The Octopus: A Story of California

Based on an actual incident, "The Octopus" is set in the San Joaquin Valley of central California towards the end of the 19th century -- not long before it was written. It concerns a dispute between the Pacific & Southwestern Railroad (in historical reality, the Southern Pacific) which owns the land it runs through and the tenant wheat ranchers who farm it. For one thing, the ranchers would like to own the land by buying it off the railroad, but the railroad raises the price per acre to exorbitant levels in violation of a previous contract; also, the ranchers are protesting the railroad's monopolistic policy of charging high freight rates for shipping wheat, which cuts into their profits.The characterization of the novel is rather straightforward. The "heroes" are the ranchers, which include "Governor" Magnus Derrick, an ostensibly upstanding politician; Broderson, an ineffectual old man; Osterman, a loudmouthed joker; Annixter, an irascible and obstinate misogynist; and an engineer named Dyke who starts his own hops business after being laid off by the railroad. The author himself is presumably represented by a third-party observer named Presley, a poet who lives on the Derrick ranch and is using the scenery and the conflict as inspiration. The "villain" is, of course, the railroad, which is personified by a porcine banker named S. Behrman who acts as the railroad's agent and mouthpiece and whose frequent insensitivity and cruelty reduces him to a simplistic caricature.The ranchers decide that the best way to keep the railroad's freight rates under control is to elect their own officials to the state Railroad Commission, which would entail bribery; after all, the railroad practically owns the Commission as it is. Despite their getting the Governor's son, Lyman Derrick, to represent them on the Commission, the ranchers' scheme proves ineffective. The railroad ultimately offers the wheat land for sale at the raised prices and sends "dummy" buyers out to dispossess the ranchers, who arm themselves to defend their homes. The result is a shockingly violent confrontation that shakes Presley's sentiments to the core."The Octopus" has some elements that I found distracting, puzzling, or faulty. First, there is not just one but *two* romantic subplots: Annixter's difficult courtship with a girl whose family works on his ranch (but at least we see how his marriage transforms his character positively and plausibly); and the shepherd/spiritualist Vanamee's incomprehensible nightly summonings of the ghost of his long-lost love Angele. Some of the dialogue is rendered flaccid by the use of euphemisms -- it's unbelievable that Annixter would refrain from calling Behrman anything worse than a "pip." The unctuous tone it applies to its oppressed-worker-vs.-corporate-monster theme is similar to the approach Steinbeck would use almost forty years later in "The Grapes of Wrath." Despite its obvious flaws, however, "The Octopus" manages to be an exempl

This is the first of Frank Norris's books that I have ever read, and my God is it great. The characters are so real and the manner in which they are described brings them to full life. Upon the death of the characters, the characters that the reader has grown to love, the reader mourns for them. They make the reader laugh and they inspire love and hatred. The truth brought about by The Octopus, that of the ultimate good, dwarfs the adjunct, impersonal truths carried on by some other literary "masterpieces". For such an unknown masterpiece, this one is a pearl. The writing is masterful and the story is golden. While it may seem that a story about the railroad in Old California may be tiring, Norris captures the same Escapist qualities that authurs such as J.R.R. Tolkien are recongnized for(Tolkien is fantasy, Norris is reality). The naturalist sting of the novel does not at all take away, but butresses the novel. The Octopus, a masterpiece, simply brilliant.

Today when we think of California we think of what else but Los Angeles and San Francisco. Many people forget that California has a rich history based in agriculure and mining. The Octopus tells a story about California's past and the epic struggle between the Wheat farmers and the all powerful railroads. The characters are dynamic and Norris has written the story so brilliantly that you actually feel for the characters. If you read this book you also must read "The Pit" also by Norris which tells the tale of the Chicago Commodities market and one mans overpowering desire to "corner" the wheat market.

Definitely not for all tastes, but a strong work, with well-drawn characters and some very beautiful (albeit long) prose passages. Norris has a habit of driving his point into the ground (a section near the end of the novel, which juxtaposes a mother and child starving to death on the street with a wealthy, upperclass, elitist meal comes to mind), but over all a profound and powerful work. Originally intended as the first part of a proposed "Trilogy of Wheat," Norris died near the publication of the second book (see "The Pit.") Definitely recommended for those who enjoy great American literature.

In his most ambitious work, turn-of-the-century novelist Norris tackles the railroad in this unflinching view of how the industrial revolution pushed the common man to the side in the pursuit of the almighty dollar. Violent naturalism the way it's supposed to be: disturbing yet beautifully rendered.