East of Eden

Chapter 35

John Steinbeck · Mountaineers 10th–12th

Teaching Companion Print Adapt for your student

Copywork

“I like it better that way,” Lee said. “If they pretended sorrow they’d be liars. It doesn’t mean anything to them. Maybe they’ll think of me sometimes—privately. I don’t want them to be sad. I hope I’m not so small-souled as to take satisfaction in being missed.”

Lee lifted the bottle to his lips and took a deep hot drink and panted the fumes out of his burning throat. “Adam,” he said, “I am incomparably, incredibly, overwhelmingly glad to be home. I’ve never been so goddam lonesome in my life.”

Read the second passage aloud. Which of Lee’s two sentences should sound louder, the glad one or the lonesome one?

For the educator Both passages are Lee speaking, one near each end of the chapter, and they are worth copying side by side for what each says and what each holds back. The first has six sentences. It opens on a plain verdict, “I like it better that way,” and then settles one point in each short sentence: pretending would be lying, the news means nothing to the boys, maybe they will think of him. The fourth sentence turns on a dash, so that “privately” arrives as an afterthought and carries the hope. The fifth is the plainest wish in the passage. The sixth is the longest, and it hedges with “I hope”: the wish it names is one Lee hopes he does not have. Small-souled is a vocabulary word. The second passage has three sentences. The first strings three actions on “and” (lifted, took, panted), so the drink comes in one breath. The second splits Lee’s words around “he said” and then piles three long words, two of them beginning with in-, onto one plain one, glad. The third drops to short words and a curse. Lee’s “goddam” is kept because the passage turns on that drop, from three long words for gladness to blunt ones for loneliness; a teacher who prefers can have the student copy the first passage and read the second aloud. Incomparably is a vocabulary word. The talk prompt leaves the student to hear that drop for themselves. Some will make the gladness louder and some the loneliness; some will say the last sentence belongs almost under the breath. Leave it open.

Discussion

Narration Tell the chapter back, from the move to Dessie’s house to Lee’s last words to Adam. Then choose the one line you think the chapter turns on, and say why.

While the boys talk about a basketball game and sausage buns, Lee stands in the kitchen door, smiling at Adam. Why might their answer make him smile? Character
Lee’s last words on his way out are “Good-by, Mr. Trask. Good-by, Adam.” Which of those two men is he leaving? Author's choice
Walking home, Cal asks, “What do you suppose he’ll do without us?” Why does he wonder what Lee will do, and not what they will do? Inference
We learn that Aron won his ten-cent bet before we see Lee come back. Why put the bet first? Author's choice
“If we had a new gas stove we could make a cup of coffee in a few minutes,” Lee says, before he has explained anything. What has he already told Adam? Character
Just after giving up his last dream, Lee puts on broken English: “Missy Tlask, Chinee boy sink gung get dlunk.” What feeling is that voice covering? Tone

Make a Connection Think of a goodbye you remember, from a book or from your own life, that was said in very few words. What did the person mean that they did not say?

Vocabulary

small-souled: I hope I’m not so small-souled as to take satisfaction in being missed.” Petty; mean in spirit, wanting small things for oneself. It is the plain English opposite of magnanimous, which comes from the Latin for great-souled. Lee uses it of one wish: to take “satisfaction in being missed.” That would mean enjoying the thought of others feeling his absence. He says he hopes he is not that small; the word names the standard he holds himself to.
incomparably: “Adam,” he said, “I am incomparably, incredibly, overwhelmingly glad to be home. Beyond any comparison; so far past the usual that nothing can be set beside it. In- means not, and comparable means able to be compared. It is the first of the three words Lee piles onto the plain word glad, and each claims something different: incredibly says the gladness is hard to believe, overwhelmingly that it is too much to hold, and incomparably that nothing else measures up to it.

Critical thinking

Lee says, “I hope I’m not so small-souled as to take satisfaction in being missed.” Is it small-souled to want to be missed?
Lee gives up the bookstore he dreamed of for years and comes back to the Trasks. Has he lost his freedom, or found what he really wanted?