Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Literary analysis on mice and men
Of mice and men analysed
Theme of mice and men
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
The 3 themes in “Of Mice And Men” are loneliness, powerlessness, and dreams often fail. One main theme in Of Mice And Men is loneliness. George and Lennie have have just sat down to eat their dinner, when Lennie asks George to talk about their life in the future. George complies, and also describes their current situation. Steinbeck writes, “ Guys like us, that work on ranches are the loneliest guys in the world. They don't got no family. They don't belong no place.” (Steinbeck 13). George is speaking of the life of people in the 1930’s. Loneliness is a common trait amongst people, especially migrant workers. They have no family to travel with, and no friends. The only true friends George and Lennie have are each other. Crooks is another …show more content…
Lennie, Crooks, and Candy are all sitting in Crooks’ room, when Curley’s wife comes in. She makes a rude comment about the group. Steinbeck writes, “her eyes traveled from one face to another. ‘They left all the weak ones here” (Steinbeck 77). Curley’s wife isn't wrong. All of the characters in the room have forms of powerlessness. The first character is Lennie. Due to his IQ disability, Lennie would probably be dead or in a horrible situation if he didn't have George looking after him. Sure, Lennie is physically strong, but his memory impairs him from doing basic things. He is powerless without George. Crooks is also powerless in many situations. Being african american, Crooks has no say in any of the decisions on the farm. This is evident when Curley’s wife threatens to get him fired. Crooks has to be respectful to everyone, and take orders from everyone, or he will get fired, or punished.Candy is the final character in the room that has multiple powerless moments. His old age deters him from from doing sustainable work, and his inability to defend his dog shows that he has a weak will. These factors put him lower in the social hierarchy, therefore making him powerless in many situations. Multiple characters have weakness in “Of Mice And Men” making it a major …show more content…
Candy and George have just found Curley’s wife's body. Candy asks George if their farm dream can still happen, but George says that the dream was going to fail anyways. Steinbeck writes, “I think I knowed from the very first. I think I knowed we’d never do her. He usta like to hear about it so much, I got to thinking maybe we would” (Steinbeck 94). The farm dream means quite a bit to everyone considering it means security from the harsh world they live in. for Crooks it means respect and equality, for Candy it means security for his age, and for George and Lennie it means security from Lennie getting in trouble, and financial stability. Even though all these people are rooting for this dream, it still ends up failing. Curley’s wife is also an example of dreams failing. She could have been in the movies, but sadly her overbearing mother forces her to stay home. She then makes her situation worse by marrying Curley. Even though she works for that dream, it still fails. The reasoning behind both of these dreams failing is completely due to circumstance, which makes it even more tragic. None of the characters can stop the dreams from falling, which means it's more likely that other dreams in the future can end the same way. Every dream that a main character has in “Of Mice And Men” ends up failing, making “dreams often fail” a major
In the novella Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, Steinbeck illustrates the dreams of George,Lennie, and other characters and how these dreams are unrealistic and unattainable .Their dreams were the reason that these characters kept moving forward but because of difficult circumstances the dreams of George,Lennie,Candy and Curley's wife are shattered , they knew that their dream was never really attainable but they still had hope but because they were so greatly impacted by Lennies actions their dreams are never accomplished.
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck is a novel about loneliness and the American Dream. This book takes place during the Great Depression. It was very difficult for people to survive during this time period. A lot of people hardly survived let alone had the necessities they needed to keep relationships healthy. Of Mice of Men has a common theme of disappointment. All the characters struggle with their unaccomplished dreams. The migrant workers, stable buck, swamper, and the other men on the ranch had an unsettled disappointment of where they were at in their lives. George and Lennie, two newcomers to the ranch, aren’t like the other guys. They have each other and they are the not loneliest people in the world. Lennie has a dream though he wants to own a farm with plenty of crops and animals one day. The only problem is his blind curiosity of people and things around him. George wasn’t justified for killing Lennie because Lennie was innocent and never got the chance to find out what he did wrong.
The main cause of George and Lennie's lonesomeness and that of all the people at the ranch was a lack of a home. The only thing that kept the two men going was their friendship with each other and the hope to soon get a place of their own. In the novel George and Lennie mention what their dream place is going to be like: "Someday we're gonna get the jack together and we're gonna have a little house, and a couple of acres and a cow and some pigs and ---" (Steinbeck 16). Throughout the book the reference to having a place of their own is stressed. It is a deeper dream for Lennie than George because he is always asking to talk about it. It is here where the friendship between both men is starting to develop as they share the same basic dream.
According to Moore, "Of Mice and Men tells the story of two drifting ranch hands, George and Lennie, who dream, as rootless men do, of a piece of land of their own, where they will 'belong'"(341). George tells Lennie that the loneliest guys in the world are like them working on ranches, have no family, no place to belong for continually moving on to a new ranch, and have nothing to look forward to(Steinbeck 13). With them, it is not like that because they have a future, somebody to talk to, and are working toward getting their own farm with a couple ac...
