Monstrous Ecology: John Steinbeck, Ecology, and American Cultural Politics
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Monstrous Ecology Lloyd Willis 357
Monstrous Ecology:
John Steinbeck, Ecology, and
American Cultural Politics
Lloyd Willis
In the collection of essays, Steinbeck and seems, would be to change the mode of critical
the Environment: Interdisciplinary Approaches inquiry from one of diagnosis to evaluation and to
(1997), a range of scholars establish that Stein- broaden the focus of such inquiry until it allows
beck was an environmentalist. They remain recognition of the complex ways in which envi-
strangely uncomfortable with their assertion, ronmentalism interacts with other key elements of
however. Warren French, for instance, asks, Steinbeck’s work. In the spirit of such a method-
‘‘How green was John Steinbeck? Did he simply ological shift, the purpose of this article is to in-
pay lip service to environmental preservation or vestigate the ways in which the three critical
did he work effectively toward mitigating eco- concepts of environmentalism, ecology, and cul-
damage?’’ (282). Similarly, John H. Timmerman ture consistently interact through the mediator of
concedes that ‘‘Steinbeck’s ethical action is the monstrosity throughout Steinbeck’s oeuvre. In-
work of revelation: to make readers mindful of vestigating the ways that monstrosity mediates
our despoilation of the land’’ but remarks that ‘‘in the interactions of environmentalism, ecology,
regard to a specific program to rectify that course, and culture constitutes one way of escaping
however, this ethic, at least as delineated in Amer- a diagnostic approach to Steinbeck’s environ-
ica and Americans, is found wanting’’ (312). Joel mentalism that ultimately offers a much broader
Hedgpeth seems disappointed that ‘‘Steinbeck is understanding of how Steinbeck viewed the
always apologizing for saying bad things and re- workings of American mass culture, why his ec-
assuring us that he still loves us all’’ (306), and ological worldviews and environmental activism
Eric Gladstein and Mimi Reisel Gladstein are un- stopped where they did, and exactly how high the
happy that Steinbeck stops short of excoriating an stakes were for potential radical environmentalists
environmental abuse when he ‘‘does not want to in the mid-twentieth-century United States.2
brand the Japanese fishermen or Mexican officials
who permitted the dragging [of the ocean floor] as
criminals’’ in Sea of Cortez (169). Monstrosity and Monstrous Figures
Beyond simply diagnosing Steinbeck as an ec-
ologically minded writer who did indeed waffle
when it came to environmental activism, how else Near the beginning of Travels with Charley: In
might Steinbeck’s relationship to ecology and Search of America (1962), Steinbeck writes that
environmentalism be investigated?1 The most his purpose in traveling across the continent is ‘‘to
immediately obvious ways to move forward, it rediscover this monster land,’’ repeatedly using
Lloyd Willis is a PhD candidate in English at the University of Florida. His dissertation, which engages authors ranging from James
Fenimore Cooper and Ralph Waldo Emerson to Willa Cather and John Steinbeck, investigates the environmental politics of American
authors and the critics who have shaped the American canon from the 1850s to the 1950s.358 The Journal of American Culture Volume 28, Number 4 December 2005
‘‘monster’’ as a metaphor to represent largeness of womanhood (although the purity and virtue of
and mystery (6, 24). This simple invocation of Curley’s wife are highly suspect) and restore the
monstrosity, however, is hardly the author’s first appearance of human beings as entirely self-
engagement with the subject or indicative of his controlled figures living within universally un-
deep understanding of the concept. In actuality, derstood codes of conduct.
Steinbeck’s use of monstrosity reveals a rather While Lenny himself comes to be declared
surprising familiarity with its historicity and its monstrous, Lenny and George together constitute
deep connection to politics, in the sense of both a more abstract social monstrosity in Of Mice and
broad state/civic governance and in the negotia- Men’s ranch culture. They share an exclusive
tion of smaller interpersonal relationships. Stein- homosocial relationship for which they are called
beck engaged monstrosity, in fact, as early as 1933 to answer throughout the course of the story. In
in To a God Unknown, with a remarkable grasp murdering Lenny privately, interestingly enough,
of how monstrosity has functioned historically. George not only denies the larger society the
A significant portion of the novel’s plot is haunted public killing that re-establishes community and
by the Renaissance belief that monstrous birth reaffirms conceptions of normalcy, deviance, and
defects—‘‘children born with tails, with extra the consequences of deviancy, but he also extri-
limbs, with mouths in the middle of their cates himself from the dire problem of his rela-
backs’’—are caused by the wayward imaginations tionship with Lenny. In killing Lenny and
of expectant mothers (99).3 In addition to his rec- allowing the community to think that Lenny at-
ognition of its historical tradition, Steinbeck’s tacked him, George proves to the rest of the
treatment of monstrosity’s politics almost per- community that his bond with the man was not
fectly demonstrates that ‘‘monsters are . . . polit- closer than that allowed by the community’s
ical beings’’ who are ‘‘chosen with deliberation to unspoken codes of normal heterosexual male
do quite specific narrative and social work,’’ in- behavior.
