1. “The Chrysanthemums”

2. Plot summary Story centers on Eliza and her relationship with her husband Henry. The story opens with a description of the surrounding Salinas Valley in California. Elisa Allen pruning last year's chrysanthemums as she notices Henry talking with two men in business suits. Elisa, Henry’s wife, who is thirty-five, is described in masculine terms. She is "lean and strong" and "looked blocked and heavy in her gardening costume, man's black hat pulled low down over her eyes.” After Henry finishes his conversation, he approaches, leans over the fence where Elisa is working and compliments Elisa, she produces the most impressive chrysanthemums around.

3. Symbolism of the fence. Division between man’s and woman’s world. Henry tells her he sold some steers to the men in business suits. Henry offers to take Elisa into Salinas for dinner and a movie. He jokingly offers to take her to see the "fights," but Elisa refuses the offer. Man’s world vs. woman’s world. Henry departs to round up the steers. A mysterious wagon comes plodding up the country road. A man, in a "worn black suit" that is "wrinkled and spotted with grease" emerges, asks if he can sharpen her scissors or mend any pots or pans. Elisa refuses the offer.

4. The man notices her work in the garden and asks about her chrysanthemums. When the stranger asks Elisa about her chrysanthemums, she becomes very happy and excited. Her tone changes as she passionately explains how to plant and cut them. She gives him a flower pot containing some sprouts to take to a woman down the road whose garden, the man says, would be greatly enhanced by them. As "her breast swelled passionately" Eliza nearly reaches out and touches the man. She comes back to her senses and is possessed by a sense of shame.

5. After the man leaves, Elisa runs into the house and vigorously bathes, scrubbing her entire body, including her "loins," with a block of pumice. After she is dressed for dinner, Henry notices something different about his wife. In a blundering attempt to compliment her, Henry tells Elisa, "You look strong enough to break a calf over your knee, happy enough to eat it like a watermelon“.

6. Elisa and Henry leave for town. As they are driving, she notices a "dark speck" in the roadway. Elisa knows immediately that the traveling handyman has tossed her sprouts into the roadway and kept her pot. The story ends with Elisa asking her husband about the boxing matches. He offers to take her to see the fights, though he does not think she will enjoy herself. Elisa settles for wine instead and sits back, "crying weakly—like an old woman".

7. Where do the deep-rooted problems of communications between Henry and Elisa stem from? Ideology of patriarchy is ingrained in both Elisa and her husband. The patriarchal ideology is reinforced by the way the characters are presented and their interactions with one another.

8. When the stranger talks about living on the road and sleeping in a wagon outside, Elisa says: “It must be very nice. I wish women could do such things”. The stranger believes that “it ain’t the right kind of life for a woman”. This raises the question: what is the right kind of life for a woman? As most patriarchal men would believe (as well as society), a woman’s place is in the home. Elisa: “I could show you what a woman might do”. Elisa is unhappy with her position in life and desires another type of life.

9. Why is Elisa attracted to the stranger? The stranger gives Elisa a boost of confidence that was not in her before. Story shows a strong, capable woman kept from personal, social, and sexual fulfillment by the prevailing conception of a woman's role in a world dominated by men". Elisa's appearance, actions, and speech depict the frustration women felt in Steinbeck's masculine world of the 1930's. Elisa is bored with her husband and with her life.

10. She is attracted to the tinker because he represents a world of adventure and freedom that only men enjoy. The husband is a “…dull but well-intentioned farmer”. Elisa’s frustration stems from her husband's failure to admire her romantically as a woman.