The Story Archive

The Chrysanthemums

John Steinbeck · 1938 CE · Short Story · Modern / American · Modernist

Elisa Allen is thirty-five, cutting back chrysanthemum stems inside a wire fence on a Salinas Valley ranch while her husband closes a sale of thirty head of steers across the yard. A tinker with a mended wagon and a lame horse talks his way into repair work by asking her about the flowers. Among the most closely read short stories in American writing, and still argued over as to what exactly it is doing.

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Attributes

Genre
Psychological
Theme
Isolation & AlienationIdentity & SelfIndividual vs Society
Archetype (Jung / Campbell)
Everyman
Plot structure
Ironic Reversal
Symbol / motif
FlowersThe GardenRain
Conflict
vs Selfvs Society
Mode / tone
RealistIronicPastoral
Culture / tradition
Modern / American

Closest analogues