In all parts of the world, people have changed their forms of government in an attempt to decide what is best for their country . Apart from most cases, communism aims to make everyone equal and eliminates the concept of dictators. The contradictory fact is that the concept fails when people do not come to an agreement themselves and then realize that a leader is needed to make the final decisions. Of course, with the greed to be at the top, people do not move away from this empty position for long. As unfortunate as it may seem, even when people decide to become equal, someone still wants to be king. When this lust for power is between men and women rather than between the dictator and the country, the men try to maintain control while the women are the poor villagers of the communist country. “Chrysanthemums” was written to show us how men blindly seize power and how women are degraded in the process. Steinbeck shows how society has mistreated women by using gender roles and symbolism to put the reader in the "clod shoes" and "heavy leather gloves" of Elisa Allen in the 1930s. The symbolism is d First used in the setting to show how Elisa's life unfolds. like the earth that surrounds his garden. This example explains why she can't escape: The high gray-flannel fog of winter closed the Salinas Valley to the sky and the rest of the world. On each side, it rested like a lid on the mountains and made the great valley a closed pot (Skredsvig 4). If the valley represents Elisa's life, then it obviously shows that she is sheltered or trapped, cut off by the sky. . One critic explains it by writing: “In this closed pot, Elisa operates within even narrower limits” (4). The handyman's dogs symbolize the three main ...... middle of paper ......vid Léon. “Chrysanthemums: overview.” Reference Guide to Short Fiction. Ed. Noelle Watson. Detroit: St. James Press, 1994. Literary Resource Center. Internet. March 13, 2011. Palmerino, Gregory J. Steinbeck's “Chrysanthemums.” The Explainer 62.3 (2004): 164+. Literary Resource Center. Internet. March 13, 2011. Skredsvig, Kari Meyers. “Women’s space, women’s place: topoanalysis in Steinbeck’s “The Chrysanthemums.” Revista de Filología y Lingüística de la Universidad de Costa Rica 26.1 (January-June 2000): 59-67. Rep. in News Criticism. Ed. Jelena O. Krstovic. Flight. 135. Detroit: Gale, 2010. Information Resource Center. Internet. March 13, 2011.Sullivan, Ernest W., II. "The Heart in 'The Chrysanthemums'." Studies in Short Fiction 16.3 (Summer 1979): 215-217. Rep. at the Literary Resource Center. Detroit: Gale, 2011. Information Resource Center. Internet. March 13. 2011.