The Pearl Part 2

The Pearl Part 2

                I’m going to be blunt and say the end of this book is just plain depressing, and completely broke my heart. While going through Kino and Juana’s adventure with the pearl I just assumed that the book would have a happy ending. I was wrong. In the second half of The Pearl everything took a turn for the worse: Kino gets attacked outside of his house, causing Juana try to throw it into the ocean while Kino was sleeping, which provoke Kino to hit Juana for defying him. But as he tries to go back home after that event he gets mugged and ends up killing a man and his house gets burned down.

                As Kino’s house burns, his neighbors believe they’re in it, His family escapes to his brother’s house secretly where they get supplies to leave town to cash in the pearl. He is driven to such things again by the darkness of greed and the power of others wanting/jealousy of the pearl. These feeling have escalated throughout the town to the point where human lives are taken and they even send trackers after Kino and his family to kill them and recover the pearl. While attempting to escape the evil of the town and the trackers they face confrontation with the trackers when Steinbeck completely broke my heart.

                There was irony to the heart break that took place. During the fight Kino has with the trackers one of them slips through his fingers and gets up to his Juana and Coyotito, their son, and shoots his son in the head. I think that it’s ironic in a way that Coyotito gets killed over the pearl because the reason that Juana and Kino were looking for pearls when they found it, was so that they could pay the doctor to save Coyotito’s life after a scorpion bite.  So the very thing that was supposed to save his life ended up being the death of him.

After the death of their son, Kino and Juana simply return to their town and throw the pearl into the ocean. I have contradicting feelings about that moment for a couple reasons. I agree with it because after that point it crosses a line that was never meant to be crossed and still attempting to go on with the pearl is life threatening and there isn’t anything else to risk their lives for now that their son won’t be able to benefit from it. But on the other hand now it seems as if their son’s life was taken from them for nothing because they have nothing to show for it. They’ve got nothing else to lose at this point. But I think that it was probably the wise choice to simply return home and grieve with their family.

I thought this book had interesting insight on the human condition, but I despise the ending of this book. It left me with my mouth hanging open wondering if that really just happened.  The thing is the life of something as innocent as a baby being taken just disgusts me. That child had no choice or control of what happened around it yet it’s the one who had to pay the consequences. I think this book was worth reading once for its views, but I won’t be reading it again anytime soon.

The Pearl Part 1

If I had to use one word to explain the theme of the first half of The Pearl it would be greed. When Kino and Juana lucked upon the pearl of the world the news spreads through the town as well as darkness, as everyone wishes that they had been who had found it. Everyone begins to see how their lives will better from this discovery; the sales men thought about the clothes they’ve had had a hard time selling lately; The Doctor, he had denied to treat Kino’s baby earlier that day, now planned to treat him and get a trip to France; The Priest wondered if the church had done anything for Kino’s family so that it could get some renovations; and it seemed that everyone was related to the pearl somehow and everyone wanted a part of it.

                The pearl even got to Kino he began to want everything, he started by just thinking of things he could get for his family but it opened flood gates where nothing was enough. He did check himself after he realized what he was saying. Steinbeck even came right out and said it when he said that “For it is said humans are never satisfied, that you give them one thing and they want something more.”  I think this puts it into words perfectly the human condition, we can’t be happy with what we have when given a taste of the riches and possibilities.

                The greed gets to someone so strongly that they risk getting stabbed to steal it, and they end up getting stabbed and not getting the pearl. But then it terrified Kino’s wife Juana, and she tries to get him to destroy it because of the evil it was causing. And what she says about it being evil definitely makes sense. I think an instance of this evil is when the doctor comes to “treat” their baby, after being stung by a scorpion the baby had improved immensely, but then the doctor gives him a white substance and tells them that they think the baby will have an outburst from the scorpion sting. And can you believe it exactly an hour later the baby has a serious reaction and the doctor saves him, and then of course he gets to be paid a bill that will come from the profit of the pearl.

