John Steinbeck Motivates George In Of Mice And Men

A famous soccer player, Hans F. Hansen, once said “People inspire you, or they drain you, pick them wisely.” He believes that the people around someone can either motivate them, or be a drawback to their dreams. John Steinbeck, author of Of Mice and Men, also shares this same opinion in his novella. Steinbeck shows through his characters how people around them affect their hopes and dreams in different ways. For George, Lennie is a drawback, as well as a companion who lets them strive for their dream, a piece of land. Lennie makes some stupid mistakes, but motivates George in the most difficult times in the farm. Crooks, a cripple African American, constantly gets discriminated by everyone in the farm making him lose all his hopes and dreams.

Another character who lost their dreams was Curley’s wife. She had many opportunities to achieve her dreams but got held back by her old lady eventually making her give up as well. On the contrary, a character who finds a new dream to work for is Candy. He overhears Lennie and George talking about their dream and tells them he could help them by giving money and looks forward to getting that “piece of land.” In the novella Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck shows how a person’s dreams can be ruined as well as inspired by the people around them.
In Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck shows readers how dreams can be inspired by the people around you through the characters of Lennie, George, and Candy.

Candy is crippled, and is almost useless in the farm and is just trying to make it to the next day without going insane. When he overhears Lennie and George talk about their dream about their “piece of land” he gets excited and tells them he can contribute his money as well in order to make this dream become reality. In the novella, Candy says, “ Tell you what-” He leaned in forward eagerly. “S’pose I went in with you guys. Tha’s three hundred an’

fifty bucks I’d put in.

I ain’t much good, but I could cook and tend the chickens and hoe the garden som. How’d that be?(59)”. Candy respects George and Lennie and therefore wants to help in this dream they have. They have been around Candy enough to trust them to put his hard earned money into this “dream” they have. Speaking of trust, another character who shows trust is Lennie. Lennie listens and does everything George tells him to do because he trusts him as friend as well as family. When Lennie sees all the ways he could get in trouble in the farm with Curley's wife, Curley, and others, he begs George to leave the farm with him.In the novella, it states, “I don't like this place, George. This ain't no good place. I wanna get outa here.” “We gotta keep it till we get a stake. We can't help it, Lennie. We'll get out jus' as soon as we can. I don't like it no better than you do.(32)”. Lennie has been with George since his childhood and makes almost all his decisions based on what Georges tells him. In this situation, George tells him that they have to stay and make money, and Lennie’s decision changes accordingly to George and he stops complaining. Even though Lennie is scared and wants to leave, George inspires him

about their dream making him change his mind and stay at the farm. This shows how your best friends can help you reach for your dreams and make them become true. Similarly, when George feels helpless, Lennie helps him strive for their goal. George is mad that they just lost their job in Weed, and is losing his hopes for their future because Lennie keeps getting in trouble. Lennie loves George and knows it his own fault, but still encourages George with their dream. Lennie influences a lot of what George does because they both care about each other. In the story Lennie says, “An’ live off the fatta the lan’,” Lennie shouted. “An’ have rabbits. Go on, George! Tell about what we're gonna have in the garden and about the rabbits in the cages and about the rain in the winter and the stove, and how thick the cream is on the milk like you can hardly cut it. Tell about that, George.(14)”. George was just yelling at Lennie for getting them in trouble over and over again, but Lennie being the light hearted person he is, takes that and uses it to encourage George about their dream piece of land. He has been around George enough to know what makes him feel better and that is to bring up their dream. These characters show how the people around them helped them strive for their dreams in the future.
On the contrary, some characters in the novella were influenced in a negative by the people around them. Curley’s wife always wanted to become an actress in Hollywood, but her old lady wouldn’t let her. She was stopped even though she had a chance from a guy to get into Hollywood. In the novella, she tells Lennie, “Well, I wasn’t gonna stay no place where I couldn’t get nowhere or make something of myself…(88)”. She was denied her chances to get into Hollywood multiple times by her old lady making her lose all her hopes and dreams for the future. For this reason, she just ended up marrying Curley, who was a wealth farmer, even though she really didn’t love him. Her old lady diminished her dreams every single time making Curley’s wife stop setting goals and just give up on her life. This shows how the people around Curley’s wife, in this case her old lady, made her give up her dreams of getting into Hollywood. Similarly, another character who was brought down everytime he has hopeful is Crooks. He has been the farm, but due to him being African American, he gets racially discriminated everyday. He has to stay in a separate barn due to his color and race. He loses hope day by day till he finally doesn’t even look toward the future.. An example of this is when Crooks got hopeful after listening to Lennie’s dream and asked is he could help sometime, but then Curley’s wife comes in and racially discriminates him. He says, “Well jus’ forget it… I didn’ mean it. Jus’ foolin’. I wouldn’ want to go no place like that.(83)”. Earlier, Crooks was hopeful for this dream, but then gives it up after Curley's wife discriminates him. The people around Crooks take advantage of his skin color due to this time period, and racially discriminate him , and slowly wither away all of his hopes and dreams. They use Crooks as a scapegoat to all of their problems and this makes his moral slowly diminish until he has no hope toward the future. Another similar character has given up his dreams is George. George could have accomplished many things in life, but has given up all of them due to Lennie. In the story he complains how he could do so many things if he wan’t with Lennie. He says, “ Why I could stay in a car house all night. I could eat at any place I want, hotel or any place and order any damn thing I could think of. An’ I could do all that every damn month.(11)”. Since George has been around Lennie, he has given up many of the things he wanted to do in his future in order to stay with Lennie. Lennie has been around George since almost their childhood, making George change all of his dreams for the future to maintain their relationship as friends. Characters such as George, Crooks, and Curley’s Wife were around people who gradually withered away on their dreams making them look into a pointless future. The people in their surrounding diminished their dreams and hopes for the future making these characters fail to reach their dreams.
John Steinbeck shows dreams can be inspired as well as ruined by people who are around them even to this day. People have friends, family, relatives, and etc. everyday in their lives that make them change their how they want to shape their future. People chose the type of people they want around them, but sometimes, they make the wrong decision leading them to a hopeless future. The author shows how each of the character’s friends or family have affected their dreams and hopes either in a good or bad way. Steinbeck’s message to the readers is to choose good people around themselves, or else their dreams and hopes can be ruined.