It may come as a surprise to some, but yes, I’m still actively involved in my Siblings’ Book Club. With the dearth of discussion we’ve had in 2021, though, it’s almost as if I’m the only one left! Still, I keep plugging away at our list, and this 1938 collection of short stories by John Steinbeck is our 7th book of 10 for the year.

Each of the twelve short stories (and one novella) in this collection is set entirely in the Salinas Valley of central California. I didn’t check it, but I’m pretty sure it’s the same general location where the Joads go in The Grapes of Wrath, and even the area whose coast Steinbeck explored in The Log from the Sea of Cortez. I’ve not spent much time in California, so the history of this particular corner of the country doesn’t mean much to me. I’m more about the story, and boy, this one’s got some doozies.

I’ll say this by way of introduction: I bet a $5 gold piece that, if my sister and the other ladies in our Book Club do take the time to read this book before the year is out, they’re going to hate it. I felt that way about a female’s likely response after the first story, and the subsequent tales never changed my mind.

As I love to do with short-story collections, I’m going to delineate my notes story by story. Most of these notes contain my just-finished-reading thoughts, so what they lack in uniformity, they’ll make up for in content — or at least that’s the theory. Spoilers likely abound.

1) “The Chrysanthemums”

It’s not too easy for a man to write from a female‘s perspective, yet Steinbeck wasn’t afraid to try. Many women today may not agree that Steinbeck captured Elisa’s thoughts and fears very well in this story, but that may not be a fault in writing or interpretation. Perhaps only a woman living during the 1930s could accurately gauge the validity of Elisa’s internal struggle. She seems to be a woman who doesn’t quite know herself and is completely ignorant of the love that exists within her marriage.

Her psyche breaks down this way: She begins as a standard hard-working housewife, a foil character at first outside a dusty farmhouse. But then, when the traveling salesman compliments her flowers, she beams with strength. She’s even willing to primp herself for a date with her husband that afternoon, her newfound autonomy shining brightly in her carefully donned femininity. But when she sees the gifted flowers tossed carelessly in the road, her entire world (and psyche) crashes. She’s crushed, and her gut responses include a desire to drown her sorrows in violence and alcohol. In the end, though, she merely weeps, and that seems to provide her the emotional release she needed…and we readers are then left to ruminate.

A few implications nose their way through this story, though I won’t touch on them much. Something sexual is happening here (especially in the room), though I’m not trying to make heads or tails of it—and it’s there that I really wonder if women can see themselves in Steinbeck’s interpretation. There’s also poor ol’ Henry, Elisa’s husband who cares for and loves her but simply doesn’t understand her. Elisa’s no hero, to be sure, but her total ignorance of the loving man in her life is as hurtful to Henry as she feels the salesman was to her. She sees an uprooted flower in the road, and he’s left with an unhinged wife. Doesn’t seem fair, but perhaps that’s Steinbeck’s pessimistic message about marriage.

2) “The White Quail”

Steinbeck follows the first female-lead story with another, and it’s equally pessimistic about wives and marriage. Many women, he must have believed, are disturbed and beyond comfort or belief. Husbands are at a loss to understand them, and, well…that’s life. In this story, the wife is so determined to create and preen her perfect garden that it’s all she can think of or talk about. This beautiful piece of natural art is a character in itself, and a character I quickly learned to hate. The deeper in love with this garden the woman falls, the deeper into disturbia the story moves. The ending was a total shocker to me, and I swear it’s the most disturbing story in the book.

3) “Flight”

I you weren’t already convinced that John Steinbeck loves to write downers, well, this one should finally clinch it for you. Nothing like killing off your main character in as grisly a way as you can. The feel of this story was powerfully Western, and I wonder if it served as a template for the likes of Louis L’Amour and Zane Grey. Really well written, as it takes you there to those thirsty desert trails.

4) “The Snake”

Disturbed and sad women seem to be Steinbeck’s theme for this collection. While this story is oddly set in town and not the country, it still bears much of the author’s outlook on life. Sadness, loneliness, death or disappearance—it’s got it all, I guess. The Long Valley doesn’t seem to be a great book for, say, a newlywed to read. Or a depressed person, but that should go without saying.

