East of Eden

Chapter 46

John Steinbeck · Mountaineers 10th–12th

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Copywork

My little sister and I did our part with Mr. Fenchel, and it is one of those memories of shame that still makes me break into a sweat and tighten up around the throat. We were standing in our front yard on the lawn one evening and we saw him coming with little fat steps. His black homburg was brushed and squarely set on his head. I don’t remember that we discussed our plan but we must have, to have carried it out so well.

There is no dignity in death in battle. Mostly that is a splashing about of human meat and fluid, and the result is filthy, but there is a great and almost sweet dignity in the sorrow, the helpless, the hopeless sorrow, that comes down over a family with the telegram. Nothing to say, nothing to do, and only one hope—I hope he didn’t suffer—and what a forlorn and last-choice hope that is. And it is true that there were some people who, when their sorrow was beginning to lose its savor, gently edged it toward pride and felt increasingly important because of their loss.

Read both passages aloud. Which sentence do you think cost the narrator the most to write?

For the educator The first passage is the whole paragraph after the one that begins “We used every cruelty we could think of on Mr. Fenchel”; the second is the start of the chapter’s last paragraph. The first is four sentences. The opening sentence names the act in the war’s own phrase, “did our part,” and then, after a comma and “and,” names the memory and two things the body still does: “break into a sweat and tighten up around the throat.” The present tense (“still makes me”) brings the memory into now. The second sentence is long and plain, two clauses joined by “and” with no comma, and it ends on “little fat steps,” seen from the lawn. The third is short and holds one careful detail: a hat “brushed and squarely set,” two ways of taking care joined by “and.” The fourth turns on “but” with no comma before it, then puts a comma before the closing “to have carried it out so well.” The second passage is four sentences. The first is eight flat words. The second answers it with its opposite, turning on “but there is”: no dignity in the death, “a great and almost sweet dignity” in the sorrow. It repeats its noun with two adjectives that nearly rhyme, “the helpless, the hopeless sorrow,” set off by commas. The third opens on two matching fragments, “Nothing to say, nothing to do,” sets the family’s one hope between two dashes as if spoken, and ends on the hyphenated “last-choice.” The fourth opens on “And,” then stops between “who” and its verbs for a “when” clause set off by commas, and then runs two verbs, “edged” and “felt”: the sorrow fades, and pride comes in by degrees. Students can practise the comma before an infinitive phrase, the commas around a repeated noun, the paired dashes, the commas around an interrupting clause, and the apostrophes in “don’t” and “didn’t.” For the talk prompt, some will choose “we must have, to have carried it out so well,” where the narrator refuses the excuse of a blank memory. Others will choose the first sentence, which admits the sweat. Others will choose “I hope he didn’t suffer,” the words a family says when it can do nothing, or the last sentence, where the narrator says a hard thing about grieving people. Let them argue; there is no single answer.

Discussion

Narration Tell the chapter back in a few sentences, from the November rain to the last line about sorrow. Then pick the one sentence you think matters most, and say why the narrator needs it there.

For about twenty years, Mr. Fenchel had “an accent that made you laugh.” What kind of laugh was that before the war? Character
Mr. Fenchel “basted and ripped and sewed and ripped on the same piece of cloth over and over.” How does the narrator know that? Inference
Mr. Fenchel “just stood there sobbing,” and the two of them walked “stiffly” back across the street to their yard. What kept them from going to him? Moral reasoning
Right after the fire, the narrator writes, “No Kaiser-loving son of a bitch was going to get away with it with us.” Who is the “us”? Author's choice
Mr. Fenchel goes broke buying war bonds, and the town calls it a cover-up. A man who makes money out of the war is only expected to put “a part of his loot” into bonds. Why do the same bonds mean such different things? Theme

Make a Connection Think of another time or place where neighbors turned on someone who sounded different. Where does the comparison with Salinas hold, and where does it break down?

Vocabulary

intransigent: The war years were wet years, and there were many people who blamed the strange intransigent weather on the firing of the great guns in France. Refusing to give way or change, however hard it is pushed. The word is usually said of stubborn people. Given to the weather, it treats the rain as if it had a will, which is the first step toward blaming it on something.
foppish: Men began to wear their handkerchiefs in their sleeves and some foppish lieutenants carried swagger sticks. Too taken up with fine clothes and a smart look, in a way others find silly. These lieutenants copy the British for show. The word helps set the tone of the chapter’s lighter pages, before the turn to Mr. Fenchel.
inevitably: We of Salinas did all of the things that are inevitably done in a war, and we thought the inevitable thoughts. In a way that could not have been avoided. The narrator uses the word twice in one sentence, once for deeds and once for thoughts. It explains the town, and it may also excuse it.
last-choice: Nothing to say, nothing to do, and only one hope—I hope he didn’t suffer—and what a forlorn and last-choice hope that is. Chosen only because nothing else is left. Once the telegram comes, a family cannot hope he lives, only that he did not suffer. The hyphen joins the two words into one, as if the hope were the last item on a list, kept because every other one is gone.
increasingly: And it is true that there were some people who, when their sorrow was beginning to lose its savor, gently edged it toward pride and felt increasingly important because of their loss. More and more, by degrees. The families do not decide to feel important; they come to feel it a little at a time as the sorrow fades. The word carries the narrator’s point that pride creeps in slowly, which is how it goes unnoticed.

Critical thinking

The narrator says Salinas did “all of the things that are inevitably done in a war.” Is “inevitably” the right word for what Salinas did?
When some families’ sorrow began to fade, the narrator says, they “gently edged it toward pride.” Could telling this story do the same thing to his own shame?
The narrator says he and Mary were “too young to do a good job on Mr. Fenchel.” Is what the two of them did smaller than what the thirty men did, or the same thing?