plots in the other world and starved over the squeezed-out soil." It is probably a sign that I've been in Japan too long that that is getting me all choked up with patriotic fervor, that or I'm getting sentimental in my old age.
Next up: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
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