Elisa Allen’s frustrations about her life dominate “The
Chrysanthemums” by John Steinbeck. As the protagonist, Elisa wants more from life. She
has a good husband who works hard to provide a good life. As in many marriages, the
communication falls short between husband and
wife,
Symbols
Chrysanthemums
and her children
Throughout the story, Steinbeck
uses the chrysanthemums as a symbol. Elisa and Henry have no children. The beautiful
flowers that she grows with tenderness and love have become her children. She shields
them by placing a fence around them. Part of her care includes protecting them from
insects:
No
aphids, no sow bugs or snails or cutworms…her terrier fingers destroyed such pests
before they could get
started.
These vermin
represent natural harm to the flowers; and, just as any good mother, she removes them
before they can harm her children.
Elisa longs for more in
her life. She is sexually and emotionally unfulfilled. The chrysanthemums represent her
desire for more. Her link to life has become her garden rather than her
husband.
Her husband tries to communicate his feelings to
Elisa but falls short.
“At it again,” he said…”I wish that you’d work
out in the orchard and raise some apples that
big.”
Although her husband
tries to compliment her work, Henry does not see the frustration that Eliza feels about
her life and her need for intimacy.
The repairman
and Elisa’s awakening
When the tinker comes in
his wagon, Elisa does not want to talk to him. Cleverly, he sees her interest in the
flowers and builds a rapport with Elisa in that way. As the man talks to Elisa, the
repairman suggests that he take some of her seeds to one of his customers. She is
delighted to provide the seeds in a red pot. Instantly, Elisa begins to feel excited and
eager.
Her explanation to the repairman about growing the
flowers has a sexual connotation.
"It’s when you’re picking off the buds you don’t
want. Everything goes right down to your fingertips. You can feel it. When you’re like
that you can’t do anything wrong. Do you see that? Can you understand
that?"
As she describes her
planting hands to the repairman, Elisa kneels on the ground looking up at him. Sexual
feelings rise in her breasts. Everything about the man draws Elisa to him. His
lifestyle, his body (she almost touches his torn trousers). This passionate connection
stimulates Elisa to try to relate to her husband on their date that
night.
The red pot and Elisa’s
loss
Elisa delights in providing the seeds in
the red pot for the repairman’s customer. She provides rigid instructions about the care
for the precious cargo in the pot. All of her senses are aroused as she talks to
him.
Readying herself for the night out becomes a slow,
sensual experience. She is rewarded by her husband’s surprise at how pretty she looks.
He uses the word "strong" to describe the change in her, and Elisa agrees with
him.
As they go into town for the date, Elisa notices a
"dark speck" on the road ahead. Immediately, she knows what it is. The repairman dumped
out the seeds and flowers and kept her red pot. Elisa feels defeated. In her anger and
hurt, she suggests that she might like to go to the boxing matches and see the
violence.
The red pot was kept by the repairman, but the
important flowers were dumped. To Elisa, this meant that they (the repairman and Elisa)
had no connection but what was in her own mind. Symbolically, his dishonesty cancels the
strength that she gained from their encounter. As the car goes down the road, Emily
turns her face away from Henry and begins to cry because now she feels “like an old
woman.”
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