Ur-Texts: Cannery Row II or III

I just finished reading Cannery Row, and feel that, rather than summing up the book as a whole, it may be better to discuss my favorite of its chapters, chapter 17.

I) Truth

This chapter more than anything else Steinbeck has written (except maybe "Log From The Sea of Cortez") demonstrates his ideas about non-teleological truth. The narrator recounts Doc's previous search for truth, then Doc, on a collecting expedition, picks up a hitchhiker, who reprimands him for drinking and driving. Doc promptly casts the hitchhiker out of his car, threatening violence. Immediately thereafter, Doc orders the beer milkshake, which he has been contemplating since early in the chapter. "Well here is was and what the hell," thinks Doc, and then, as the chapter reaches its climax. Doc drinks the beer milkshake, and realizes that it tastes "just like stale beer and milk."

The milkshake has, at this point, become a sort of Holy Grail stand-in, yet Doc's triumph in finding it is preceded by a moment of bad faith with the hitchhiker, and followed by a lie ("I've been drinking it for seventeen years"). This Grail is clearly not some powerful image of purity as much as it is a thing for the sake of the thing.

It is this kind of truth that Steinbeck is after: things are what they are. It is a philosophy that has a lot of resonance with both Zen Buddhism and biology, and though I am neither a Buddhist nor a biologist, I like this kind of truth, partially as a result of this book's warmhearted, funny, deeply sad and touching portrait non-teleology.

II) My Beer Milkshakes

In my first post on "Cannery Row", I linked to a piece I wrote for the Williams-Mystic student literary magazine about my experience making a beer milkshake there, but that is not the only beer milkshake I have made.

My good friend Jesse Albanese, maybe after having read "Cannery Row," or maybe just having heard about it from me, was curious about the beer milkshake. Ben and Nathan were also there, and so we made a second beer milkshake. There are a few ways to explain why that beer milkshake was not nearly as satisfying as the first beer milkshake. It could have been that the higher quality of the ingredients paradoxically lessened the quality of the milkshake. It could have been that, having just had dinner, we were not hungry for it. I suspect, though, that it was because a second beer milkshake is an impossibility; that the value of the beer milkshake is in the experience of fearing it and accepting it. Once that experience has been had, it cannot be re-had.

III) Conclusion

Having had tangible impact on my real-life actions is something that few books can claim on me, and so, between the beer milkshake(s) and the reading at Cannery Row, this book's position on my list of ur-texts is indisputable.

Ur-Text-ish: A "Cannery Row" Story and Miscellany

I just wrote a more focused post on my favorite chapter of "Cannery Row," (to be posted soon, after a bit of polishing) but I wanted to relate another story that just couldn't fit into that post. First, though, a few notes:

I) David Wax Museum featured in this interesting article. It makes me wish I had the kind of house I could host concerts in.

II) As you may have read before, I'm also blogging for my place of gainful employment, and I wrote the two most recent posts (two links!). I've added that blog to my blogroll (at right) so when it updates, you can read it there. I'll stop posting about it now. Thanks to all y'all abroad who read it; my managers, upon viewing the google analytics report, were impressed by the international audience. I was able to account for all the countries except for a small northeastern European country (Estonia? Latvia). If any of y'all are there and reading, please let me know. I am curious.

My photo of "Doc's Lab." (Western Biological, in real life)

 III) All right, the story about "Cannery Row":

Like "Moby-Dick," I read this book while studying in the Williams-Mystic Maritime Studies Program. Unlike "Moby-Dick," this reading was not the first time I had read this book. I knew I loved this book coming into the program, so during our field trip to the west coast, my literature professor, Rich King, invited me, as we sat on the docks next to the (defunct, now tourisit-ified and gentrified) canneries, to read aloud the introduction to the class. It was a surprisingly moving moment, in which the power of place was incredibly evident. I read the "disclaimer," the dedication, and the introductory passage, and by the end, was almost choking up. I am not typically moved to tears by books, yet sitting there, mere yards from Doc's lab, the Palace Flophouse and Grill, Lee Chong's, etc. I could barely help myself.

I am also not usually connected to particular books as physical objects, but my Penguin paperback of Cannery Row now contains a map of the row, sketched while I was there, and it accrues new underlinings and dog ears at every read. Both in terms of place and the book itself, "Cannery Row" is, for me, a book of physicality.

