Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes.
Throughout the course of East of Eden, different members of the Trask family correspond to the biblical Cain and Abel at different times. In the first Trask generation, Charles and Adam correspond to Cain and Abel, respectively. Like the biblical Cain, Charles grows jealous of his brother, Adam, and attacks him in rage—Charles does not, however, cause his brother’s death. As the novel progresses, Adam relinquishes his role as an Abel figure and takes on the role of his biblical namesake, Adam, the first human. Adam’s sons, Cal and Aron, become the respective parallels to Cain and Abel in the new generation of the Trask family. Again, Cal, the Cain figure, becomes jealous of his brother, Aron. In this iteration of the story, Cal’s hurtful actions indirectly cause Aron’s enlistment in the army and subsequent death in World War I. When Adam asks Cal where Aron has gone, Cal sneers, “Am I supposed to look out for him?”—a parallel to Cain’s famous retort to God after murdering Abel, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” In indirectly causing Aron’s death, Cal succumbs, like Cain, to his evil instincts. However, unlike Cain, Cal ultimately understands that he has free will to overcome sin and, on the final page of the novel, is redeemed by his father’s blessing.
The Trask family fortune is an emblem of the idea of original sin—the sin that, by the Christian tradition, has been passed down through every human generation since the fall of the biblical Adam and Eve. In East of Eden, Cyrus leaves his fortune, likely earned through corruption, to Charles and Adam. When Charles dies, he passes on his share to Adam and Cathy. Adam subsequently squanders his share on a failed business venture, while Cathy increases it through her work at the brothel and then passes it on solely to Aron. In blowing the inheritance on his failed business, Adam essentially sidesteps its moral taint. Aron, however, is forced to bear the full burden of it himself. This symbolic burden of sin proves too much for Adam and ultimately leads to his death. Cal, meanwhile, is left out of the Trask inheritance and escapes untainted. Through this turn of events, Cal avoids his family’s legacy of sin and evil and realizes he has the freedom to choose his own moral path.