cluding the clear mapping of the ‘‘edge[s]’’ and
‘‘normal center[s]’’ of social groups and the
strengthening of the ‘‘communal body’’ through Monstrous Cultures
‘‘killing the monsters—in as public and showy a
way as possible’’ (Ingebretsen, ‘‘Monster-Making’’
26).4 As Steinbeck uses figures and notions of mon-
Steinbeck’s clearest exhibition of monstrosity strosity in his fiction, he also works with the other
as a type of sociopolitical regulatory device is side of the coin—the cultures in which these
probably Of Mice and Men (1937). The story monstrosities are created. In most of Steinbeck’s
confronts monstrosity in the sense of both phys- early fiction, the cultural core is local. Tortilla Flat
ical aberrations and abstract, deployable political (1935), while written as a deliberate glorification
constructs. Lenny, of course, is an anomaly— of a social class and way of life that lie outside of
monsters, after all, are not born but created dis- national norms, focuses entirely on a fringe com-
cursively within communities—who possesses su- munity and culture—that of the paisanos who live
perhuman strength, works like a machine, and on the outskirts of Monterey. To a God Unknown
lacks normal human capacities for judgment and (1933) is largely limited to the workings of a large
restraint. With the exception of George, who is family and a small valley community, and Of Mice
capable of seeing him as he is (a human being who and Men concerns itself with the goings-on of one
means no one any harm), Lenny is a monster to particular ranch. With The Grapes of Wrath
the culture in which he lives and must ultimately (1939), however, Steinbeck clearly increases his
be ‘‘staked’’ (Ingebretsen’s term), or ceremonially scope. Rather than offering a story, like Tortilla
killed, by the dominant culture of the book in Flat, that quietly offers a counterpoint to a main-
order to eliminate a threat to the purity and virtue stream culture that never actually becomes a topicMonstrous Ecology Lloyd Willis 359
of discussion in its narrative, in The Grapes of crime to be happy without equipment. . . .
Wrath, Steinbeck creates a narrative that overtly The doctrine of our time is that man can’t
confronts the national problem of the Dust Bowl get along without a whole hell of a lot of
and moves its characters across half the continent. stuff. You may not be preaching it, but
you’re living treason.’’ (61)
The Joads maintain a system of core cultural val-
ues that privilege agrarianism, independence, and
toughness, but they face an increasingly frighten- Through negations—explanations of what the se-
ing and increasingly more powerful culture of er is not—Steinbeck outlines the characteristics of
technology, progress, and capitalism that is ad- America’s cultural core. The seer does not fit into
vanced by faceless conglomerates (the business the mainstream because he is reasonable; there-
forces that displace them from their farm) and by fore, mainstream American culture is not reason-
cyborg men who, merged with tanklike tractors, able. He does not fit in because he is not
literally drive the family from its land. After The materialistic, he does not need stuff; mainstream
Grapes of Wrath, the cultural core that Steinbeck American culture, in this assessment, is therefore
engages is consistently national in scope and un- profoundly materialistic. The most interesting el-
derstood as profoundly materialistic, consump- ement of these comments is not that Steinbeck,
tive, wasteful, and antagonistic toward any form through Doc, damns the core values of American
of individuality. Characters who exist outside culture as wayward, but that he describes the ab-
of this core—visionary and prophetic characters errant seer as endangered because of his difference
like Tom Joad and Jim Casy—moreover, live pre- and his power of speech. Steinbeck understands
carious lives on a cultural border that is vigilantly that although the seer may not be committing a
patrolled and violently defended against subver- codified crime by living outside of cultural ex-
sives and radicals. pectations, he can be punished simply because his
The different levels of political engagement way of life is incomprehensible to those around
displayed in Tortilla Flat and The Grapes of him. It is only because he is silent, ‘‘not preach-
Wrath also exist in Cannery Row (1945) and ing,’’ it seems, that the seer has not been branded
Sweet Thursday (1954), two novels set in the same monstrous and killed in the name of preserving
place and inhabited by essentially the same cast of the status quo of progress, materialism, and
characters. While Cannery Row, set in pre–World conformity.5
War II Monterey, offers a group of characters Steinbeck’s fiction paints a startlingly clear
quietly resisting progress and capitalism under the picture of how the author understands American
shadow of the fish canning industry, Sweet Thurs- culture to work, but his nonfiction reaches an
day explicitly engages the dominant hegemonic even higher level of directness and vitriol as he
national culture of postwar America and exposes describes a mass public that is directly and delib-
this culture as one that uses notions of monstros- erately manipulated through the use of construct-
ity to control its borders. This intricate combina- ed political monstrosities that are as predicable as
tion of culture and monstrosity appears vampire or mummy monstrosities in gothic/
eloquently in a conversation that Doc holds with horror fiction. In the ‘‘Genus Americanus’’ sec-
the seer, a prophet character who lives as a hermit tion of America and Americans (1966), he writes,
on the beach. After hearing of the seer’s way of ‘‘the stalking horror is ‘Communism,’ with its
life, Doc comments, thread of confiscation of private wealth, and ‘So-
cialism,’ which implies that they might be forced
to share their wealth with less fortunate citizens’’
‘‘I’m surprised they don’t lock you up—a
reasonable man. It’s one of the symptoms of (364). More than simply presenting Communism
our time to find danger in men like you who as a ‘‘stalking horror,’’ Steinbeck explains that
don’t worry and rush about. . . . I don’t these fears do not simply exist but are deployed
know why they don’t put you in jail. It’s a by ‘‘leaders,’’ who ‘‘are surely screwballs,’’ against360 The Journal of American Culture Volume 28, Number 4 December 2005
‘‘any reform movement’’ with a ‘‘stated purpose strous. He carefully describes dominant American
[that] is invariably patriotic—they promise to culture and continues to meditate upon it as he
preserve the nation by techniques which will in- carries out an ecological study that he knows this
evitably destroy it’’ (364). It is this system of culture will certainly not understand, and possibly
constructed ideological/political monstrosities find intolerable.
