¶ … East of Eden by John Steinbeck John Steinbeck's "East of Eden" is a story patterned after the Biblical stories of the banishment of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden and the sibling story of Cain and Abel. The primary theme of the story focuses on the struggle of good against evil. In the first Biblical story, the Garden of Eden is shown as a place where purity, happiness, and all the beauty of the world can be found, and Adam and Eve, the first man and woman of the world, resides in this 'paradise.' Similarly, Steinbeck shows his own version of the Garden of Eden, which can be found in Salinas Valley in California. Meanwhile, the story of Cain and Abel is illustrated twice in the story: the first being the story of Adam and Charles Trask, and the second one with Aron and Caleb, Adam's sons from Cathy. These stories will be discussed and analyzed in relation to the theme of good and evil, and how this primary theme is reinforced...
There are many parallelisms of he story of Adam and Eve when compared to Adam Trask and Cathy's story. Adam, as the namesake of the first man, is married to a sinful woman, Cathy. Steinbeck's novel does not only show Cathy as the 'sinful' Eve who pushes Adam to sinfulness, but he also illustrates Cathy as Satan also, especially since Cathy's history shows how evil her ways are, possessing lust and greed that can be found in Satan's character. Cathy's evil character is best described in Steinbeck's description of the evil character, saying: "And it occurs to me that evil must constantly respawn, while good, while virtue, is immortal. Vice has always a fresh young face, while virtue is venerable as nothing else in the world is." This passage shows how…
East of Eden John Steinbeck's story centers on two generations of the Hamilton and Trask families. "East of Eden" is essentially a modern-day 'Cain and Abel' tale corresponding the Biblical conflict to two generations of two sets of brothers, Charles and Adam Trask, and Adam's sons Aron and Caleb Trask. "The Trasks were his 'symbol people,'" Steinbeck insisted, "and their story was one about how one lives with human suffering" (Summary
John Steinbeck's book East of Eden gathers under the pages of a beautifully written literary work the deep concerns of a troubled mind. Steinbeck appears to be haunted by those eternal questions human being must have asked himself or herself ever since any form of religion even existed. The conflict between good and evil and the meaning of the "truth" as well as the theme of the original sin and
Finally, redemption is possible and is achieved by some: when Hester, Pearl and Dimmesdale all stand on the public scaffold, Dimmesdale falls fatally ill and Pearl kisses him, the spell of sinfulness is broken for them (Hawthorne 175), while Chillingworth "positively withered up, shrivelled away and almost vanished from mortal sight" because his plan to destroy Dimmesdale were simultaneously broken (Hawthorne 175). In sum, Puritan religious views are highly
authors, John Steinbeck puts a lot of himself in his novels. In his novels we can see self-characters, representing Steinbeck himself in some ways and also hidden characters that represent his family, his friends and the events of his life. We also see how the people he met in his life resulted in his interest in some major themes that are seen in many of his novels. The greatest
Tiflin; and as a result, he tried to make it a point that Jody grows up responsible and independent (SparkNotes). Strengths & Weaknesses: The strength of this book is that three of the four stories in this book were published as separate short stories. The elements in common that hold these stories together so that they can be considered a book are characters, setting, and themes (SparkNotes). All four short stories are
Never cold. an'fruit ever'place, an' people just bein' in the nicest places, little white houses in among the orange trees [...] an' the little fellas go out an' pick oranges right off the tree. They ain't gonna be able to stand it, they'll get to yellin' so."(Steinbeck, 95) Their conviction is enhanced by the stories they hear and by false advertisements they are sent. These false advertisements may very
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