John Steinbeck's agricultural upbringing in the California area vibrantly shines through in the settings and story lines of the majority of his works. Steinbeck's novel, Of Mice and Men, takes place in the Salinas Valley of California. The drama is centered around two itinerant farm workers, George Milton and Lennie Small, with a dream of someday owning a place of their own. Lennie Small is a simple-minded, slow moving, shapeless hulk with pale eyes whose enormous physical strength often causes him to get into trouble. George Milton on the other hand is small in stature, clever, dark of face and eyes, and acts as Lennie's guardian and calming force.
Early in the story the prospect of their ever realizing their dream seems remote, but as the plot unfolds (they meet a crippled bunkhouse worker who wants to go in with them on the scheme, and who offers offer to chip in his life savings), the probability of fulfillment rises. If the three pool their salaries at the end of the current month, they can quit and move into their farm. Lennie manages to avoid disaster for exactly three days. He gets involved with the flirtatious wife of Curley, the boss' violent son. Through a series of unfortunate events, he becomes frightened and inadvertently kills the girl. Curley organizes a group to apprehend Lennie. George gets to Lennie first and out of sympathy for his companion, shoots him in the head to spare him the pain of Curley's shotgun or the misery of incarceration.
Lennie's killing of mice and later his killing of the puppy sets up a pattern that the reader expects to be followed. George's story about Lennie and the little girl with the red dress, which he tells twice, adds to this expectancy, as do the shooting of Candy's d...
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...ypical Steinbeck novel in terms of simplicity, story line, and setting. Steinbeck transplants the knowledge he gained and the images he conceived of California in his writings.
Works Cited and Consulted:
Bloom, Harold. John Steinbeck. Pennsylvania: Chelsea House Publishers, 1999.
Davis, Robert Murray. Steinbeck: A Collection of Critical Essays. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1972.
Fontenrose, Joseph. John Steinbeck: An Introduction and Interpretation. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1964.
French, Warren. John Steinbeck's Fiction Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1994.
Lisca, Peter. The Wide World of John Steinbeck. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1958.
Steinbeck, John. Of Mice and Men. New York: Penguin Books USA Incorporated, 1978.
Tedlock, E.W. Steinbeck and His Critics. Albuquerque: The University of New Mexico Press, 1957.
George?s act of shooting Lennie can be looked upon as gracious. If Lennie had not left the world and his problems, a large amount of torture would fiercely come his way. The bloodthirsty mob, including the violent, disruptive Curley, has the mindset to demolish this ignoramus who killed Curley?s wife. Because of Lennie?s mental impairment and immaturity, he would not be able to handle such animosity. In saying that Lennie is not to blame for the death of Curley?s Wife, Lennie should not have to face the merciless people at the farm. George knows that Lennie is unable to survive in the world.
Although George is angry with Lennie, he reassures Lennie all is well and retells him the story of their farm. George relinquishes the American dream of owning a farm and the chance of a better life with Lennie. He is now fully aware that all of his plans and dreams amount to nothing. George also realizes he is just a lowly migrant worker with no future; he will never own a little piece of land to call home sweet home. Lennie gives George a sense of meaning and purpose in life. The death of Lennie gives way to the death of their American dream
shows the angle of her feet and focuses on where her next step will be
As George becomes aware of the situation he begins to ponder what will happen if Lennie gets away. George understands that Lennie would not be capable of providing for himself out in the wild. As George contemplates allowing Lennie to be free of all the men, he “[is] a long time in answering” (94). George is one of the few men who understands Lennie’s mental limitations, he knows Lennie would not remember how to survive and “the poor bastard’d starve” (94). He
Set in the farmlands of the Salinas Valley in California, "Of Mice And Men" is based on the 1930's Great Depression. This novel shows the struggle of two migrant workers, George Milton and Lennie Small in fulfilling the 'American dream'. The dream shared by many of owing "a little house and a couple of acres". From the onset of the novel, it becomes crystal clear that Lennie is heavily reliant on his companion, George. What's more, Steinbeck portrays the two by juxtaposing them to a father and son figure. In this assessment, I plan to clearly deconstruct and explore some of the ways Steinbeck leads up to George's final decision to shoot Lennie.
