It was my high school English class when I first read John Steinbeck’s The Pearl and Of Mice And Men, but really a better verb would be analyzed or studied ad nauseum. F. Scott Fitzgerald actually impressed me more at the time, though I also profusely studied The Great Gatsby, but the romance of forbidden, hopeless love appealed to my very spirit as I, too, dreamed of being so loved and needed. Steinbeck’s Pearl, on the other hand, did not satisfy the spirit in me.

After rereading it for Stephen_Murray’s write-off in celebration of Steinbeck’s 100th birthday, I can better understand why.

In a way, the glorious pearl that is found by the Mexican fisherman, Kino, is also greatly loved and thought to be needed. It is doven for in order to pay the doctor to cure his and Juana’s baby son, Coyotito, who is struck by a scorpion in his box, and suddenly Kino is no longer content with his poor man’s life. He is enchanted with the pearl’s beauty. He basks in the power of being able to afford new, pretty clothes for the family and schooling for Coyotito and a rifle. Yes, he is in love with the idea of money, but this didn’t seem to be the kind of love that connected with me.

After all, Gatsby wasn’t in love with money, but only hoped having it would make him good enough for Daisy, his love. Kino rather hoped money would make him more knowledgeable through his son’s schooling so he wouldn’t be taken advantage of by the rich. The Pearl was actually about power and not love.

And you know the old saying about how power corrupts? Well, Steinbeck shows us just how it does that. The story began flowing on the peaceful song of God’s wondrous nature around them that Kino once was satisfied to hear. The song changes sinisterly when the scorpion is spied and is never the same. When Kino realizes how far his dreams are taking him and how much he, a quiet man, is speaking, fear takes a hold of him for surely the gods will not like his arrogance and will show him who’s boss.

This is when he senses an intruder after his pearl and is attacked in the dark. Juana cleans him up in a cold fury, exclaiming that the pearl is sinful and must be destroyed before they were. Kino disagrees and seems to convince her that they need it, yet when she hopes he’s asleep, she tries to throw it back into the river. It’s bewildering to me how she could defy her husband and then not object when he thrashed her and looked wild enough to kill her. He was, she believed, half-god!

Right. This would seem to show a growing love and faith in her husband for she never leaves his side again, but could it just be fear for her life or that she would be left alone if she did separate from him? Maybe not. These are, in any case, very superstitious/religious people.

Then because the small town of La Paz’s pearl buyers are crooked, Kino refuses to deal with them and sets out with his family to find a decent price for them somewhere else. “Evil” is still harassing them and when his brother and he exchange “Go with God,” it sounds more like a curse. Still Kino is committed to facing his fears like a man and off they go to an uncertain future.



Little tufts of sad dry grass grew between the stones, grass that had sprouted with one single rain and headed, dropped its seed, and died. Horned toads watched the family go by and turned their little pivoting dragon heads…Oh, the music of evil sang loud in Kino’s head now, it sang with the whine of heat and with the dry ringing of snake rattles. It was not large and overwhelming now, but secret and poisonous, and the pounding of his heart gave it undertone and rhythm. P 104,105


Will they regret their journey through the night? Will “evil” prevail? And does this reader honestly close the novelette, feeling “not despair but hope for mankind” as the jacket claims?

My Thoughts


The Pearl is one of those American classics that is short in length (my copy was not much over one hundred pages), yet so powerfully orchestrated as to create an opus. Perhaps the award-winning author intended his creation to ring with the joy that there is hope for mankind when he comes to his senses and is satisfied with not rocking the boat and just being a poor animal. It sounded that way to me as evil from the scorpion was overwhelmed by the good of Juana’s healing actions, but the vibrations of evil from the pearl only became more frantic and jarring.

Steinbeck would have preferred that Kino had tossed the great pearl back since the child was doing fine, but does that mean that is what God wanted, too? Why had Kino found it, the pearl that he had dreamed of all his life? This parallels the Garden of Eden story, it seems to me, when human beings gained knowledge of good and evil. They, however, were not so much punished as they were made aware of their humanity and kept from becoming gods.

So was Kino seeking knowledge of his humanity. This is not a sin to desire to be more than an animal. Unfortunately, because of pursuers, he is instead compelled only to murder and an "animalness". After he and his wife have struggled unsuccessfully to break free of what keeps them from growing as humans, is it really a sign of hope that they can only see the pearl as a now-useless sin and bringing them evil?

I don't think so, but Steinbeck implies that it's a sin to try to be above the animals and closer to God. Maybe to him the desire for knowledge and self-respect doesn’t actually bring one closer to God, only further from the contentment of the simple life when power is not sought after and is left to God? As you can see, the story raises a bunch of heavy questions in me and the odds are that it will in you, too.

Perhaps, though, this gripping story might be quite satisfying and hopeful for you when Kino and Juana decide they have had enough and get rid of the seemingly-useless “evil.’ Not only will the various movements of Steinbeck’s opus wash entrancingly over you with the precise notes of a maestro (as they did for me), but they may make perfect sense to you and make reading this a less frustrating experience than it was for me.

I predict, though, that its sinister vibrations will trouble you and leave a sadness in your heart. If you are now confused as to whether to read it (or reread it), then you definitely need to so you can decide for yourself if the pearl was evil or just become a symbol of one. One thing it was for them and for me, though, was a pearl of questionable satisfaction. :-)

Note to my Readers: In case you’re new to my work, I’m not always so serious or confused, but I do have a sense of humor. My last (movie) review was of the comedy, For Love Or Money, and my next in the series exploring satisfaction is aptly called Satisfaction: The Art Of Female Orgasm. Whether it’s a comedic book, I have yet to discover! (not in Barnes and Noble yet)

Now please check out the other better writers than me in this write-off to learn much more about Steinbeck than I ever could tell you:

Curtis_Edmonds, Deaser, Ed-Grover, Ed_Williamson, eplovejoy, Garym, Jankp,
Macresarf1, Mridula, NFP, Stephen_Murray

Recommended: Yes