Cannery Row

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorCollege, Undergraduate August 2001

download word file, 6 pages 1.0

Cannery Row John Steinbeck is one of the best authors of the twentieth century. With books like Of Mice and Men and The Pearl, Steinbeck does a wonderful job of always entertaining readers while still making people think. He often uses poor people, who have some kind of interesting story to tell, as the main characters in his books. Cannery Row is no exception.

The setting of the book Cannery Row is just that, on Cannery Row. As far as the plot goes, it seems as though Cannery Row is the plot in itself. Meaning this. While there are many character stories in Cannery Row, John Steinbeck does not really focus on one particular character. He talks about the lives of many people who live on Cannery Row. The plot, or plots, of this book is/are the lives of many different people who live there.

There are too many characters in Cannery Row to even name.

And many of them have no greater importance than any other. However, there are a few who do a great job of symbolizing important types of people. Doc, a marine biologist, is one of those characters. Doc's purpose in the book is to symbolize hope. In the beginning of the book, Doc is said to be a very lonely man. It seemed as though his only purpose in life was to be a single man who did his work that needed to be done, and settle for just that. Things would later change for Doc. He fell in love. Doc is a perfect example that good things can come to anyone.

Lee Chong, the owner of the grocery store on Cannery Row, seems to symbolize a Baptist, or something close to that. Lee's store is said to have everything any...