My wife and I took our daughter out to Monetery, California for a couple days. My wife and I had visited there a few times, and we had visited Cannery Row. This time, we actually stayed on Cannery Row. We didn’t have an agenda packed full of things to do, so I picked up the book, Cannery Row by John Steinbeck, to see what all the hubbub was about.
I love reading about California history. I also tend to appreciate Bohemian fantasy. I’m not much of a leisure reader, at all, but I have read and really enjoyed Siddhartha (Hesse) and On the Road (Kerouac). I sometimes wonder if I should live a life of “voluntary simplicity” instead of chugging away at work.
Anyway, I’m about half way through the book and I’m enjoying it. It’s a nice read, simple, and it moves along. The characters are colorful and fun. I don’t know if I should be gleaning any kind of deep thoughts from it. Share whatever thought you like.
Unlike most novels assigned in school (back in the early 70s), I re-read Cannery Row a couple of times and went on to read a lot of his other books. Still have half a shelf of them at home!
I recently read it myself, after a short vacation to Monterey with my wife and daughter.
It was an enjoyable read, and rather different from the sort of book I usually choose. I don’t think I’d read any Steinbeck since high school; once I finish with C.S. Forester’s Hornblower series (i.e., many months from now, given the time I make for leisure reading), I may hit the library to grab another Steinbeck tome.
I love the book, too, and I read the sequel Sweet Thursday while actually visiting there once. I still quote bits of Cannery Row now and then - whenever I see a frog, I like to say, “We go see flog.”
I also love Tortilla Flat, and whenever we visit the area, we like to point out various little tumbledown wooden homes in the area (there are still a few left!) and say “There’s Danny’s house.”
Well, damn it all. Steinbeck botched the geography of my childhood stomping grounds.
He writes about Doc’s road trip to La Jolla. Doc stopped for a “heavy dinner” in Santa Barbara, then got a beer milkshake in Ventura, then had a cheese sandwich in Carpinteria before continuing on to Los Angeles.
Carpinteria is between Santa Barbara and Ventura. Also, the distance from Santa Barbara to Carpinteria is fairly short; I can’t imagine being hungry again at that time.
Only things I ever ate at Cannery Row was seafood, and only if I had family visiting from out of town. Wonderful place to go for a run though. Some nice scenery makes all the difference sometimes. Note that Gianni’s isn’t on Cannery Row, but rather an entire block away, on Lighthouse Drive.
I read *Cannery Row *years ago, around 1980 IIRC, thought then (and still do) that it was one of Steinbeck’s better efforts. I was living a pretty bohemian life myself at the time - albeit in Oregon rather than California - and could really relate to the characters and the lifestyle. I thought it was pretty neat that Steinbeck could write a book about guys like us.
SS
If you want to get lit geeky about it, there are a lot of allusions to the Arthur in those stories… Steinbeck was a scholar on Arthurian legends, and his treatment of them with vagabonds and layabouts is really enjoyable. I never pursued the parallels to carry on an intelligent conversation about it though, just know it’s there.
I saw Monterey once… nice little town. I liked all the Steinbeck stuff and the aquarium. If I’m ever independently wealthy and have no responsibility, it also looks like the perfect little boutique beach town to live in.
Yeah, outside of Texas, Monterey is on my top two choices of places to retire. Although it is probably much more expensive to retire in Monty than in Texas.
I just have to add; a few days ago I put two wheels of my truck in a ditch about five miles out of the nearest town. It was a logging, fishing coastal town. Immediately I started jogging for the nearest paved road to hopefully hitch a ride into town for a tow. About a mile into my jog I came to a secluded rock pit with a couple of cars and a tarp, tent, set up, calling into the tent for a bit of help, I met a man named “Rock pit Mike” who gave me a ride into town. Come to find out he had been living in the tarp, tent, in the rock pit for 20 years. I paid him in 5 gallons of gas for his services as he saved my day.
That little experience reminded me of Cannery Row, and to let you all know that it still exists, as long as you keep moving north.
Like I said, my parents live there - they got a house in Pacific Grove 40 years ago for less than $30,000. It is just below Monterey; Cannery Row sits pretty much on the border between the towns - PG was a Methodist campground, leading to the nicknames "Carmel by the Sea; Monterey by the Smell (of Cannery Row’s fish processing) and Pacific Grove by God Yay parents.
It is a surprisingly mixed area - yes, there is now a lot of wealth there, especially in Pebble Beach and Carmel - but for the most part it is a cool, vibrant, artsy set community if you avoid those fancier spots…
Yay parents.