                The pearl buyers seem to be in on the greed and evil when it comes to The Pearl of the World. They attempt to conn Kino for it by tell him it’s too big to be worth anything, when we know that it’s worth a large sum of money that Kino’s family could seriously use.  But this backfires on them because Kino calls their bluff, even though he doubt himself, and tells them that he’ll go to the capital to sell it instead of doing business with them.

                So far I’ve found The Pearl to be suspenseful and enjoyable. I also find it easy to connect with Kino because of how he connects emotions and events to song that makes it easier for me to grasp because I am musically inclined and everything seems to make more sense in song.

The Pygmalion Part 2

I just finished reading The Pygmalion by Bernard Shaw and even though Eliza didn’t end up with Higgins I did actually enjoy the ending of the book. I thought it was strange that Eliza ended up with character that we didn’t really get to know throughout the book, because we only ever met him twice. Which to me made it that more evident that Eliza settled for Freddy. And that becomes even more evident when at the end of thing the book when it says that sometimes she wishes she could take him to a deserted island where there are no social obligations where they could just be together. But in reality she had to choose “Will she look forward to a lifetime of fetching Higgins slippers or a lifetime of Freddy fetching hers”?

Another thing that I thought was interesting was that Shaw chose to end the book by saying that the relationship wouldn’t work because he’s too godlike to her to be agreeable. In saying that the book goes into a reason that they wouldn’t end up together and that’s that they both try to be the strongest, and best the other.  The beginning of hem not ever going to bet together start after Eliza passes as a duchess and Higgins and Pickering are on a high congratulating each other on their success.  Meanwhile Eliza sat on the couch and was being ignored by the men.  After Pickering heads off for bed Eliza and Higgins get into a heated argument. She yells at him for never treating her for anything more than a flower girl, but he tells her he treats duchesses like flower girls as well. And then they go into words about how she wouldn’t be with Higgins even if he asked her. Higgins said they could live together as two old bachelors and a maid.

Something that I found interesting in this argument is when they talk about how Eliza could find a husband now, any man brought up wasn’t good enough in Higgins eyes because he didn’t want his best work to go to a second rate guy. But I think that Eliza with any other guy than himself was just something he didn’t want. I believe that he thought that since they weren’t going to be together that she shouldn’t be with anyone. Mostly I think that Eliza didn’t end up together because they’re both to stubborn to admit they want to be together. I might be reading into The Pygmalion differently than Shaw intended, but that’s the way I see the relationship, and that’s how I see their relationship and the end of the Pygmalion.

The Pygmalion part 1

     I've recently finished reading the first half of Pygmalion, and even though normally with books I have to read for school I have to force myself to read them, but with the Pygmalion I've sincerely enjoyed reading it. After I began the book and got a sense of what it's about, I wanted to figure out how the title Pygmalion related to the story, so I decided to look it up.
     The Merriam-Webster dictionary said that Pygmalion was a king who makes a statue out of ivory that Aphrodite brought the statue to life for him. This to me was a very clever title, because of how Eliza Doolittle is Higgins ivory statue that he is creating. As he teaches he tries to mold Eliza into what he believes to be a lady who could pass as a duchess, he is also in my head, creating his ideal woman.  This makes me wonder if in this story it ends with something happening between Eliza and Higgins. Which I like to hope there is, whenever there’s romance involved I pull a classic teenage girl and find it ten times more enjoyable.
            Another reason I like this book is some of the subtle humor. One of my favorite instances of this is when Higgins takes Eliza to his mother’s house and to see if Eliza could pass as a lady. As Higgins and Pickering are explaining what they’ve done to teach her how to be a lady, they mention have to dress her, when of course his mom jumped to the conclusion that he dresses her  where she has an objection but they don’t even notice that she’s speaking because of how caught up they are in their story. I found this so amusing because it seemed like a typical thing a mom would do to skip over the obvious answer and go straight the one that’s controversial, but it doesn’t even seem to faze him because he’s probably so used to it and he’s so caught up in his story.
            So, so far I’m enjoying The Pygmalion and I’m looking forward to finishing this book.