This life-sized bust of John Steinbeck depicts him as a middle-aged man wearing a blazer.
The plaque on the plinth reads:
"JOHN STEINBECK
1902 -1968
'CANNERY ROW IN MONTEREY IN CALIFORNIA IS A POEM,
A STINK A GRATING NOISE, A QUALITY OF LIGHT, A TONE,
A HABOT, A NOSTALGIA, A DREAM, CANNERY ROW IS THE
GATHERED AND SCATTERED, TIN AND IRON AND RUST
AND SPLINTERED WOOD, CHIPPED PAVEMENT AND WEEDY
LOTS AND JUNK HEAPS, SARDINE CANNERIES OF CORRU-
GATED IRON, HONKY TONKS, RESTAURANTS AND WHORE-
HOUSES AND LITTLE CROWDED GROCERIES, AND LAB-
ORATORIES AND FLOPHOUSES...'
---JOHN STEINBECK
CANNERY ROW, 1945
DONATED TO THE PEOPLE OF MONTEREY
BY
MR. & MRS. MERLE W. STRAUCH
C.W. BROWN, SCULPTRESS
1972"
John Steinbeck wrote several books about this area. Wikipedia (
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"John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. (February 27, 1902 – December 20, 1968) was an American author of twenty-seven books, including sixteen novels, six non-fiction books, and five collections of short stories. He is widely known for the comic novels Tortilla Flat (1935) and Cannery Row (1945), the multi-generation epic East of Eden (1952), and the novellas Of Mice and Men (1937) and The Red Pony (1937). The Pulitzer Prize-winning The Grapes of Wrath (1939) is considered Steinbeck's masterpiece and part of the American literary canon. In the first 75 years since it was published, it sold 14 million copies.
The winner of the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature, he has been called "a giant of American letters". His works are widely read abroad and many of his works are considered classics of Western literature.
Most of Steinbeck's work is set in southern and central California, particularly in the Salinas Valley and the California Coast Ranges region. His works frequently explored the themes of fate and injustice, especially as applied to downtrodden or everyman protagonists."
and read about the novel, Cannery Row, at (
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