readily available for the use of those like Joseph Steinbeck’s picture of American culture arises
McCarthy (Steinbeck names McCarthy later in largely through his description of Monterey, the
the essay), who police the United States’ cultural expedition’s starting point, and San Diego,
hinterlands, that brings Steinbeck to write, in ‘‘I the Western Flyer’s southernmost port of call in
Am a Revolutionary’’ (1954), the United States. In his treatment of the first of
these key locations, Steinbeck explains that it was
The so-called masses are more lumpen now extremely difficult to charter a boat because the
than ever. Any semblance of the emergence
vessels were owned by ‘‘Italians, Slavs, and some
of the individual is instantly crushed and the
Japanese’’ who believed in and understood only
doctrine of party and state above everything
has taken the place of the theory of liberated one thing—sardine fishing—and were deeply sus-
men. picious of anything outside of this narrow pursuit
(7). ‘‘The owners were not distrustful of us,’’
The victim of this savagely applied system is Steinbeck writes, ‘‘they didn’t even listen to us
the individual. Individuality must be de- because they couldn’t quite believe we existed. We
stroyed because it is dangerous to all reac- were obviously ridiculous’’ (7, emphasis added).
tionary plans because the individual is creative Steinbeck does, of course, find the Western Flyer,
and creativeness outside the narrow pattern of
but its captain grants the charter because he is
the status quo cannot be tolerated. (90)
‘‘used to [such] nonsense’’; ‘‘he was willing to let
us do any crazy thing that we wanted so long as
we . . . didn’t mix him up in our nonsense’’ (8,
Monstrous Ecology emphasis added). Before ever leaving port, Stein-
beck repeatedly reinforces the notion of ecology
as an aberrant pursuit in the eyes of American
If we wish to understand Steinbeck’s hesitancy culture. Here, ecology is not a phenomenon that
to become an environmentalist, I ask that we do it threatens aristocratic or management classes in-
in this context—understanding that he viewed the vested in industry and economic progress. Even
mass culture of the United States as a ‘‘lumpen’’ for ethnically diverse working-class fishermen,
mass violently committed to the preservation of the idea of an ecological expedition is much worse
‘‘a status quo’’ dominated by capitalism and con- than merely nonsensical or ridiculous; it is polit-
sumption, and understanding that he clearly ically dangerous. None of them wants to be in-
viewed any expression of stark difference as a volved with it at all—after all, what kind of
dangerous undertaking that exposed one to the sardine fisherman goes off on an ecological expe-
mark of monstrosity. The Log from the Sea of dition?—and when Steinbeck finally does find a
Cortez (1951), which contains Steinbeck’s longest, captain, it is only under the stipulation that he not
most focused treatment of ecology and seems the be involved with the ship’s mission in any way.
perfect place for him to develop an environmen- If the difficulties of chartering a boat in Mon-
talist position, presents ecology in a constant and terey were frustrating and revealed the exasperat-
tension-filled juxtaposition with the cultural ing economic single-mindedness of one particular,
norms of the United States.6 Rather than devel- if representative, group of people, San Diego rep-
oping an overt environmentalism, however, Stein- resents a frightening, dangerous, and aggressive
beck repeatedly places ecology and environmental nation. Instead of fishermen and fishing boats,
reform in the dangerous category of the mon- Steinbeck encounters robotic, unthinking sailorsMonstrous Ecology Lloyd Willis 361
of the United States Navy and frighteningly sleek, actually belie a deep anxiety about American mass
incredibly destructive military vessels: culture and its relationship to the environment
and environmentalism.7 Steinbeck’s tendency to
All about us war bustled, although we had
superimpose his own anxieties about American
no war; steel and thunder, powder and
men—the men preparing thoughtlessly, like
culture onto the Mexicans in his narrative is
dead men, to destroy things. The planes evident before the Western Flyer ever arrives
roared over in formation and submarines in Mexico. It becomes particularly pronounced
were quiet and ominous. . . . The port of San when he writes, ‘‘it seemed to us that we should
Diego in that year was loaded with explo- be armed with permits’’ because
sives and the means of transporting and
depositing them on some enemy as yet un- [t]he work we intended to do might well
determined. The men who directed this have seemed suspicious to some patriotic cus-
mechanism were true realists. They knew toms official or soldier—a small boat that
an enemy would emerge, and when one did, crept to uninhabited points on a barren
they had the explosives to deposit on him. coast, and a party which spent its time turn-
(35–36) ing over rocks. It was not likely that we
could explain our job to the satisfaction of a
Although the entrance of the United States into soldier. It would seem ridiculous to the mil-
World War II shortly after Steinbeck made these itary mind to travel fifteen hundred miles for
the purpose of turning over rocks on the
observations may justify such a military buildup,
seashore and picking up small animals, very
Steinbeck’s description of San Diego shows us a
few of which were edible; and doing all this
paranoid culture poised to obliterate arbitrarily without shooting at anyone. (23, emphasis
defined enemies and controlled by frighteningly added)
inhuman ‘‘military mind[s]’’ who think neither
about the massive power of their weapons nor the Steinbeck, it seems, has only the vaguest ideas of
people destroyed by them (35). When the Western what he will find in Mexico, and in this passage,
Flyer returns to San Diego at the end of the Log, he paints the country with the same language that
Steinbeck suggests that the place is alarming for he uses in the subsequent twenty pages to describe
more than its role as a military installation; it also the Americans in Monterey and San Diego. In
represents a tremendous hardened system of or- Monterey, he uses the same word, ridiculous, to
ganization endowed with the power to assign describe how fishermen perceived his expedition;
value. He writes that ‘‘when at last we came back in San Diego, he repeats the phrase military mind
to San Diego the customs,’’ another arm of the to describe the mindset of that place, where he
militaristic bureaucracy speedily preparing for also finds plenty of mindless patriotism embodied
war, ‘‘fixed a value on our thousands of pickled in customs officials and soldiers.