George and Lennie have to continue to move around the country looking for work until Lennie screws up again. The instability of work only makes it that much harder for them to complete their dream of a farm of their own. Candy’s participation in the dream of the farm upgrades the dream into a possible reality. As the tending of rabbits comes closer to happening fate curses them with the accidental death of Curley’s wife. The end of their wishful thinking is summed up by Candy’s question on page 104, “Then-it’s all off?”
In “My Last Duchess” and “Porphyria’s Lover” both deal with the love of a woman. The theme for both is power and how the speaker in both want to be in control over the woman. The imagery in “My Last Duchess” is based off what the Duke’s feel and what he shares with the servant. The imagery in “Porphyria’s Lover” is based on Porphyria’s. The tone in “My Last Duchess” is arrogant and ignorant because the Duke think so much of himself and foolishly shares all his flaws. The tone in Porphyria’s Lover” is rational the speaker makes sense of the murder of a woman he loves so much. Both poems displayed dramatic
... of the love shared between a man and a woman. The aspects of jealousy, vanity, pride, obsessive desire, beauty, and flirtatious behavior are contained in both poems. The desire to completely possess another person's love and affection are related through a dramatic monologue. Robert Browning compares the love Duke Ferrara has for his Duchess with the obsession of Porphyria's lover. The Duke's has a jealous, stubborn, and irrational love for his Duchess. Likewise, Porphyria's is the recipient of a sinister, uncontrolled, and destructive love. Her mysterious admirer is overwhelmed by Porphyria's supreme beauty and her sensual mannerisms. His jealousy and obsession for Porphyria, compels him to act upon his depraved thoughts that will secure her total love and devotion. Porphyria and the Duchess experience similar outcomes that result in the death of both women.
At the end of the book Of Mice and Men George takes Lennie's life because the violence keeps progressing. Lennie went from in the beginning of the book killing
Three poems were written by different authors, all of them responding to the first poem’s main idea. The poems are called; The “Passionate Shepherd to His Love” by Christopher Marlowe, “The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd” by Sir Walter Raleigh, and “Raleigh was Right” by William Carlos Williams. Throughout the three poems there is a central idea that connects them all together. Love is a theme that is developed and is elaborated on through all three poems. It is important and carries the main points of each poems. Marlowe’s poem is centralized on good love. Raleigh’s contradicts what the first poem has to say, and William’s poem agrees with the second one.
Browning takes a stance, not very radical for the Victorian Era, that the women should not be bold, promiscuous, or decisive without their male partner at the forefront. This analysis of Browning’s treatment of women is brought about quite simply in each of the lady’s deaths. First, in “My Last Duchess,” the female smiles too much, according to the speaker, and this represents her promiscuity, and smiling at every passing suitor. Her husband did not like this (can we blame him?) so he, assumedly, kills his wife. “I gave commands; / Then all smiles stopped together.” As for “Porphyria’s Lover,” the female enters the room with dominance, she is the only one taking action in the plot for the first three fourths of the poem, all the while her male partner is watching her, stewing. Porphyria sits down next to him, and after a lengthy description of the setting, she, “...put my arm about her waist, / And made her smooth white shoulder bare, / And all her yellow hair displaced, / And, stooping, made my cheek lie there.” In the end, after Porphyria takes the male role in the relationship, the speaker decides what he will do: he strangles his female partner to death with her own hair, revealing her weakness even within herself. Each of the women die for taking actions that are out of the ordinary for women of the Victorian Era, and this reveals Browning’s treatment of
The types of love in a poem can be reflected in many ways. One of
‘Porphyria’s Lover’ and ‘My Last Duchess’ are both poems by the Victorian poet Robert Browning. In this essay I will compare these two poems to find similarities and differences.
Though ballads and Sonnets are poems that can depict a picture of someone’s beloved, they can have many differences. For instance, a Ballad is a story in short stanzas such as a song would have, where as a sonnet typical, has a traditional structure of 14 lines employing several rhyme schemes and adheres to a tight thematic organization. Both Robert Burn’s ballad “The Red, Red, Rose, and William Shakespeare’s “of the Sonnet 130 “they express their significant other differently. However, “The Red, Red, Rose depicts the Falling in new love through that of a young man’s eyes, and Shakespeare’s sonnet 130 depicts a more realistic picture of the mistress he writes about; which leaves the reader to wonder if beauty is really in the eyes of the beholder.
Munich. It has also made me a more faithful person and I tend to stand