In Of Mice and Men one of the main themes is the idea of the american dream. This is one of the more important themes in the book because it plays such a big role in how each character pursued life, and their dreams show a different side of who they are and what they want from life. Many of the characters talk about what their version of the american dream is. Curley’s wife talks about how she wanted to be a movie star. Candy and George both want to own their own land. Crooks dream is to work in lennie's garden. However it remains only a dream for them and they are awaken by the fact that they can't have the perfect american dream. Another way that this idea is used in the book and by characters is that Lennie and George keep faithful
alone just to try make some money. This was a very bad period in the
The theme in the book “Of Mice and Men” is “All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them”. Steinbeck shows us this throughout the story of George and Lennie dreaming and how they pursue them. The story shows how some characters have dreams that they look forward to in the long days on the ranch. Dreams have the power to change lives and give hope.
Loneliness and Companionship are one of the many themes that are conveyed in the novel Of Mice and Men, By John Steinbeck. Many of the characters admit to suffering from loneliness within the texts. George sets the tone for these confessions early in the novel when he reminds Lennie that the life of living on a ranch is among the loneliest of lives. However Lennie, who is mentally disabled holds the idea that living on a farm very high. "Tending the rabbits" is what Lennie calls it. Often when Lennie is seaking encouragement he askes George to tell him how its going to be. Men like George who migrate from farm to farm rarely have anyone to look to for companionship and protection. George obviously cares a lot for lennie, but is too stubborn to admit to it. The feeling of being shipped from place to place leaves George feeling alone and abandoned.
The great and famous author john Steinbeck once said, “All great and precious things are lonely.” In the Steinbeck book Of Mice and Men, many of the characters show their loneliness in many different ways. Candy, Curley's wife, and Crooks all show perfect examples of how they are lonely. The characters in of mice and men show that loneliness is a problem that must be overcome in order to live a happy, fulfilled life.. all three of these characters know what is feels like to be lonely.
Overall, Steinbeck presents several dreams from various characters in order to portray how dreams are ripped asunder. Through the story the reader followed main characters George and Lennie, as well as Curley’s wife’s dream through the novella and understood that “even the best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft agley.” (Burns Corporation)
They make plans to retire to their dream farm and have rabbits, acres of land, and a garden. Lennie shows his excitement about the farm when he 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” (Steinbeck 14). Lennie, George, and Candy plan their dream farm very thoroughly, but like the mouse and the farmer, they didn’t plan for if something goes wrong. Lennie kills Curley’s wife accidently and Curley wants to go murder Lennie himself. To save him from a brutal murder, George finds Lennie and gives him happy thoughts of the dream farm to think about and he shoots Lennie. This makes a big impact on their dream farm plan. The moment that George shot Lennie, their dream of the farm was over. They couldn’t live on their dream farm without Lennie.George knew that the farm was unrealistic but he wanted to give Lennie something to look forward to. Candy realizes that the dream farm won’t work anymore because now he has to save up money for half of the ranch. When Lennie dies George almost feels relief because he no longer has the burden of Lennie or the dream farm. The burden of Lennie is a hardship like
Of Mice and Men, written by John Steinbeck, is a book that can be analyzed and broken down into a vast majority of themes. One of the predominant themes found in this book is loneliness. Many characters in this book are affected by loneliness and they all demonstrate it in one way or another throughout the book. Examples of these characters are Curley’s Wife, Crooks, and Candy.
Throughout the book there are four main dreams, which the characters have in ‘Of Mice and Men’. Firstly George and Lennie’s dream about owning their own land. This progresses when Candy makes the dream more realistic. Curley’s dream was about wanting himself to be physically bigger and to gain peoples respect. Curley’s wife’s dream was to go to Hollywood and be a big time actress.
In his novel Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck depicts the essential loneliness of California ranch life in the 1930s. He illustrates how people are driven to find companionship. There were so many moments of loneliness and sadness throughout the novel, including many deaths. Following the deaths, they were very unexpected making the novel more intense and latch onto it more.
John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men’s theme concerns the futility of attempting to achieve dreams alone. Multiple characters in the novel aspire to lead lives with unchallenged freedom and the ability to pursue happiness, however when their plans go awry and they are left alone, these dreams are promptly dismissed. Candy is left with no one once his dog is killed reducing him to another lonely farm worker. The idea of working on George and Lennie’s farm not only provided Candy an indefinite job, but opened the opportunity of having companions. Unfortunately, Lennie killing Curley’s wife disrupted these plans, “I could of hoed in the garden and washed dishes for them guys” (Steinbeck 96).