animals of five dollars,’’ thus utterly devaluing the As the Log moves into the Gulf of California
work accomplished during a six-week expedition and Steinbeck actually comes into contact with
that traveled over four thousand miles (84). actual Mexicans themselves, Steinbeck does in-
Steinbeck writes that after the Western Flyer deed group the people he meets into categories
left San Diego, ‘‘the great world dropped away that are always, to some extent, fluid—‘‘Mexi-
very quickly. We lost the fear and fierceness and cans,’’ ‘‘Mexican Indians,’’ and ‘‘Indians.’’ Al-
contagion of war and economic uncertainty,’’ but though these categories are shifty and loosely
the narrative he offers tells quite another story defined, they do nonetheless come to represent
(173). Many of Steinbeck’s discussions about different things to Steinbeck. He uses the first
Mexico, in fact, feature meditations upon three moniker, Mexicans, to describe three groups of
groups of people—‘‘Mexicans,’’ ‘‘Mexican Indi- people: those among a vast group of people living
ans,’’ and plain old ‘‘Indians’’—that, far from south of the United States who are tremendously
treating these figures fairly in their own right, different from citizens of the United States, those362 The Journal of American Culture Volume 28, Number 4 December 2005
living relatively European/Western lifestyles in identical to what he uses, in his nonfiction, to
the more urban areas visited by the Western Flyer, describe political ‘‘screwballs’’ and idiotic ‘‘lum-
and, the most unmistakable, those representing pen’’ masses, and, in his fiction, to describe the
the Mexican government who are always identi- precarious lives of aberrant ecologically minded
fied by their government-issue sidearms. individuals like the seer in Sweet Thursday and
Despite the multiplicity involved in ‘‘Mexi- Joseph Wayne in To a God Unknown.
cans,’’ this group often serves a purpose that has As his treatment of the cormorant-shooting
little to do with anything Mexican at all—as a suggests, Steinbeck finds his observations of
stand-in for a hegemonic United States mass cul- ‘‘Mexican’’ daily life compelling, but his interac-
ture. Nowhere is this more clear than during the tions with ‘‘Indians’’ raise a different set of prob-
Western Flyer’s approach to Cape San Lucas, the lems than those inspired by ‘‘Mexicans.’’ The
expedition’s first stop in Mexico. Here, Steinbeck differences between these groups—‘‘Mexicans’’
turns an interaction between men (certainly and ‘‘Indians’’—are extremely tenuous, particu-
‘‘Mexicans,’’ for all their connections to guns larly considering that Steinbeck often uses a third
and industry) and cormorants into a parable about term that obviously complicates the Indian/Mex-
the relationship between ecology, radical politics, ican binary, the implications of which never be-
and regulatory practices of hegemonic culture. In come entirely clear: Mexican Indians. Part of the
this story, a normal ecological process—birds difficulty of reading Steinbeck’s Indians arises
pursuing prey—becomes a monstrosity because it from the fact that more characters enter the Log as
inconveniences human beings. Steinbeck describes ‘‘Indians’’ or ‘‘Mexican Indians’’ than as anything
men on the coast shooting cormorants because the else. They are absolutely ubiquitous in Steinbeck’s
birds are dispersing baitfish that have been drawn image of the Gulf of California, and at various
close to shore (and therefore very convenient to points in the narrative, it becomes very hard to
fishermen who want to catch them and use them determine whether Steinbeck does indeed exclude
for bait) to eat ‘‘the entrails and cuttings’’ dis- these figures (which are everywhere in the text)
carded by a tuna cannery (48). In Steinbeck’s from the category of ‘‘Mexican.’’ Ultimately, how-
dramatization of this situation, by disrupting the ever, Steinbeck does maintain the distinction;
status quo, the cormorants become something ‘‘Indians’’ are much more impoverished than
larger than birds to the fishermen: ‘‘they are con- ‘‘Mexicans,’’ they are clearly subservient to ‘‘Mex-
sidered interlopers, radicals, subversive forces icans,’’ they are shown living only on the outskirts
against the perfect and God-set balance on Cape of towns and villages where ‘‘Mexicans’’ live, and
San Lucas. And they are rightly slaughtered, as all they live much closer to the earth, largely as fish-
radicals should be’’ (48). Likewise, the fishermen ermen, than do ‘‘Mexicans.’’
