John Steinbeck Human Nature Essay

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The novella, The Pearl by John Steinbeck, expresses human nature through Kino, the main character, and shows how human nature can be unstable, like the waves of a thundering sea, or like the winds of a blazing winter. The common greed seen in everyday life in human nature was represented by a pearl, “the pearl of the world,” or so it was said. Although this pearl was going to produce an abundant amount of money, it would produce grave danger for Kino and his family. It filled Kino’s heart with greed and rapacity. But it is normal nature for human beings to feel this way when they achieve wealth or a high status in life. This emotion of greed is a very strong and evil concept that may even destroy the wisest of people and families. And this greed caused Kino’s family to fall apart. The greed had started when Kino started dreaming about everything he could do now that he found the pearl. As Kino commented to the whole village, “We will be married in the church” (Steinbeck 24). “We will have new clothes” (Steinbeck 24). “A rifle,” he said. “Perhaps a rifle”(Steinbeck 25). “My son will read and open the books, and my son will write and will know writing. And my son will make numbers, and these things will make us free because he will know and through him we will know” (Steinbeck 26). In greed he spoke more words together than he ever had in his entire…show more content…
Kino had now obtained the perfect pearl. As stated in The Pearl,“Then the doctor hurried in, followed by his man.He took the baby and examined it and felt its head. ”(Steinbeck 34) John Steinbeck used this platform to show how people can be gluttonous and avaricious even at certain times of peril. Kino was feeling what most people felt, greed, especially now that he had secured the pearl. He didn’t want to sacrifice the pearl, so he fooled the doctor and said that he would give him the money
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