East of Eden
East of Eden,novel by John Steinbeck, published in 1952.
In the late 1890s Adam Trask marries Cathy Ames, a beautiful but viciously evil former prostitute, and moves from his family farm in Connecticut to the Salinas Valley, California. There, aided by Sam Hamilton, a warm-hearted Irishman, he develops a large ranch, and Cathy gives birth to their twin sons. Hating her situation and her husband, Cathy shoots Adam when he tries to prevent her leaving, and under the name of Kate Albey joins a house in Salinas run by a madam whom she slowly poisons so as to get a place of her own to cater to men's darkest and most perverted desires. Adam, withdrawn and detached, has the help of kindly Sam and of his educated Chinese servant Lee in rearing his children, Caleb and Aron, whom he had considered naming Cain and Abel, particularly since Lee interpreted the Biblical story to show that although God exiled Cain to the land east of Eden, He said to him,...
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