|
On the one hand the title is the name of the town where the story takes place and on the other hand the title could also come from the neighbouring sardine factory. As far as I concerned the name deals very good with the story because Cannery Row stands for metallic things and therefore it could be the reason why its set is filled of scrap metal like the old boiler the rusty pipes and the broken old Ford T. Thirdly "Cannery Row" can also be the name of a poem which is mentioned in the beginning of the book.
Theme
The theme of Cannery Row, in short, is no less than a poetic statement of humans surrounded by a chaotic and essentially indifferent universe, and this is one reason why the structure of the book does seem so "loose". Another theme which is exposed in the book is the mysterious Oriental who threads his way through the book without any purpose but to remind us of the emptiness and loneliness we all share. Moreover alcoholism can also be a theme and a symbol of that mentioned loneliness. Interestingly all the main characters like alcohol too much. In contrast to this there are the parties which are signs of happiness. Otherwise "Cannery Row" is a novel about poor carefree loafers who do nothing for their living but they are fundamentally good hearted. Finally the over all plot is about Doc's love. Doc feels like he is unloved during the story and it really surprises him when he discovers that he's a man loved by everyone in town. Furthermore, he feels often alone because he hasn't got a woman.
Narrator
We don't know anything about the narrator. He is very omniscient and reserved which emphasize the loneliness and the tragedy of the story. It could be possible that Steinbeck himself is the narrator because he had lived there for several years and knew the set perfectly. The narrator is a third-person narrator and knows, sees and hears everything. The strength of this point of view is that Steinbeck could better express the truth of the story. A subjective narrator would falsify the story and that he didn't want. Strangely Steinbeck used no inner monologues in "Cannery Row".
Setting
Cannery Row is a "real" city in Monterey, California where the whole story takes place. It is a fishing village with a couple of houses where only poor people live. There is the Western Biological Laboratories where Doc does his work, the Flophouse where Mack and his boys live, Dora's Bear Flag Restaurant, the whore house of the town, naturally Lee's shop, the boiler of the family Malloy and at last Henri's unfinished boat. Everywhere are uncompleted and dirty things like rusty pipes, rusty boilers, weeds, a broken truck. All these things give the town an untidy atmosphere. But there are other sets mentioned as well. In San Jose the boys collected frogs to finance Doc's party. Doc had his journey for hunting little octopi.
Time
The time which is covered by the narrator is about four weeks which the boys used to prepare the parties. According to this the book is set in the time of the industrialist revolution. In order to understand the sense and the meaning of the novel you don't need any further informations.
Structure
The book has about 200 pages and is divided into 32 chapters. Every chapter tells the story of one inhabitant in Cannery Row. Sometimes it seems that there is no content between the chapter but later almost everything makes sense. The novel has no prologue and no epilogue. In addition to this Steinbeck used no foreshadowing and flashbacks as well It is a complex story with a straightforward going plot. Sometimes this plot confuses the reader because there are so many subplots in the book. As said every chapter describes one person of Cannery Row. The end is suprising because the reader exspects that the party will fail like the first one but it doesn't.
Language
The language which is used in the book isn't a specific language. To my mind it's a American-colloquial language which was sometimes very difficult to understand because a lot of the words you don't find in school-dictionar. The author used a lot of vulgar words which makes the book very difficult to read. The chapters are full of dialogues. They are responsible for the lively power in several scenes. Besides the Old Chinaman there is another symbolism as well. The scrap metal which is laying around Cannery Row expresses that the people don't care about their environment. For them it is unnecessary in which trash they live but for them it is important to be good hearted, to help others and to have a strong charity. As an illustration the boys, they live in an old dilapidate house, but they didn't take care of it. What they want is to help everyone. Other examples are the parties. After the first party failed they didn't surrender to give Doc a surprising party because indeed they wanted to do something nice for Doc. Therefore they prepared a new one which turned out much better. It was a real success.
|