also adopt an inflated role. More than people try- Largely because of their poverty, perceived
ing to feed themselves and their families, they are simplicity, and closeness to the natural world, the
men who do not understand ecological principles, mere presence of these ‘‘Indians’’ forces Steinbeck
who cannot see beyond their economic self- to constantly reflect upon the purpose of the
interests to the larger, interconnected whole of expedition and outsiders’ perceptions of it. He
the situation, and who become cultural Brahmins writes that ‘‘we had known that sooner or later we
preserving the order of their world by murdering must develop an explanation for what we were
the deviant. doing which would be short and convincing. It
Steinbeck’s description of this situation may be couldn’t be the truth because that wouldn’t be
accurate—the Mexicans of the story may have convincing at all . . . [so] we developed our story
understood the birds as ‘‘radicals’’ and subver- and stuck to it thereafter. We were collecting cu-
sives—but the language and the rhetoric he em- rios, we said’’ (83–84). While the men collect spec-
ploys again point toward his concerns about imens at La Paz, ‘‘Indians,’’ who flock into tidal
American, rather than Mexican, culture. It is pools with the men while they are collecting,Monstrous Ecology Lloyd Willis 363
finally ask the ‘‘embarrassing question,’’ ‘‘what do survival suggests that the problem of explaining
you search for?’’ (92). Steinbeck considers a range ecology to ‘‘Indians’’ whose basic needs are barely
of answers but eventually settles on the prepared met is not really an exclusive problem of Native
lie: Americans, but at least in part a return to the
problem of presenting ecology to figures like the
We search for something that will seem like
truth to us; we search for understanding. We
Monterey fishermen in the United States.8
search for that principle which keys us deep- The anticipated and actual questions of the
ly into the pattern of all life; we search for ‘‘Indians’’ never end; they haunt Steinbeck
the relations of things, one to another, as this throughout the text. Pondering the problem of
young man searches for a warm light in his the mission’s purpose, Steinbeck writes,
wife’s eyes and that one for the hot warmth
of fighting. These little boys and young men To our own people we could have said any
on the tide flat do not even know that they one of a number of meaningless things,
search for such things too. We say to them, which by sanction have been accepted as
‘‘we are looking for curios, for certain small meaningful. We could have said, ‘‘We wish to
animals.’’ (92) fill in certain gaps in the knowledge of the
Gulf fauna.’’ That would have satisfied our
While they are hardly ecologists, Steinbeck’s as- people, for knowledge is a sacred thing, not
sumption that the Indians would not understand to be questioned or even inspected. But the
‘‘the truth’’ behind the expedition’s project may be Indian might say, ‘‘What good is this scien-
flawed; these people do, after all, live close to the tific knowledge? Since you make a duty of it,
land, often in subsistence fashion and under the what is its purpose?’’ We could have told our
people the usual thing about the advance-
shadow of massively destructive forces (the Jap-
ment of science, and again we would not
anese fishing fleet, which I will discuss later) that have been questioned further. But the Indian
roam the borders of their fertile and sustaining might ask, ‘‘Is it advancing, and toward
ecosystem. Why does Steinbeck immediately as- what? Or is it merely becoming complicat-
sume that these people would reject ‘‘ecological ed?’’ (172)
understanding’’ as a ‘‘reason’’ behind their expe-
dition? Is the language barrier prohibitive? Does This imagined conversation between himself and
he simply believe these people to be dotards? his crew, his own culture, and the culture of the
In a move that mirrors his treatment of ‘‘Mex- ‘‘Indians’’ is fraught with problems that all point
icans,’’ instead of investigating the ‘‘Indians’’’ po- to ecology’s perceived economic and utilitarian
tential ecological understanding, Steinbeck uselessness. If Steinbeck’s analysis of American
quickly asks a question that ultimately brings culture in the Log, America and Americans, and
him back to problems in the United States: ‘‘How the rest of his nonfiction tells us anything, it is
can you say to a people who are preoccupied with that the ‘‘sacredness’’ of ‘‘useless’’ knowledge and
getting enough food and enough children that you the ‘‘advancement’’ of a science that does not lead
have come to pick up useless little animals so that to the production of material stuff hardly retains
perhaps your world picture will be enlarged?’’ any value in the dominant American culture of
(84). While this seems like an honest, and quite the day. In this sense, ‘‘our people’’ is clearly an
insightful, recognition on Steinbeck’s part, it is idealized and disingenuous construction that
again unclear whether the problem he sees before Steinbeck wants to exist, even though he has lit-
him is that of Mexico or the United States. Ten tle faith in it. If we believe in his assessment of
pages earlier, Steinbeck writes that ‘‘Some time American culture as entirely practical and thor-
ago a Congress of honest men refused an appro- oughly dedicated to material progress, then his
priation of several hundreds of millions of dollars suggestion that he could justify ecology in the
to feed our [American] people’’ (74). The reap- United States is purely false. ‘‘The Indian’’ of this
pearance of this concern about food and basic particular passage is equally problematic as a364 The Journal of American Culture Volume 28, Number 4 December 2005
complex blend of ideologies. His criticism of the expedition to appear in his introduction, but
science may truly reflect a Native American, then it disappears, only to resurface two hundred
nonindustrial, antimodern outlook; as an ideal- pages later as a ‘‘large destructive machine . . .
