Analysis of: The Pearl by John Steinbeck
The Pearl by John Steinbeck
1.
Literally: The short novel is about a man called kino who finds this pearl that
he thinks would bring him luck and fortune when in the end it cause death,
misery, pain and a curse.
B. Setting:
1. It takes place in the gulf of what I believe it’s Mexico.
C. Characters
1. Main Charters:
Kino:
poor Mexican man who has a wife a baby boy and works at sea diving looking for
pearls to sell and barely talks to his wife.
Juana:
Kino’s wife, mother of a baby boy, barely talks with his husband but goes with
him wherever he goes. She’s very respectful and caring, doesn’t care about the
money and her family always comes first.
Coyotito:
Kino and Juana’s baby boy. Doesn’t talk but always knows what’s happening, got
stung by a scorpion and is a pretty little fighter.
2. Secondary:
Juan Tomas:
Kino’s older brother who’s willing to help his brother at all causes. Married
to a fat woman called Apolonia.
Apolonia: Juan
Tomas’s wife. Willing to help his brother in law, Kino, and Kino’s family.
The doctor’s servant: also a Indian from Kino’s culture who wants to help
but is not allowed by his master.
3.
Antagonist:
The doctor:
Self-centered monster who poisoned Coyotito and then acted like a hero by
getting to Kino’s brush house just in time to save the baby.
The three men:
these were the men who were searching for Kino and his family. One of them had
colored skin, carried a rifle, smoked and rode a horse, and the other two
walked.
D. Plot
1.
in this novel we can see how a kind simple man changes by finding a pearl that
might make him rich, he could send his kid to school, get married in church
with his wife, buy new clothes and a rifle. Through the story, bad things start
happening to the man’s family, (his son gets stung by a scorpion, they can’t
sell the pearl, he beats his wife, his house caught fire, he kills four men and
his son) so the man and his family go on a journey to sell the pearl and in the
end all it does is bring the misery so they end up throwing the pearl back in
the sea.
E. Conflict:
Man
vs Man and Man vs Nature
The
‘pearl of the world’ Kino found and thought it would bring him riches, actually
curses him and his family. Kino tries to sell the pearl but all the buyers give
him a low price and all of a sudden worst things start happening.
G. Climax:
The
one moment that didn’t want to make me sleep and actually kept me at the edge
of my seat, was the moment where he beats Juana and when he starts to kill the
three men that looked for him and accidently kills his son by shooting him in
the head with the rifle he’s always wanted.
H.
Resolution:
After
their long journey, Kino returns with Juana and Coyotito’s body and without looking at anyone, stopping where
their house was or looking at Kino’s broken canoe they walked to the shore and
threw the pearl back to the sea now that Kino noticed that the pearl wasn’t
good and only brought him misery and loss.
I. Point
of View:
To
be honest I thought the story was way too slow and that the author described
too much, but it still gave me that curiosity of wanting to know if it’s real
or not and what happened to Kino and Juana after that excepted ending and what
did the rest of the society thought of them. In my opinion I would’ve liked the
story a little bit more if the author didn’t describe everything the way it
did, described a little more the violent scenes and if it would’ve had more
action in it, but besides that it was ok.
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