Cannery Row Chapter 12 Summary

We pause in our tale of Mack and the boys to learn about the town of Monterey and its "long and brilliant literary tradition" (12.1).
To illustrate this, we get the story of the death of real-life comedy writer Josh Billings.
The townsfolk discover that the local doctor (who also embalms people) has been throwing guts into the gulch behind his office.
Everyone is shocked that a great literary man's guts were thrown out, so they make the doctor collect them, clean them and put them in a box with the rest of the body.
Because literary men deserve respect. And also because throwing human entrails into a ditch is just gross.