When they saw it was a beautiful baby, they did not know what to say. Those feminine exclamations of delight designed to reassure young mothers that the horrible reptilian creatures in their arms are human and will not grow up to be monstrosities, lost their meaning.Once again, I am in awe. There are times when the thing you read is no longer a set of black lines on white page, no longer words and symbols of images far away, no longer even vivid pictures of good things going on right before you; instead the words become a mirror into your own self--a picture of your heart which only you would have recognized in the first place. Steinbeck has an uncanny knack for catching what is in your heart exactly and then sending characters out dancing before you, clothed in your deepest being. It can be startling, but it always makes you surge forward with the recognition of yourself.
"Helen, every man must some time or other want to beat a woman. I think I'm a mild man, but right now I want to beat your face with my fists." He looked into her dark eyes and saw that he had only put a new tragedy upon her, had only given her a new situation to endure.
The people of the valley told many stories about Junius. Sometimes they hated him with the loathing busy people have for lazy ones, and sometimes they envied his laziness; but often they pitied him because he blundered so. No one in the valley ever realized that he was happy.
Pastures of Heaven is like some less frolicking version of Tortilla Flats and Cannery Row. Yet, it is by no means dark. The word I think which summarizes it best would be solemn. With Steinbeck's usual attachment to the earth and its hearty biology (which no human is free from) is especially present. And as he tells the half melancholy, half joyous stories of the inhabitants of this blessed valley, you cannot help but walk beside the characters.
There are many memorable persons who haunt this book. Every chapter, though linked tightly to all the others, is the story of a separate family in the valley. And every family has its separate burdens, desires, dreams and struggles. I cannot do justice to all, or even one, but cannot help but mention the chapter on Junius and his son. I have never seen a more idyllic portrait painted of poverty and wisdom. While I am almost sure such an existence could never be, Steinbeck has me doubting my certainty.
There is a deep meaning in this tale which I do not yet understand. I think I could just barely smell it, see its shadow coming around the corner. There is something about being content, something about peace, something about living with the world. And it is strange that it takes words of heaven to speak of this. Heaven is what it is. As long as we are refining it, molding it, shaping it to be ours, we will not ever reach it.
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