One of the main themes of The Pearl is the destructive power of greed. Kino disregards the safety and love of his family to pursue selling the pearl he finds. When the pearl brokers offer him a poor price, Juana, his wife, tries to throw the pearl into the ocean. In response, Kino beats her savagely, and then a series of misfortunes befall him. He kills a man who tries to rob him, and, as a result, he is forced to flee his home with his family. His house then burns down, and the boat in which he tries to flee has a hole in the bottom. When he attempts to flee by land, the men sent to pursue him wind up killing his baby. Left with nothing, he realizes the error of his ways and tosses the pearl back into the ocean. His greed caused his undoing, the unraveling of his family, the death of his baby, the destruction of his home, and the sorrow of his loving wife.
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