ized object of reflection rather than a living, committing a true crime against nature and
breathing figure engaged in conversation, howev- against the immediate welfare of Mexico and the
er, ‘‘the Indian’’ also functions as a device that eventual welfare of the whole human species’’
allows Steinbeck an outlet for his own anxieties (206–07). The positioning of the destructive Jap-
about ecology as a legitimate science. In addition anese fishing fleet at the beginning of the work
to both of these possibilities, however, the com- and near its end casts its net over the whole text
ments of ‘‘the Indian’’ also reflect a pragmatic, and suggests that the purpose of Steinbeck’s ex-
production-and-progress-driven American cul- pedition, though he cannot say it, is to see and
ture that Steinbeck clearly does not include in preserve the Gulf of California before it is thor-
his figuration of ‘‘our people.’’ In this light, the oughly destroyed through this exploitation. The
Indian’s questions may also be interpreted as voyage is a type of environmentalist intervention
questions that Steinbeck’s own progress-driven in the wrecking of the natural world.
culture might ask: To what purpose can this Throughout the Log, Steinbeck presents ecol-
knowledge be applied? What can it produce? ogy as a concept incomprehensible to both Amer-
What is it advancing toward? Is this a useful body icans and Mexicans and as a pursuit that allows
of knowledge, or does its line of inquiry circle people who understand it—Steinbeck, Ed Rick-
endlessly inward through an already isolated etts, and eventually, The Western Flyer’s entire
body of data? crew—to escape the rushing, materialistic, and
Steinbeck never achieves any satisfactory an- consumptive capitalist system of the United
swer to the purpose of the Gulf expedition, and at States. Ultimately, however, we have to wonder
the end of the Log, he ultimately abandons any why Steinbeck—an author, a communicator by
attempt to explain its real value when he writes, in trade—cannot give ecology and the values that
a tone of resignation, ‘‘Here was no service to it engenders a clear, unequivocal voice. What
science, no naming of unknown animals, but prevents his description of environmental ex-
rather—we simply liked it. We liked it very much. ploitation from ever reaching the level of envi-
The brown Indians and the gardens of the sea, and ronmentalist activism?
the beer and the work, they were all one thing and In John Steinbeck and Edward F. Ricketts: The
we were that one thing too’’ (224). Shaping of a Novelist, Richard Astro suggests one
Despite Steinbeck’s inability to describe it, the answer in his discussion of the Log as a collab-
voyage of the Western Flyer does seem to have a orative project between Steinbeck and Ricketts
very distinct purpose, even if it is unspeakable. In and in his investigation of the pair’s similar but
the Log’s introduction, Steinbeck writes that the different philosophical positions. Most Steinbeck
intent of the voyage was to ‘‘collect and preserve’’ scholarship acknowledges Ricketts’s deep philo-
the animals ‘‘of the littoral’’—a very succinct sophical influence on Steinbeck, just as most dis-
statement of intent—but he also reveals that si- cussions of the Log mention that Ricketts was
multaneous to their acts of preservation, ‘‘Fifty deeply involved in the construction of the Log.
miles away the Japanese shrimpboats [were] Astro, however, explains that it is a mistake to
dredging with overlapping scoops, bringing up presume that Steinbeck’s philosophical outlook
tons of shrimp, rapidly destroying the species so was the mirror image of Ricketts’s. Through a
that it may never come back, and with the species close textual analysis of Ricketts’s earlier writings,
destroying the ecological balance of the whole Astro argues that the worldviews of Ricketts and
region’’ (2, 3). The destructiveness of this shrimp- Steinbeck were different in several critical ways,
ing fleet looms over the whole of the Log. It is and he suggests that Steinbeck included in the Log
important enough in Steinbeck’s recollection of passages that were written exclusively by RickettsMonstrous Ecology Lloyd Willis 365
out of respect for his friend despite their philo- trialism and consumption of American culture—
sophical differences. The chief point of difference all of this comes from Steinbeck.
