The main theme in, “The Chrysanthemums” by John Steinbeck is about the inequality of gender. Elisa Allen is a thirty-five-year-old from Salinas Valley, who gives all of her energy to maintain her house and garden, but all of these efforts go to waste. The pleasure she takes in her housekeeping is both exaggerated and depressing. The two key men, Henry Allen and The Tinker in the story are less enthralling and talented than she is, their lives are far more occupied.
Elisa Allen is a compelling, bright, and heartfelt woman who lives an under stimulated life. Having a professional occupation is not an option for her, she does not have children, her work in the flower garden goes unnoticed, and her volunteer of helping her husband on the farm is treated with disdain. Her wish is to see the world, but it is ignored off as an unsuitable desire for a woman to have. As a result, Elisa devotes all of her life to preserve her house and garden. Elisa’s relationship to nature seems involuntary, she knows a great amount about plants, probably because as a woman, gardening is the only thing she has to focus on.
Henry Allen, who is Elisa’s husband is not...
