MORAL CORRUPTION UNDER POVERTY: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE HOUSE OF FLESH (BAYT MIN LAHM, بيت من لحم) AND THE PEARL

Abstract

The Pearl by John Steinbeck (1947) and House of Flesh by Yusuf Idris come from different cultures and literary backgrounds, America and Egypt. Both of them show that a poor family struggles and slowly disintegrates. The purpose of this research paper is to conduct a comparative literary analysis of the two works so as to highlight on how the two authors give different versions of human desperation and flimsy familial bond. Using close-reading and comparative-analysis framework, this paper explores common themes of poverty, sacrifice, gender relationships and tragic ending, using a framework that differentiates between external and internal agents of family breakdown. As is to be revealed through analysis, Steinbeck employs the pearl to symbolize the corrupting influence from the external environment that corrupts the family, whereas, Idris makes use of the blind Sheikh to represent the corrupting force from within the family's psychology, that destroys the family from within. These results help illustrate how two writers of the short fiction on different continents build completely divergent accounts of vulnerability of which one is motivated by outward greed and the other by motivations of inner psychological corruption, and thus broaden our understanding of how culture and literary tradition shape the presentation of family crisis.

Keywords: Comparative Literature, Poverty, Family Disintegration, Symbolism, Gender Dynamics, Social Criticism, Tragedy, The Pearl, and House of Flesh.