Final thoughts on Beyond the Outer Shores

I just finished this book which I feared at one time I was stuck in a low reading gear with. Wow. Just loved it in the end. Although parts of it were tedious to read at the time, I now understand what Tamm's intention was when he wrote it-namely, to take the charming Doc from Steinbeck's novels and turn him into the rounded and much more complex Ed Ricketts. He did like to drink and he did like women (although some speculate the Steinbeck exaggerated-he said when going through Ricketts journals after his death he tore out many "blackmail material" pages on Ricketts' daliances with local women and yet only two pages were missing.) He was also a devoted stepfather to his second wife's daughter who died of brain cancer. The illness put him deeply in debt. He was an ecologist ahead of his time who predicted the collapse of the sardine trade in Monterey-killed by greed and overfishing for the war effort. He wrote essays decrying the treatment of Japanese Americans during WWII. The greatest ecologist of the time, Dr. TA Stephenson, was a fan of his work and visited Ricketts, telling him he quoted Between Pacific Tides to his wife until she was sick of hearing about it.

I learned many random brilliant things from this book; hence, I will list them in a random fashion:

• Darwin did not apply his theory of evolution to mankind in The Origin of the Species. He thought church types would freak out. He posited it 20 years later in The Descent of Man. He even suggested religion was proof of man's evolution.
• Steinbeck called his first novel  an "abortion" and he was embarrassed by it.
• Joseph Campbell was very impressed by Steinbeck's ideas in To a God Unknown and said he hoped people would discover his work
• Campbell and Steinbeck, alas, never really became friends because of a brief unconsumated romance between Campbell and Steinbeck's first wife, Carol.
• Ricketts was a HUGE influence on Steinbeck's writing. He died in 1948. Steinbeck only wrote one book considered great after that (East of Eden) and he had started work on it before Ricketts died although not sure if he actually was writing it in earnest. He planned it as his magnum opus.
• Sweet Thursday may have been the Cannery Row sequel but people plainly saw more Steinbeck than Ricketts in the Doc character. Ricketts died in May, 1948 and was full of optimism about his planned trip to BC where he would meet up with Steinbeck and complete his Pacific ecological trilogy with The Outer Shores (ahh, that's the meaning of this books title.) The Doc in Thursday had writer's block, couldn't find pleasure in anything, and was annoyed that people were trying to find him a wife. This all-especially the last-applied to Steinbeck. He even describes Doc as staring at a yellow legal pad and being unable to write. It was Steinbeck, not Ricketts, who wrote on yellow legal pads.
• Steinbeck burned most of his correspondence with Ricketts after his death. Some friends of Ricketts (not all of whom liked Steinbeck) said it was because he didn't want people to know how responsible Ricketts really was for Steinbeck's output. I don't know why Steinbeck did it. Grief makes you do funny things. Ricketts was obviously a huge influence but he repeatedly referred to Steinbeck's gift for words and asked Steinbeck and Joseph Campbell to polish his work sometimes so I don't think it's fair to say Ricketts is the reason Steinbeck could write. 
• A lot of critics didn't like Cannery Row and found it not deep. Steinbeck said he wrote it in 4 layers. I of course am stuck in first gear with my literal Asperger's mind and loved the book. Ricketts' wife at the time wrote about it in the local paper and called the book a "poison cream puff" in response to some critic's review. Really? I thought it was sweet. WTF am I missing? I need a skeleton key.
• Steinbeck's first post-Ricketts work was the experimental novella/play Burning Bright. It was described as moribund by audiences.
• There was a real Mack, a real Lee chong, a real Dora Flood. Her story is interesting and rather tragic. She was indeed a madam and a large woman. She was also big hearted and a pillar of the community who contributed to local charities and quietly gave food to local families. The agents of decency descended on Monterey, alas, like a plague of locusts with hard hearts and small minds towing their offended messiah on a bier behind them and put her out of business. She died penniless a few months after Ricketts accident.
• Steinbeck thought Le Morte d'Arthur was one of the best books ever. His clique loved Robinson Jeffers' poem, The Roan Stallion.
• Steinbeck writing about the mourners following Ricketts funeral as they walked out of the Chapel and walked separately and alone on the shore "We were lost and could not find ourselves."
• Speaking of the funeral, Ricketts new wife (who was in her mid 20's) fell apart at his death and asked a friend to make the arrangements. He opted for a small invite only affair which angered Ricketts sister who said Ricketts was the kind of guy who was friends with everyone and wouldn't have excluded people.
• While going thru his things at the lab after his death, Steinbeck and a friend had Ricketts safe pried open. It was the only thing that survived the lab fire in 1936 (where he lost his books and records.) In the safe was a bottle of scotch and a note "What the hell do you expect to find in here? Here's a drink for your trouble." 
• One more happy story to end on: Ricketts was terminally perturbed with the treatment he got from Stanford University Press. They were supposed to be coming out with a second edition of his book but again, kept delaying it. He and Steinbeck got drunk one night and wrote a note to the publisher saying they looked forward to the Press' forthcoming opus "The Internal Combustion Engine-Will it Work?" Ricketts contacted them a few days later to apologize but he publisher actually said the note shamed him and he would work to get the second edition finally released. Alas, it was published posthumously. But, it did contain a touching prologue saying the author "Dr. Ricketts" died tragically before he could review the final copy. After all the delays and snubs from peers for his lack of a degree, recognition at last.

Ok that's enough. The book is just too fresh in my head. I really could sit and cry for Ricketts, Steinbeck and the sardines if I let myself.