Transcript By Dr. Lakshmi Muthukumar Head, Dept.of English, SIES College, Sion West  Steinbeck blends both naturalism and realism as literary techniques is his novella The Pearl. 

By Dr. Lakshmi Muthukumar
Head, Dept.of English,
SIES College, Sion West
 Steinbeck
blends both naturalism and
realism as literary techniques is his novella
The Pearl.
 The Pearl deals with a tragic story of a
poor Mexican Indian, Kino, who fails to
realise his dreams.
 At a thematic level the novella deals with
the inability of the poor to change their
lives
once
they
are
trapped
in
circumstances beyond their control.
 Central
to Steinbeck’s oeuvre were themes
such as:
 the struggles of the poor,
 man’s inhumanity to man
 the destructive effects of selfishness and
 the saving power of the family.
 Steinbeck
belongs to a tradition of socially
concerned American writing.
 The
Pearl embodies not just the
oppression of the poor by the rich but also
the conflicts between ordinary people
themselves, who exploit each other for
relatively little gain.
 The
novella The Pearl
underscores :
 the
importance of the positive
values of endurance
 companionship
 acts of kindness and
 the supportive role played by
the family.

Displaying an essentially humanist view of society, the
work shows how overbearing external forces such as the
Doctor (Medical Care), the Priest (Religion) & the traders
and the pearl dealers (Capitalist forces) impose
themselves on the characters’ struggle for survival.
 Tightly
controlled dramatic structure
 The form of the parable
 Objectivity
 Credibility in the narrative
 Capable of expanded belief
 Thus an interesting parable realized in
objective, imagistic detail
 The abstract fleshed by the particular
 Compact
precision
 Convincing thematic materials
 Temporally speaking, the novelette covers
about five days of elapsed time
 Balanced narrative method
 A spare, impersonal narrative
 Richly implicational materials
 As
a social critic and as a chronicler of the
Depression era, he champions the notion
that people can stake out an intellectual or
moral claim in their lives in spite of the
many hardships that life has to offer.
 Ed
Ricketts ran the Pacific Biological
Laboratory in Monterey, which supplied
schools and institutions with a variety of
creatures, living or dead, from cats to
cuttlefish.
 Steinbeck found a soulmate in Ed who
shared his love and fascination for the
natural world.
 Ed
Ricketts confirmed Steinbeck’s belief
that mankind was an integral part of the
animal kingdom, not a separate species
working out some divine plan.
 Steinbeck’s naturalistic approach in The
Pearl resonates Rickett’s beliefs.
 The
Pearl was written in 1947, 28 years
after the Wall Street Crash which was
followed by the Great Depression of 1929
and approximately 14 years after the Dust
Bowl Tragedy.
 The
1920s had been boom times for the
United States.
 The prosperity was reflected in the share
prices on the New York Stock Exchange,
which rose to dizzying heights by the
summer of 1929.
 Then, in the autumn of that year, the
market feel sharply, rallied briefly and
then slumped.
 The
Wall Street Crash had a dire and lasting
effect
on
the
American
economy.
Investments and savings were wiped out
and businesses went bankrupt.
 Banks went broke on a daily basis and the
old values of thrift and financial prudence
no longer made sense.
 Unemployment soared to 14 million in
early 1933 (more than a quarter of the
workforce).
 The
American Dream presupposed
economic well-being and the opportunity
to work hard for tangible rewards.
Suddenly, millions of people who had,
during the 1920s, attained the highest
standard of living in the history of the
world fell into poverty. Furthermore, there
was no safety net between them and
destitution.
 Charitable
organizations such as the YMCA
and the Salvation Army did what they could
to alleviate the suffering. They set up
breadlines and soup kitchens which soon
became familiar sights in cities from coast
to coast.
 Then President Hoover was voted out and
Roosevelt
came
to
power
(1932
presidential elections).
 The
most tragic event of the Roosevelt Era
is the Dust Bowl tragedy which struck the
Southern plains of the Texas, Oklahoma
and the adjacent areas of Kansas, Colorado
and New Mexico.
 A strong wind originating in the Gulf of
Mexico blows steadily through this bowl,
formed naturally in the abovementioned
plains.
 These
areas had very little rainfall and no
trees.
 Tough prairie grass is all that holds the soil
in place and preserves the moisture to
nourish it.
