The Chrysanthemums - John Steinbeck Reflection

The Chrysanthemums

John Steinbeck

            I really enjoyed this short story for a couple of reasons. One reason stemmed from the writing style of the story itself. Steinbeck organizes his story forcing his reader to think about what he is working to convey. By simply providing the reader with clues as to how to understand the events that occur throughout the story, Steinbeck rarely identifies a single correct interpretation. By doing so, I found this story to open my thoughts to a multitude of interpretations and to produce a variety of emotions and feelings. I also enjoyed how Steinbeck introduced this story. In the first two paragraphs, the passage about the setting ignites a variety of thoughts as to the direction the story may go. Highlighting undertones of new life and growth as well as empty hope and anguish, the story’s introduction immediately grabbed my attention and sparked my imagination.

            Throughout the story, Elisa is full of emotions. By allowing for a variety of interpretations, Steinbeck allowed me to go through the story feeling some of the same emotions I believed Elise felt. The scene that interested me most was the scene in which Elisa discovers the abandon Chrysanthemums on the side of the road. Leading up to the discovery of the Chrysanthemums, a rush of emotions crossed my body. Anxious, nervous, and unsure, these emotions were simultaneously defining my feelings as a traveled alongside Elise to the spot where the abandon flowers lay. As Elisa appears to be transitioning between emotions as well, the slow, dragged out ride to the abandon flowers provides the reader with a space to form their own interpretations regarding Elisa’s feelings. A mixture of emotions, I felt sadness, anger, and uncertainty fall upon Elisa as she passed her abandon flowers.

            Hinting at Elisa’s feelings, Steinbeck does a great job allowing for the open interpretation I mentioned before. As readers, we can sense the feeling of sadness Elisa experiences, however it is undefined as to whether she is angry or furious with the tinker man. This undefined interpretation, and the forcing us to draw upon our own conclusions, was what attracted me to this story. Steinbeck places us as the readers into the position of Henry or any other person in Elisa’s life. Those in Elisa’s life are just as unsure about her feelings as we as reader are. I also found it interesting to reflect upon what Elisa thinks about herself. Unable to pinpoint her emotions as the reader, I believe that Elisa herself appears to have a hard time interpreting her own behaviors and has a hard time understanding what she feels and why she feels the way she does. Throughout the story I really worked to place myself in Elisa’s place and tried to experience what she was feeling.

            The first two paragraphs of this story hold a sense of hope; a hope that appears to be in the near future, but is taken away quickly thereafter. For example, when talking about the weather and the rising sun, Steinbeck states “the fields seemed to be bathed in pale cold sunshine, but there was no sunshine in the valley now in December”. In this passage, the open interpretation holds that there is sunshine or hope in the distance or ahead, however there is none now. The description in the introduction of the setting of this story demonstrates the empty hope that is apparent throughout the rest of the story. In many of Steinbeck’s descriptions, of both events and physical environmental features, there is a sense of promise and hope with no fulfillment. As a reader reading these descriptions, I was able to feel this hope, and then time after time felt let down and almost disappointed with the consistent failure of its fulfillment. I felt like Steinbeck teased the reader time and time again inserting disappointment both into the scene at hand, but also many times into his characters, and in particular Elisa.

            Overall I enjoyed this story and surprised myself with some of the feelings I felt. Many times, I found myself feeling sorry for Elisa and found myself upset with the tinker for throwing out the flowers. Working to decode the different scenes in the story and organizing the emotions at hand proved to be an intriguing and complicated task.

David Belpedio