Ur-Texts: Cannery Row

I chose "Cannery Row" to follow "Moby-Dick" mostly because I knew after the long hunt for the white whale, I'd be hankering for some lighter fare. But re-reading Susan Shillinglaw's introduction,  I found this gem: "[Cannery Row's] multiplicity of perspective is roughly equivalent to 'The Doubloon' chapter in 'Moby Dick,' and both books are, in fact, about how one sees and precisely how deeply one understands."

Never have I had a segue so simply handed to me, and I'm going to run with it, because it is this book's quality of vision that makes it one of my Ur-Texts. At its most fundamental level, "Cannery Row" is an encouragement to see things as they are, not as we want to see them. This is a lesson that I also learned reading "East of Eden," but that will come later.

I love just about everything about this book, from its dedication ("To Ed Ricketts, who knows why or should") to its disclaimer ("The people, places, and events in this book are, of course, fictions and fabrications" emphasis mine) to the final, climactic party scene. Other noteworthy portions of the book include the first, enigmatically unnumbered chapter (the beautiful opening lines of which are quoted here), and the beer milkshake sequence. More on the beer milkshake here.

And of course, more to come as I finish reading this lovely little book.

My Favorite Things I: Books

In one of my first posts on this blog, I mentioned that, counter to a cultural trend of ambiguity and inability (or lack of desire) to name favorites, I like being able to have a favorite thing in a category. Sometimes I don't, and sometimes those favorite things come with a lot of disclaimers, but I like being able to note that I prefer certain things. That gives you 1) more of a sense of who I am in terms of my media preferences, and 2) new media products to enjoy (assuming my media preferences align somehow with yours. This is not so straightforward--I have plenty of people who I love and respect from whom I will never take movie/music/book recommendations). So this is the first in a multi-part series on my favorite things. Each post, I'll present five of my favorites within a certain category. Today's category: books.

I chose five of each because five is such a nice number (I do not think, however, that five is my favorite number. Not something I often think about). Also because I don't want to have to choose one of each. The lists are ranked alphabetically, not by preference. Because this post is called "my favorite things," do yourself a favor and listen to the John Coltrane Quartet recording of the song of the same name (yes, the one from The Sound of Music. Shoutout to Bryn Mawr's Mike Tratner, whose ringtone is that recording).

Books

Cannery Row - John Steinbeck
Though it might seem superfluous to have this minor Steinbeck work on this list, what with his magnum opus just below, this book always makes me laugh, and makes me aspire to be like Doc. Williams-Mystic folks will remember our Halloween night search for Truth, making the beer milkshake in the Johnston House kitchen.

East of Eden - John Steinbeck
This book combines so many things that I love: The triumph of the human spirit, quirky characters, quotable quotes, Bible stories, beautiful descriptions of landscapes, even a noir-esque intrigue. When asked to name one favorite book, I often name this one. Though I love movies, and movie adaptations of books, and though I respect that they are separate art forms, not necessitating comparison with one another, I can't bring myself to watch the movie version of East of Eden for fear that it would ruin the book for me.

For Whom the Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemingway
This one barely edged out The Lord of the Rings for this, admittedly last-of-the-top-five slot. People always seem more surprised to hear that I like Hemingway than to hear that I like The Lord of the Rings, so Hemingway it is. Though it is not often hailed as the best of Hemingway's three major works (The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms), I like it the best. Maybe it's the romance at its center, maybe it's the fact that I was reading John Donne when I first read it, maybe it's the 8-year-old inside of me getting excited about blowing up bridges. I just know that I love so much Hemingway, and when I have to pick one, I pick this one.

Moby Dick - Herman Melville
The (in)famous early American work of literature. I don't think I ever would have read this if it hadn't been required for class at Williams-Mystic, but having plowed through it, I can say that it is one of the most interesting, thought-provoking, and strange (not to mention long) books I've ever read. I regularly use the metaphor of the whale's head to refer to encounters with the ineffable.

One Man's Meat - E.B. White
This book's title has not aged nearly as well as its contents. Sad, because the contents (a series of essay from the early/middle of the 20th century) are charming, insightful, and well-written. If you only know E.B. White as the author of Charlotte's Web, these essays provide a new insight into the man. Of all the writers I read, I feel the most writerly kinship with E.B. White, in large part because of this book.

RUNNER UP: The Lord of the Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien
As you know from above, this one was barely edged out, mostly because, at least among Swatties, it's assumed that everyone has some fluency with, and that the majority of people enjoys these books. A small true confession: I went in costume to local premiere screenings of the later two movie releases. I apparently don't have the same reservations about The Lord of the Rings that I do about East of Eden.