between the worldviews of Ricketts and Steinbeck Even more than his relationship with Ricketts,
concerns ‘‘non-teleological’’ thinking. Astro Steinbeck’s hesitancy to boldly present ecology or
writes that Ricketts’s ‘‘non-teleological thinking to argue against the poor treatment of the natural
is an open-ended approach to life by the man who world seems related to a thread of characters and
looks at events and accepts them as such without political criticisms that permeate his work. It is
reservation or qualification, and in so doing per- linked to Lenny, the seer, and Joseph Wayne
ceives the whole picture by becoming an identi- (pagan-pantheist protagonist of To a God Un-
fiable part of that picture’’ (38). Steinbeck’s known); to Steinbeck’s joint understanding of
problem with this, not surprisingly, lies in its in- American culture, ecology, and environmentalism;
sistence upon acceptance and reservation; he and to his awareness of monstrosity as a tool for
‘‘viewed the ideal of nonaction as one of meta- cultural manipulation. As limited as it is (it may
physical indifference,’’ and ‘‘consistently put preserve representative organisms, though it cannot
the highest premium upon action, conflict, and save species from extinction at the hands of indus-
change’’ (Astro 57). try), the body of Steinbeck’s work suggests that the
Astro points out that Ricketts profoundly in- type of preservative mission carried out by the
fluenced Steinbeck’s writing from To a God Un- Western Flyer is nearly the only type of interven-
known through the rest of his career. The extreme tion that an individual can surely survive. He tells
closeness of Ricketts to the writing of the Log (it us that politicians stand on watchtowers awaiting
was literally a collaborative project written by the appearance of any radicalism that challenges
both men), however, presents a series of very spe- established hegemonies, that they have ready-made
cific problems, the most perplexing of which con- rubrics of monstrosity to cast over such radicals,
cerns Steinbeck’s decision to work Ricketts’s and that they can effectively summon the ‘‘lumpen’’
discussion of nonteleological thinking into the masses to crucify beasts of potential change. He
Log’s fourteenth chapter, ‘‘Easter Sunday.’’ This tells us, through Father Angelo in To a God Un-
inclusion, as Astro acknowledges, makes it unclear known and through Doc in Sweet Thursday, that
just how highly Steinbeck valued Ricketts’s phi- monstrous radicals without voices pose no threat to
losophy (how resistant could he have been to it if culture at large, but that when they possess a public
he included it?), and it makes it extremely difficult voice, they are intolerable.
to understand how Steinbeck negotiated the dif- Criticism has long recognized Steinbeck’s in-
ferences between his own worldview and that held terest in ecology (Peter Lisca acknowledged it in
by his friend. To boil Steinbeck’s treatment of 1958 in The Wide World of John Steinbeck), and
ecology and environmentalism down to a conflict since Steinbeck and the Environment, it seems
with Ricketts, however, would oversimplify the that his environmentalist perspectives are gener-
issue. It is bigger than a relationship between the ally accepted even if they also seem to fall short of
two men, and it extends, in the body of Steinbeck’s true activism. If Steinbeck did not become enough
work, far beyond Ricketts’s death in 1948. The of an environmental activist, it may mean, iron-
sections of the Log that most directly address the ically, that the man who ultimately finds hope in a
relationship between ecology and the masses, after bumbling, mistake-prone American culture in
all, are not those that may be pinned down to America and Americans also understood that very
Ricketts (with the exception of the section dealing culture as one that would have recognized envi-
with the Japanese fishing fleet). The inability to ronmentalism—if he presented it as vehemently as
make regular people understand ecology, the em- twenty-first-century readers and scholars would
barrassment of explaining to Mexicans the purpose have liked him to—as a monstrosity and would
of collecting useless animals, the juxtaposition of have attempted to kill it in the name of preserving
the ecological expedition with the military indus- the consumptive, exploitative status quo.366 The Journal of American Culture Volume 28, Number 4 December 2005
sequent uses of these words, I feel I cannot. Mexican, Mexican In-
Notes dian, and Indian function in such a variety of ways in the Log, and in
my argument itself, that I feel I do need to qualify each word each
time it appears for the sake of clarity.
8. Here and elsewhere in this article, when I use Native Amer-
ican, I do intend to move beyond Steinbeck’s restrictive language to
For their tireless support and their contributions to this article in signify a much larger category that applies to the indigenous pop-
particular, I wish to thank Stephanie Smith and Sidney Dobrin. ulations of the Americas as a whole.
1. Although the lines are often blurred between ecolog[y][ical]
and environmentl[al][ism][ist] I want to maintain a clear distinction
between these terms. In this article, I intend ecology and ecological to Works Cited
suggest a scientific understanding of the functioning of ecosystems.
Environmentalism, while largely based upon ecological understand-
ing since the 1960s and 1970s, should be understood as a popular
ideology rooted in political activism.
Astro, Richard. John Steinbeck and Edward F. Ricketts: The Shaping
2. While I recognize the problems involved in using America[n] of a Novelist. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1973.
as an abbreviation for ‘‘The United States of America,’’ especially
Botting, Fred. Making Monstrous: Frankenstein, Criticism, Theory.
when discussing a variety of nationalities and cultures that span the
New York: St. Martin’s, 1991.
continents of the Western hemisphere as I will later in this article,
I use America here and throughout the article as the most graceful Cohen, Jeffrey Jerome, ed. Monster Theory: Reading Culture.
way to incorporate ideas related to ‘‘The United States of America’’ Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1996.
into my writing. French, Warren. ‘‘How Green Was John Steinbeck?’’ Ed. Susan F.
