the grapes of wrath

Elisa is frustrated as a woman, and so has taken on masculine qualities, so she is first depicted as a woman whose strengths are really too much for the tasks at hand. "She was cutting down the old year’s chysanthemum stalks with a pair of short and powerful scissors," the reader learns. She has too much energy for the job. "Her face was eager and mature and handsome; even her work with the scissors was over-eager, over-powerful. The chrysanthemum stems seemed too small and easy for her energy." Thus, we get a sense, early on, of Elisa’s promise, of her potential. But it is also checked and limited by her circumstances and by her stereotypical role as a woman, and as a farmer’s wife.
A tinker comes on the scene. Elisa’s first response to his overtures as a salesman is in her masculine guise—she simply tells him she has no work for him. But he persists, and he finds her "soft spot," her chrysanthemums. While it is possible to interpret Elisa’s "love" for the chrysanthemums...