Steinbeck
Steinbeck' s The Pearl was based on a story he had heard during his expedition with a friend to the Gulf of California about a poor Mexican fisherman who found a pearl which he though would guarantee his future happiness, but however it almost destroyed him before he threw it back into the ocean (Astro 62). "While Ricketts idea about the inherent virtues of the simple, natural life serve as a thematic substratum on which Steinbeck builds his parable, the novelist's chief concern in The Pearl is with how man's failure to "participate" in "the region inward adjusts" can lead to complete personal and social disintegration" (Astro 66). "Man himself appears, becomes, or emerges as good or evil because of the way men use other men, nurturing or destroying the human relationship between them, validating or invalidating the meaning of their existence" (Karsten 54). "John Steinbeck can properly be called the author of disengagement on at least two levels, for its traces the symbolic journey and withdrawal of novels protagonist" (Hayashi 48).In Steinbeck's novels he offers a moral lesson about the nature of good and evil. Steinbeck illustrates that good and evil are inseparably intertwined and that this duality is essential to existe
"Good is identified both with admirable individual qualities (philanthropy, kindness, generosity, self respect, courage, creativity) and with conventional moral goodness. Evil is identified with ignoble individual qualities, with criminal acts, and with carnal pleasures, particularly sex acts: and not only with prostitution and perversions, but also with sexual satisfaction in general" (Fontenrose 375). Also in Steinbeck's novels he asserts that duality undergoes all of man's actions and that intertwining good and evil are a part of each postlapsarian [time after the fall of man] human (Meyer 29). "Good is identified both with admirable individual qualities (philanthropy, kindness, generosity, self respect, courage, creativity) and with conventional moral goodness. Evil is identified with ignoble individual qualities, with criminal acts, and with carnal pleasures, particularly sex acts: and not only with prostitution and perversions, but also with sexual satisfaction in general" (Fontenrose 375). In The Grapes of Wrath some of the elements of tragedy are: the driving forces the swift rush of events, inevitability, mounting pity and terror, clash, violence His characters react properly in the face of evil and the foolish things they do are pieces of eternally human foolishness (Frohock 324). In the conclusion of The Grapes of Wrath it has been said to be extreme, sensational, and overwrought. The Joads have reached at last a condition of utter desolation, Rose of Sharon, her baby born dead, is rain-drenched, and her breast weak and heavy with milk. In the barn they come upon a boy and a starving old man too weak to eat the bread his son has stolen for him. Ma knows what must be done but the decision is Rose Of Sharon's. Rose of Sharon also knows what has to be done and then with just a glance at Ma she excepts to feed the starving man (Shockley 368). "In The Grapes of Wrath Steinbeck stresses the evolutionary idea that men must adapt to changing conditions. Among the worst offenses he feels one man can commit against is that of inhibiting the process of adaptation or of causing another to revert to a former state in self-defense" (Hoffman 324). The Pearl is a lyrical tale which Steinbeck calls these types of tales black and white story like a parable. "It is a parable about the search for happiness and the nature of man's need to choose between the inherently benign natural life the frantic self-oriented modern world (Astro 63). The very concern with material things with technology is for the most part unnecessary to mere biological survival. It is man's
Some common words found in the essay are:
John Steinbeck, Rose Sharon, Juana Kino's, Wrath Steinbeck, Gulf California, Grapes Wrath, Sometimes Steinbeck, Paz Despite, Pearl Steinbeck, Kino's Faith, grapes wrath, steinbeck's novels, individual qualities, man's nature, steinbeck writes, evil steinbeck, hayashi 49, he's deceived brilliance, false promise, brilliance false, promise holds, discovers pearl he's, deceived brilliance false, pearl he's deceived, kino discovers pearl,
Approximate Word count = 1752
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)
|