5) “Breakfast”

This is the only apparently non-fiction story in the lot, more of an anecdote actually. And boy, what a refreshing pit stop! The only female character present is surprisingly not depressed, there’s bacon to be had, and it’s written in first person. There’s hope for humanity yet!

6) “The Raid”

Communists attempt to hold a secret meeting and are willing to become martyrs for the cause. In case the readers missed their virtue, Steinbeck has them quote Jesus towards the end, so he can equate the two worldviews. A theologian he is not. Honestly, I think it shows that Steinbeck had about as much love for Christians as he did for the Commies. I could be wrong.

7) “The Harness”

This story is about the inexplicable power a wife can have on the husband, even when she’s dead and he’s a widower. There’s an interesting perspective on the widower and his relationship with the wife after she’s passed:

“Even if she could see me, and I didn’t do what she wanted, she ought to feel good because I did [what she wanted] when she was here. It ought to please her that she made a good man of me. If I wasn’t a good man when she wasn’t here, that’d prove she did it all, wouldn’t it?” (117-118).

8) “The Vigilante”

Here’s a story about guilt that you will likely never see reprinted. Well, maybe in Alabama. It includes a lynching, a whole mess of racial slurs, and guilt…but not really the kind of guilt that’ll change a man and heal a country, I don’t think.

9) “Johnny Bear”

This one was weird, and my only notes say this: “What a long, convoluted way to say, ‘I’m not only racist against the Blacks but against ‘Chinks’ too.” Yeah, it would be pretty hard to see this one reprinted either. I’m reading from a First Edition, so I can’t know, but I wonder if this book is still in print and/or in its entirety.

10) “The Murder”

And just when you thought the stories couldn’t get any worse! Infidelity, violent spousal abuse, treating women like animals (well, animals that cook your breakfast, if they’re worth the space)—this one cuts no corners. What would my sisters be thinking? Now I get it that spousal abuse actually remained normalized back then and in some cultures (i.e. Jelka wasn’t from the Salinas Valley), but come on. I know that even today back in China, this continues to be an issue in many (most?) Chinese marriages, but again, come on! Why does Steinbeck feel the need to delve into the depths of our human depravity? Is that what sold in 1938? Hard to imagine, but obviously so.

11) “St. Katy the Virgin”

This one’s just gross. Ever want to read a book about religion by a man who seemed to hate organized religion? This one’s the ticket. Granted, Steinbeck seems more anti-Catholic in this story than anti-religion or anti-Christianity, but I’m sure he’d be happy to cross those boundaries if you want to interpret him this way. In my notes, I wondered: “When am I going to put this book down?”

12) “Red Pony”

Finally something familiar! I’ve actually never read this three-part novella before, but I’ve seen it around. If I’m not mistaken, it often gets sided with Of Mice and Men. Longer than the rest and following the young boy, Jody, this tale was still as depressing as the others, and I noted in the margins at one point: “No wonder they called it ‘The Great Depression!'” It certainly left its mark on people! This was the most Steinbeck-esque story of the lot (if I’m allowed to say that), focused on the battles of expectations.

One question I had (and perhaps reading more of his stories would tell me): what happened with the rapier and the old man? It’s like he came and left only to fill that chapter. Unless he’s a metaphor for something I missed, it seems like Steinbeck could have skipped that episode entirely.

13) “Leader of the People”

I was surprised to find that the final story in the lot took us back to Jody’s farm with Billy Buck the cowhand and the rest. This time, grandfather comes to visit. We’ve offended the women, the children, the spouses, and the races…so why not take a jab at the elderly too? This moderately depressing tale sends loud and clear the message that “there’s no hope for future explorations, so even your dreams are dead.” Thanks, John. Needed that.

It’s been so long since I’ve read anything by Steinbeck that I can’t really compare this to any of his other works. I can say with hesitant confidence, though, that this was even more of a downer than The Grapes of Wrath. Promising to depress or offend anyone, this collection of short stories bears all the marks of a truly great piece of literature. I jest, but only slightly.

©2021 E.T.

Read More from John Steinbeck:

• The Long Valley (1938)
• The Moon is Down (1942)
• The Pearl (1947)
• Log from the Sea of Cortez (1951)
• America and Americans (1966)
• The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights (1976)