The Pearl written by John Steinbeck is a novel about the insanity a person can cause themself as a result of their goal.  The novel is centered around a mans craze to protect his most prized possession.  He is driven to do whatever he must to protect the pearl that he had found.  The narrator of the novel is Kino a diver who lives in a poor village searching for the day that he will become rich and live a better life.  The story takes place in a poor village where everyone struggles to survive and hope for the day that a better life will come.  Self-conflict is the type of conflict that is shown in this novel.  Kino is driven by the force that makes him believe he is going to be rich.  He finds a pearl that he believes to take him to another place where he will reside in riches and the best that life can give him. Throughout the novel he is controlled by this force and the actions that he takes explains why this force is in control of his mind and body.
    Kino is the main character in the novel.  He is the one that finds the pearl in the sea and takes control of the story.  He is the âeœdriverâ ? and takes the audience, as well as his wife and child wherever he believes is the place he will gain his fortune.  His wife Juanita follows his every lead because of her nature to support her husband in any situation.  His actions explain his motives and is shown to be drastic and immoral.  Kino is changed at the end of the novel because he has realized his actions.  It has taken major loss for Kino to realize what he has done.  I feel that Kino is lost in his own mind throughout the entire novel.  He has no plan of what to do with the pearl and just follows his instinct.  He goes on day by day thinking he is going to be rich and yet does not put into plan a way to become rich and does not heed the words of a loved one.  He is as stupid and as vulgar as each and every one of his actions.
    Juanita is the wife of Kino.  When Kino had found the pearl, she was only thinking of means to get by with it.  She was not as taken away as Kino was. She did not wish the world to be in her palm.  She follows Kino in every action he takes and takes the role of a very supportive wife in a primitive village.  Juanita always had little to say about the actions that Kino took. When she had an opinion of what to do with the pearl, Kino hit Juanita. Juanita had experienced the effect of not taking more action to stop Kino before he became in a crazed stage.  The loss of Kino's sanity explains all when Juanita tries again and again to stop his madness.  Juanita undergone a great change by the end of the novel.  She had realized that she had to aid her husband in Kino in telling him what to do.  He mistake is that she was too late in doing so and she had suffered the consequence.  Juanita is the most realistic person in this novel.  She knows that the pearl might not take her to wondrous places but her mistake is that she does not take her husband out to the dream that he is trying to live.  She is the more reasonable of the two and she in need to take control of the situations that Kino put them in.
    The third character I have chosen is a bit of a weird choice.  The character I have chosen is Coyito the son of Kino and Juanita.  I have chosen him because he is innocent in every way possible and he has no choice of what to do.  He is just a baby set in a world that his father Kino creates for him.  At the beginning of the novel, he is stung by a scorpion and is poisoned.  His father has a choice to sell the pearl and save his life but he opts to wait and put Coyito's life in danger.  John Steinbeck puts Coyito in this position to show the madness and greed in Kino.  Without Coyito, Kino's craze would be diminishing and his actions would not be expressed as great as the drama that is created in this novel.  I feel that Coyito sets up the story and brings a lesson learned when he dies at the end of the novel.
    Kino finds the pearl and he brings it back to his home.  He is overjoyed by the fact that he may become rich and he will live a life of luxury.  He does not see what is in front of his eyes nor does he see Juanitas reaction.  Juanita sees that it is joyful for her family but she does not dream as Kino does.  When Coyito was stung by the scorpion, Kino needed to sell the pearl.  He and Juanita rushed to see the doctor.  Kino refused to give away the pearl as a mean of paying for the fee.  His selfish ideas
could have caused the life of his son to be taken away.  In way this was the beginning of Kino's sanity.  The action that he has taken to save his son has shown that he cares more about the pearl and himself (and possibly his wife) than his own offspring.
    In a scene where Kino and his wife was in his home Kino heard strange sounds.  His fear of losing the pearl took over all of his senses.  He did not see nor hear his wife in his mind, nor did he even realize he still had a child under his care.  The sounds that he heard was a person outside his home. Kino took a knife as a mean of protection for his most prized possession, the pearl.  He creepd outside and saw a shadow.  As the shadow got closer and closer, Kino's insanity and greed forced him to
attack the person and slay him.  Even though Kino realized what he had done, he felt that it was the best thing to
do and he was right for his actions.  This scene along with the last one shows that Kino had gone through a transtion in his mind.  He has lost control of all of his morals and he no longer wishes for anything but riches.
    The most intense scene in the story in when Kino is being chased by the trackers he still only wanted to save the pearl.  While being chase he was forced to