East of Eden

Chapter 39

John Steinbeck · Mountaineers 10th–12th

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Copywork

At intervals Salinas suffered from a mild eructation of morality. The process never varied much. One burst was like another. Sometimes it started in the pulpit and sometimes with a new ambitious president of the Women’s Civic Club. Gambling was invariably the sin to be eradicated.

In the kitchen Cal urged on the water heating in the coffeepot, and yet he was pleased to be waiting. A miracle once it is familiar is no longer a miracle; Cal had lost his wonder at the golden relationship with his father but the pleasure remained. The poison of loneliness and the gnawing envy of the unlonely had gone out of him, and his person was clean and sweet, and he knew it was. He dredged up an old hatred to test himself, and he found the hatred gone. He wanted to serve his father, to give him some great gift, to perform some huge good task in honor of his father.

Read both passages aloud. Which sentence in the second sounds most like the narrator of the first?

For the educator The two passages come from the first section, one from its opening and one from its middle, and they are worth copying as a pair. The first has five sentences and opens the chapter. The narrator talks about the town’s fits of virtue in the language of an illness: Salinas “suffered from” them, and what comes up is an “eructation,” a belch, dressed in a long Latin word. The next two sentences are short and flat, and they say the same thing twice: the process “never varied much,” and “One burst was like another.” The fourth balances two starting points, the pulpit and the club president, on the word sometimes, used twice. The fifth springs the joke: whatever the start, the sin is “invariably” gambling. Eructation, invariably and eradicated are vocabulary words. The second passage has five sentences and comes from the kitchen, in the middle of the talk at breakfast, while Adam waits for his coffee. The first sentence holds two feelings at once, joined by “and yet”: Cal hurries the water and is glad to wait. The second opens with a general truth about miracles, and a semicolon turns it on Cal; “but the pleasure remained” is the sentence’s turn. The third strings its clauses together with “and,” and its first clause holds a rare word, “the unlonely,” an adjective made into a crowd of people. It ends on five short words: “and he knew it was.” The fourth is a test and its result, with “hatred” said twice. The fifth climbs through three verbs, to serve, to give, to perform, each task bigger than the last, and “his father” comes both early in it and at its very end. For the talk prompt, many will choose the second sentence: like the narrator’s line about the raids, “It is one of the triumphs of the human that he can know a thing and still not believe it,” it steps back to state a general truth and then turns it on a person. Some will choose the third, for “the unlonely,” a word coined for the occasion, as “eructation” is a grand word borrowed for one. Some will hear the dry ending “and he knew it was” as kin to “One burst was like another.” Then ask whether that echo casts a doubt on Cal’s change or only marks the narrator’s voice. Leave it open, and claim nothing about whether Cal’s happiness lasts.

Discussion

Narration Tell the chapter back in a few sentences, from the town’s gambling raids to Cal running out of Kate’s house. Then choose the one sentence you think the whole chapter turns on, and say why.

The narrator calls it a triumph that a person “can know a thing and still not believe it.” Who in this chapter does that? Theme
When Cal’s fear turns to resentment, the narrator says a trapped fox might feel “anger at the paw which held him to the trap.” Whose paw is that? Author's choice
At the end of breakfast Adam says “Cal!” harshly, and then he tells his son, “I trust you.” What is he trusting Cal with? Character
For weeks Cal is sure Kate has not noticed him, but at her gate she says, “This isn’t the first time you’ve followed me.” By then, which of them knows more about the other? Inference
When Cal says he loves his father, “an aching twist” rises in Kate’s chest. What hurts her? Character

Make a Connection Think of a story, from a book or from your own life, where kindness was harder to take than anger would have been. What made it harder?

Vocabulary

eructation: At intervals Salinas suffered from a mild eructation of morality. A belch. It is a long Latin word for a crude thing, and the narrator uses it on purpose: the town’s fits of virtue come up now and then like a belch, short and noisy, and then they are over. The grand word for a low act sets the mocking tone of the whole account of the raids.
invariably: Gambling was invariably the sin to be eradicated. Always, without exception; every single time. It is built from in-, not, and vary: it never varies. The narrator uses it for the punch line of his joke: a crusade may start in the pulpit or in the women’s club, but the sin it picks is always gambling, the one that is safe to attack. Later in the chapter Kate’s Monday route never varies either.
eradicated: Gambling was invariably the sin to be eradicated. Pulled out by the roots; wiped out completely. It comes from Latin e-, out, and radix, root, the same root as radish. The town speaks of gambling as a sin to be torn out by the roots, and what follows is one night’s raid and a few fines. The big word measures how far the talk outruns the deed.
spotlessness: The town relaxed in its new spotlessness and the houses lost only one night of business plus the fines. The state of having no spot or stain; perfect cleanness. The suffix -ness turns the adjective spotless into a thing the town can own and rest in. The word is ironic here: the town relaxes in a cleanness that lasted one night, and everyone knew the raid was coming.
vortices: Adam’s irises were light blue with dark radial lines leading into the vortices of his pupils. The plural of vortex: a whirl, like water spiraling down a drain, that pulls things toward its center. Looking into his father’s eyes for the first time, Cal sees dark lines running into the vortices of the pupils, as if the eyes drew him in, and deep in each pupil he sees his own face. The Latin plural works like index and indices.

Critical thinking

Right after Kate tells him to “wipe your nose,” Cal says he has made Aron cry, and that it makes him sick. What does he want her to hear?
Cal tells Kate, “I don’t hate you,” and then, “But I’m glad you’re afraid.” Is that gladness a sign that he is free of her, or a sign of how much of her he still carries?