Curley's Wife Character Analysis

What would life be like for Sally if she told someone or got help from her abusive father? What would happen to Curley’s wife if she waited to find someone she loved to marry? Why didn’t Sally and Curley’s wife just talk to someone about how they felt? Throughout the book The House on Mango Street, the character Sally is, at first look, seen as a popular, immature, and inappropriate girl. Meanwhile in Of Mice and Men, another character, Curley’s wife, has a similar image because of her poor decisions. However a closer look shows that, although many people think Sally and Curley’s wife are irresponsible and immature they make bad choices do to them trying to avoid their families, their rush to find love, and their lonely lives.
Sally is avoiding the problems she has with her family which continues to cause her to make unfortunate decisions, such as going back to her father. “Her father says to be that beautiful is trouble,” (Cisneros 81), “You become a different Sally. You pull your skirt straight, you rub the blue paint off your eyelids,” (82). Sally at school is seen as a beautiful and dangerous girl by many people including her father, yet when she goes home she is a bit

more appropriate. “…who comes with her pretty face all beaten and black can’t be falling off stairs. ‘He doesn’t hit me hard’” (92). Here Sally, when Esperanza asks about her bruises, she avoids the truth and lies. Further in the story, it will show more of Sally’s avoidance with her family problems.
Sally and Curley’s wife avoidance causes them to marry anyone they thought they loved. “…Sally, was to love and to love and to love and to love…” (Cisneros 83). Sally was and is very beautiful but she wanted to find love and she rushed it. “…you can’t get the keys back unless you kiss us and Sally…but she said yes” (96). Here Sally is flirting with the Tito and his friends making her seem very inappropriate. “Sally got married…young and not ready but married just the same” (101). Here Esperanza says herself that Sally married young and was not ready for such a big step. “She met a marshmallow salesman…and she married him…” (101).This shows that sally married someone she just met, desperate to find love even if it’s with the wrong person.While Curley’s wife married Curley not only to find love quickly but to avoid her mother. Curley’s wife was too fast to marry someone she though she loved, “Met him out to the Riverside Dance Palace that same night” (Steinbeck 88). This closer look at Sally and Curley’s wife shows that, they seemed immature but were just trying to find their loves.
Curley’s wife was lonely, in her life with her mother and with her husband Curley.

”’I’m lookin’ for Curley,’ she said,” (Steinbeck 31), “’You seen a girl around here?’ he demanded angrily,” (37). Here it shows the reader that Curley and wife are never together in the same room at the same time. “’Any you boys seen Curley?’” (76), once again Curley’s wife is looking for Curley. “’Why can’t I talk to you? I never get to talk nobody. I get awful.’” (86), here Curley’s wife says herself that she is lonely. Although Curley’s wife lives on a ranch filled with workers, none of them want to talk to her when she comes by. This and her never being with Curly causes her to visit the workers who are all men, giving her the image of an inappropriate woman doing adultery with other men besides her

husband.
Rumors and stereotypes are sadly everywhere in the world today. The way people look or be seen doing say more about them then the actual person and the things and feelings they truly do and feel. Sally and Curley’s wife look very beautiful but are seen as people they truly are not. The more the reader reads and learns about these two characters it makes the reader themselves think about things they thought of people they never met before too. About the people they wrongfully accused of being evil, ugly, out of place, and so on being different then what they originally though. Sally and Curley’s wife are just two characters that have been seen as completely opposites of who they truly are.