The Chrysanthemums Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

The Chrysanthemums - Assignment Example This is evident on her passion to pursue a life of adventure, on the road, like the tinker who came up her house one day. Her sexual needs are also mentioned in the story, having shared a flirtatious banter with the tinker and even kneeling in front of him like â€Å"a fawning dog†. It should be noted that Elisa doesn’t have kids and she was already 35, which signals that she and her husband Hank do not really have a productive, if at all, sexual relationship. The story ended with Elisa crying because she knew that she would be forever kept in that â€Å"closed pot† of a valley. The conflict of the story is character vs. society. This is set in 1938 and the women are not as privileged as men. Even though we see that Elisa is smarter and better than the two men, she is still confined to the house, tending flowers instead of doing something more productive. She finds this frustrating, and this is not her fault, it’s the society’s. Her happiness and se lf-fulfillment is being regulated by the society and it’s suffocating her. The theme is also gender inequality. We see this story as a good reflection of society in that day, and Elisa symbolizes the women as much as the two male characters symbolize the men. However great a woman can be, she is still relegated to doing house work, just because of her sex.