Cannery Row
- Apr 2, 2017
- 2 min read
★★★★★
I’m not exactly sure why I chose Cannery Row as my next book. Steinbeck was gnawing at me for some vague reason, and perhaps after a couple of fairly intense reads I thought this one would be pleasant if a bit slight. It turned out to be both of those things, but also a great deal more.
The plot is simple enough: Mack and his small group of derelicts decide to do something nice for their friend Doc. They throw him a party, the whole thing goes awry, everyone winds up in a foul mood, eventually things blow over, and they decide to throw him another party but make sure it works this time. Interspersed throughout are a series of unrelated vignettes about the lives of others on Cannery Row, including my favorite about a gopher that appears near the end.
It may sound harsh to hear that the plot is irrelevant, but it is. Mack and his friends could have done anything—held a bake sale, painted Doc’s lab, organized a neighborhood cleanup—and it wouldn’t have mattered. It’s not what happens that makes Cannery Row work. It’s Steinbeck’s love for these characters and the humanity he gives them, it’s the unadorned language that lets the people and the place come through of their own accord, and it’s his unshakeable faith in the human spirit that not only makes you give a damn but actually makes you root for the dispossessed, the ne’er-do-wells, the misfits and the eccentrics living at the margins. Cannery Row isn’t just a place—it’s a state of mind, a way of life and of living that, even 80 years removed from the Great Depression, we can still relate to, and, more importantly, learn from.
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