 During the latter half of the 19th century,
the delicate balance of nature was
seriously disrupted by overgrazing, which
resulted in dust and snow storms.
 In
the early 20th century cattle farming
gave way to wheat farming as an
economically lucrative venture and this
reckless and short sighted move, broke the
soil and destroyed the precious grass which
held the topsoil in place; thus upsetting
the balance of nature.
 When
the price of wheat fell sharply with
the onset of the Depression, the farmers
responded by growing more wheat and this
compounded the problem resulting in
blizzards that destroyed homes, lives,
landscapes and crops. There was nothing to
harvest and labourers and shiny new
tractors were rendered as unnecessary
luxuries.
A
pearl usually signifies purity and
innocence. These are the very qualities that
Steinbeck loses after he (ironically) finds the
pearl.
 By inverting the symbolism, Steinbeck
emphasizes the parable aspect of the
novella.
 When
Kino dives for the pearl, his heart is
filled with anger and frustration; he is fierce
and animal-like in this predatory mood.
When he returns to the world above the floor
of the Gulf, he is in possession of the Pearl of
the World, but the beauty of the pearl slowly
begins to dim; it turns ulcerous because
Kino’s heart changes. Steinbeck’s irony is
extremely subtle.
Apparently, what he desires are ‘good’ things:
 He wants to be married in the church
 He wants Coyotito christened (Juana has
been saving for his christening clothes till
they could find a pearl to afford them)
 An education for Coyotito
 A rifle for himself
 He
is already married – Juana and Kino are a
truly married couple – they are man and wife
– body and soul. True companions. Yet, Kino
craves for the social recognition that
accompanies a “foreign marriage” performed
by a circumspect priest in a “foreign”
religion and he wants the elegant religious
sanction of this foreign religion.
 When
the scorpion first bit Coyotito, Juana
sucks the poison from the wound, utters
charms in the native religion and uses
indigenous medicine (a poultice made of
seaweed) to save her son. All this worked till
the doctor intervened with a mild poison
intended to cause the child to turn blue so
that he could make the most out of the
situation.
 Kino
wants his son to get educated and seek
his place in the new and foreign world.
 He wants him to become a part of the world
which has just rejected him.
 His new desires are all intended to please
the members of this new world and its priest
rather than his native gods and people.
 His attempts to alienate himself from his
own religion, people and customs result
therefore in self-destruction.
 The
real community is hidden behind paved
streets and in gardens protected by stone
walls.
 The people who attack Kino are never seen
 They remain simply evil forces in the dark.
 His very manhood is challenged by these
“dark ones” who ambush him and try to steal
the pearl from him. He suddenly becomes
the one hunted.
 He has lost his own world without gaining
another. He is left without a society.
 Nothing
in life is black or white, innocent or
evil; everything is a shade somewhere in
between.
 Kino is tricked into seeing and wanting things
that are not, in themselves, innately good.
 He feels that education brings a knowledge
that sets a man free and that the church
blesses and makes proper husbands and
wives.
 However, he finds to his dismay, that these
things are good only if man is not forced to
crawl like an animal to achieve them.
 Kino’s
manhood does not allow him to
surrender. He must display bravery. The
readers sympathize entirely with Kino.
 He finally does what Juana had suggested
very early on and for which he had hit her.
 Both of them together cast the pearl away
and go back to the society that they truly
belong to.
 His return is a simple victory of all that is
good in man.
 The
novella concludes with Kino and Juana
returning without Coyotito yet with a dignity
that is unmatched.
 The throwing of the pearl back into the Gulf
along with his return to his village is Kino’s
act of defiance of a world that refuses to
grant him the dignity to which he thought he
was entitled.
 All those who witness his return recognize
the change that has come over him.
 It
is not only the people of his village who
recognize and acknowledge Kino’s newfound
dignity.
 Juana also recognizes this as she stands
proudly beside him and refuses to throw the
pearl herself. It is for the newborn man who
is still master of his soul to dispose of the
pearl as he sees fit.
 The act of throwing the pearl back into the
ocean is thus not a defeatist gesture but an
act of defiance and bravery.
 “If
this story is a parable, perhaps everyone
takes his own meaning from it and reads his
own life into it.”
 The full meaning of these lines cited in the
introduction dawn on the reader