3. These fears are cultivated by Rama, a mystical matriarch who Beegel, Susan Shillinglaw, and Wesley N. Tiffney, Jr. Steinbeck
becomes a sort of duenna to Elizabeth, a young expectant mother. and the Environment: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Tuscaloosa:
Marie-Hélène Huet explains Renaissance notions of monstrosity in U of Alabama P, 1997. 281-92.
great detail in Monstrous Imagination. Gladstein, Clifford Eric, and Mimi Reisel Gladstein. ‘‘Revisiting the
4. To borrow the title of one publication, Monster Theory has Sea of Cortez with a ‘Green’ Perspective.’’ Ed. Susan F. Beegel,
proved a rich field for literary and cultural studies since the early Susan Shillinglaw, and Wesley N. Tiffney, Jr. Steinbeck and the
1990s. The definitions of monstrosity that Ingebretsen uses here are Environment: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Tuscaloosa: U of
foundational assumptions from which an array of scholars work. See, Alabama P, 1997. 161-75.
for instance, Botting, Cohen, Halberstam, Huet, and Valerius. Halberstam, Judith. Skin Shows: Gothic Horror and the Technology
Ingebretsen has also published the ideas he presents in ‘‘Monster- of Horror. Durham, NC: Duke UP, 1995.
Making’’ in book form: At Stake: Monsters and the Rhetoric of Fear
in Public Culture. Hedgpeth, Joel W. ‘‘John Steinbeck: Late-Blooming Environmental-
ist.’’ Ed. Susan F. Beegel, Susan Shillinglaw, and Wesley N.
5. This association of voice with recognized cultural and political Tiffney, Jr. Steinbeck and the Environment: Interdisciplinary Ap-
monstrosity also appears in To a God Unknown. Steinbeck develops proaches. Tuscaloosa: U of Alabama P, 1997. 293-309.
his protagonist, Joseph Wayne, as a ‘‘Christ of nature’’ who is per-
ceived as a religious monstrosity of radical potential to those around Huet, Marie-Hélène. Monstrous Imagination. Cambridge: Harvard
him (Astro 88). Joseph senses the presence of his father’s spirit in an UP, 1993.
oak tree under which he builds his home, and he comes to associate Ingebretsen, Edward J. ‘‘Monster-Making: A Politics of Persuasion.’’
the life of the tree with that of the land as a whole. He holds con- Journal of American Culture 21.2 (1998): 25-34.
versations with the tree and, though he refuses to describe them as
such, makes offerings to it. In a final sacrificial act performed to heal ———. At Stake: Monsters and the Rhetoric of Fear in Public Culture.
the land, Joseph commits suicide, saying, in his final moments, ‘‘‘I am Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2001.
the land . . . and I am the rain. The grass will grow out of me in a little Lisca, Peter. The Wide World of John Steinbeck. New Brunswick,
while’’’ (184). Rutgers UP, 1958. New York: Gordian, 1981.
Near the end of the novel, Father Angelo, the Catholic priest of Steinbeck, John. To a God Unknown. 1933. New York: Penguin,
the closest village, recognizes that because he places the condition of 1995. (Partial Rpt. of Sea of Cortez, 1941)
the land over the condition of his own soul, Joseph could easily come
———. Tortilla Flat. 1935. New York: Penguin, 1986.
to be seen as a monster to the community in which he lives and meet
the culturally imposed death of saviors and prophets if he became ———. Of Mice and Men. 1937. New York: Bantam, 1984.
recognized as a radical: ‘‘‘Thank God this man has no message. ———. The Grapes of Wrath. 1939. New York: Penguin, 1999.
Thank God he has no will to be remembered, to be believed in.’ And,
in sudden heresy, ‘Else there might be a new Christ here in the ———. Cannery Row. 1945. New York: Penguin, 1994.
West’’’ (177). As in Sweet Thursday, it is not radicalism per se that ———. The Log from the Sea of Cortez. 1951. New York: Penguin,
exposes one to the brand of monstrosity—it is the adoption of a 1995. (Partial Rpt. of Sea of Cortez, 1941).
radical voice, or ‘‘message.’’
———. ‘‘I Am a Revolutionary.’’ 1954. America and Americans and
6. The Log from the Sea of Cortez is the narrative portion Selected Nonfiction. Ed. Susan Shillinglaw and Jackson J. Benson.
(published alone in 1951) of Sea of Cortez (published in 1941), which New York: Viking, 2002. 89-90.
was a collaborative project of Steinbeck and his friend and marine
biologist Ed Ricketts. ———. Sweet Thursday. 1954. New York: Bantam, 1972.
7. With my quotation marks here, I intend to call attention to the ———. America and Americans. 1966. America and Americans and
fact that Steinbeck’s classification of these people is arbitrary and Selected Nonfiction. Ed. Susan Shillinglaw and Jackson J. Benson.
problematic. Although I would like to allow my quotation marks in New York: Viking, 2002. 331-404.
this sentence to stand as a single qualification for each of my sub- ———. Travels with Charley. 1961. New York: Penguin, 1980.Monstrous Ecology Lloyd Willis 367 Timmerman, John H. ‘‘Steinbeck’s Environmental Ethic: Humanity Valerius, Karyn Michele. Misconceptions: Monstrosity and the in Harmony with the Land.’’ Ed. Susan F. Beegel, Susan Shil- Politics of Interpretation in American Culture from the linglaw, and Wesley N. Tiffney, Jr., Steinbeck and the Environ- Antinomian Controversy to Biotechnology. Diss: SUNY Stony ment: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Tuscaloosa: U of Alabama P, Brook, 2000. 1997. 310-22.
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