East of Eden (novel)

Legendary card · No. 17

East of Eden is a 1952 family saga novel by American author and Nobel Prize winner John Steinbeck. Many regard the work as Steinbeck's most ambitious novel, and Steinbeck himself considered it his magnum opus. Steinbeck said of East of Eden, "It has everything in it I have been able to learn about my craft or profession in all these years"; the author later said, "I think everything else I have written has been, in a sense, practice for this." Steinbeck originally addressed the novel to his young sons, Thom and John (then 6 and 4 years old, respectively). Steinbeck wanted to describe the sights, sounds, smells, and colors of the Salinas Valley, California, for them in detail. East of Eden recounts the lives of two families, the Trasks and the Hamiltons, and their interwoven stories. The Hamilton family in the novel is said to be based on Samuel Hamilton, Steinbeck's maternal grandfather, and his family. A young John Steinbeck appears briefly by name in the novel as a minor character.

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