The Chrysanthemums Setting Analysis

The setting shapes the mood and tone of a story and has a great affect on what happens in a story. The setting influences the events that take place, how the characters interact and even how they behave. Settings show where and how the character lives, what they do, and what they value. Characters have a relationship with the setting just as much as they do with other characters in the story. This is seen in the effects the setting has on the development of the Character Elisa in the story “The Chrysanthemums.”

Gray with a flannel fog of winter describes the Salinas Valley where Elisa lives and the dress and manners she has on her ranch in the foothills. Confined by the dark fog that restricts the valley and the surrounding mountains like a “lid placed on a pot,” she and the valley have no sunshine, no happiness, no noise, and no warmth. While the Allen ranch is clean and organized, a feeling of oppression and entrapment is felt in the physical setting and is seen in the development of the character Elisa. The valley, “Closed off” by the winter fog and isolated from other life, Elisa is also trapped and closed off in a life behind her garden gates. “Closed up like a pot,” describes Elisa’s feeling of separateness, loneliness, and emptiness, from the outside world. The Allen’s value the simple life of a rural farmhouse, but Elise still seems dissatisfied. Not until the arrival of a stranger who

The setting in the story depicts what is happing to Elisa not only in the physical world, but what is happening in her emotional world. This connection of the physical setting on the character develops Elisa as a character throughout the story and builds