Mark André ’s Reviews > East of Eden > Status Update
Mark André
is on page 28 of 602
And you must not expect to find that people understand what they do. So many things are done instinctively, the way a bee makes honey or a fox dips his paws in a stream to fool dogs. A fox can’t say why he does it, and what bee remembers winter or expects it to come again?
— Mar 18, 2026 11:09PM
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Mark’s Previous Updates
Mark André
is on page 153 of 602
Teachers rarely lasted very long in the country schools. The work was so hard and the proposals so constant that they married within a very short time.
— Mar 22, 2026 01:12PM
Mark André
is on page 152 of 602
They were handsome girls and they carried with them the glow of their descent from the kings of Ireland. [...] No one ever thought of them as deserving pity. Samuel raised a distinctly superior breed. They were better read and better bred than most of their contemporaries. To all of them Samuel communicated his love of learning, and he set them apart from the prideful ignorance of their time.
— Mar 22, 2026 08:23AM
Mark André
is on page 149 of 602
Well, a man’s mind can’t stay in time the way his body does.
— Mar 22, 2026 08:14AM
Mark André
is on page 147 of 602
Uisquebaugh—it’s an Irish word—whisky, water of life—and so it is.
— Mar 22, 2026 08:09AM
Mark André
is on page 134 of 602
Let’s close it like a book and go on reading! (...) A man will have clean hands once we get the lid slammed shut on that stinking century. There’s no rot on this clean new hundred years. (...) It’s not stacked, and any bastard who deals seconds from this new deck of years—why, we’ll crucify him head down over a privy.
Oh, but strawberries will never taste so good again and the thighs of women have lost their clutch!
— Mar 21, 2026 09:33PM
Oh, but strawberries will never taste so good again and the thighs of women have lost their clutch!
Mark André
is on page 133 of 602
Old men who didn’t know whether they were going to stagger over the boundary of the century looked forward to it with distaste. For the world was changing, and sweetness was gone, and virtue too. Worry had crept on a corroding world, and what was lost—good manners, ease and beauty? Ladies were not ladies any more, and you couldn’t trust a gentleman’s word.
— Mar 21, 2026 09:23PM
Mark André
is on page 119 of 602
Her fingers were pink and soft, but the skin on the back of her hand seemed to have an underbloom like a pearl. Adam chuckled with delight. Her breathing stopped and he became electrically alert—then her throat clicked and the rhythmed snoring continued. Gently he worked her hand and arm under the cover before he tiptoed out of the room.
— Mar 21, 2026 12:49PM
Mark André
is on page 88 of 602
I hated to do it,” he said. “I had to. And I think it did her good. She seems like a changed girl to me. Maybe we haven’t bent the twig enough. We’ve spared the rod. Maybe we were wrong.” And he knew that although his wife had insisted on the whipping, although she had forced him to whip Cathy, she hated him for doing it. Despair settled over him.
— Mar 21, 2026 06:52AM
Mark André
is on page 76 of 602
There was a time when a girl like Cathy would have been called possessed by the devil. She would have been exorcised to cast out the evil spirit, and if after many trials that did not work, she would have been burned as a witch for the good of the community. The one thing that may not be forgiven a witch is her ability to distress people, to make them restless and uneasy and even envious.
— Mar 20, 2026 08:09PM
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Thank you, Kushagri!A rather interesting observation by the author.
Thank you, Beda! Nice to hear from you.I’m finding Steinbeck’s storytelling style enjoyable so far.
Thank you, Jackie L.! Nice to meet you.My first Steinbeck. Pretty good so far.
Thank you, Maryana! Nice to meet you.I’ve seen this book on many shelves, so I thought I would try it myself. So far, so good.
Thank you, Mighty Aphrodite! Nice to meet you.I’m trying to resolve my unfounded prejudice against mr Steinbeck. We’ll see.
Thank you, Andrea! Nice to meet you.My first Steinbeck.
Thank you, Jamie! Nice to meet you.I know nothing about the story here. I love being surprised by a new book.
Thank you, carla 🦋! Nice to meet you.My first Steinbeck. Pretty good so far.
Thank you, Sara!My first Steinbeck. Not bad so far.
Thank you, Sharon_🌺! Very nice to meet you.An interesting remark about the bees: ‘remember’ and ‘expect’ are such complex ideas.
Thank you, Kay! Very nice to meet you.My first Steinbeck. Quite readable so far.
Thank you, Izzy! Very nice to meet you.My first Steinbeck. Interesting story so far.
Thank you, Akane! Very nice to meet you.My first Steinbeck. Interesting reference to bees.
Thank you, Alice!I love the bit about the bees.
Thank you, Raz. Good to hear from you.Actually bees are pretty smart.
Thank you, Sarah! Very nice to meet you.The narrator here has a lot of things to say.
Thank you, J.! Nice to hear from you.I particularly like the speculation about the bees, where the more human traits remembers and expects stand out.
Thank you, A.E.! Nice to hear from you.Interesting examples of what the narrator labels instinct.
Thank you, Peter. Good to hear from you.I like the speculation about the bees. Very imaginative.
Thank you, Sayuri! Very nice to meet you.This is my first adventure with this author. I’ve seen this title posted on a number of persons sites. So it’s kind of an experiment. I like especially the question at the end: “what bee remembers winter or expects it to come again?” At first I thought that remembers and expects were rather complex notions to apply to a bee, but then I remembered that the comment started off about instinct which is a much more complicated facility to understand. Provocative writing.
I like the end: “what bee remembers winter or expects it to come again?”