“Why-why Elisa…. You look strong enough to break a calf over your knee, happy enough to eat it like a watermelon. (Steinbeck 232) Most people reading this would simply pass it off as an attempt at a compliment from a tactless man, but is that all it is? In “Les Chrysanthèmes”, Elisa is a farmer whose only passion in life is in her gardening. Henry, her husband, owns a farm and ignores the monotony of Elisa's life. Throughout the story, Henry is on the outside, never really understanding Elisa and how she feels. Until a handyman comes to the farm and talks to Elisa about her chrysanthemums. By asking just one question, the handyman opens Elisa up and allows her to unleash the passion and femininity she has kept hidden throughout her life. In John Steinbeck's "The Chrysanthemums," Henry Allen's seemingly inane comment is not only that but an allusion, set up by Steinbeck, to Dionysian maenads. Dionysus is the Greek god of wine, revelry and gathering. His followers, the maenads, were said to have been driven into a certain form of "divine madness", aided by wine, which would lead to prophecy and insight. More often, however, it led to drunkenness and promiscuity. They danced, sang and walked around, not to mention joining in sexual activities to stimulate the fertility of the land and achieve ecstasy. Maenads sometimes reached a dangerous “frantic state” where if they crossed it, they “teared animals apart and devoured the raw flesh” (“Maenads” par.1). Knowing this, we take a second look at our history. Elisa Allen had an erotic experience with the handyman just talking about the passion she has for her chrysanthemums that opened her eyes to everything she hides and submits about herself. Henry notices a difference in Elisa, beyond the way she is dressed, but he has never seen her passionate side and doesn't know what to say. When Henry claims that Elisa looks strong enough to kill and eat a cow, Steinbeck is making an allusion to the maenads of the ancient Greek world. David Leon Higdon, a scholar, asserts that "With this image...Steinbeck transforms the characters and the ranch, synchronizing empirical and mythical realities, and identifying Elisa's new power and beauty with that of the Maenads or Bacchae in their worship of Dionysus” (par. 1). . – It’s clear that Henry’s comment goes way beyond that. “It is as if Steinbeck wanted his reader to feel, for a brief moment, that he or she had opened a door inappropriately and