Curley's Wife in Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men

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Curley's Wife in Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men

The story OF Mice and Men by John Steinbeck is set in California,

U.S.A during the Great Depression in the 1930s. The Depression was a

time of economic downfall which caused very high unemployment in

western nations, one of the worst hit being the U.S.A. This caused

lots of people to become homeless and Jobless, this also cause people

to become awfully depressed in the harshest of lifestyles and in some

incidents people even went on to commit suicide. People who were very

rich lost everything they had all their land all of their money. This

forced the government to pass out the New Deal this is where people

became migrant workers and were given work from place to place on

farms. The lifestyle and conditions for the migrant farm workers was

really harsh.

In the story Curley's wife is one of the main characters. She is

married to a man called Curley who has a lot of authority in the ranch

because he is the boss's son. I think that Curley is a self centered

man who cares about no one except himself. This influences on her a

lot as well, I think that this is why she acts like she does. The only

reason she did get married to Curley was to spite her mother.

To answer the question fully I must first find out what the work

'tragic' means. The meaning is a) Disastrous; generally distressing;

very sad.

b) Of tragedy. So to answer the question fully I will have to explain

how Curley's wife and a few other characters fit in to this

description.

In the story the character of Curley's wife can be regarded as tragic

figure in the story because I think that she has wasted her whole life

...

... middle of paper ...

...ause of Lennie's actions. Once again candy who is

uncertain of his future and is really devastated that they could not

get their own place. This is an example of another tragic figure

within the story.

The character of Curley's wife can be regarded as tragic and she is

not the only one, in fact in this whole story there is not even one

character who is not a tragic one. This shows how hard life was in

those days with the great depression and the segregation. No one in

the whole of the story had reached their dreams. So on the whole I

think that the whole of the story was a tragic story. Especially

because of the waste of Curley's wife's life and George in the end

having to kill Lennie, Candy being uncertain of his future once again.

No one in the story has come out pleased of what he has accomplished

or achieved.

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