The story Of Mice and Men took place during the 1930s. That time period was very different from today. Race and gender were very important characteristics that determined whether a person had the opportunity to make money. The 1930s were also a time where people started questioning life and the American culture.
Many people like John Steinbeck thought that life was very unfair and questioned whether if life was even worth living. In Of Mice and Men John Steinbeck demonstrates that mans dream is destined to be destroyed by a cruel reality. George was a very smart and able man who had taken responsibility of a mentally-challenged man named Lennie. George could have found a good steady job for which he could have stayed at and made good money, but when he went to work with Lennie, Lennie made a mistake that got both of them in trouble.
George was a very good person for taking care of Lennie. Lennie was very dumb, but he always remembered the dream he and George shared. The main dream that George possessed was to be happy, and he realized that even though taking care of Lennie was hard work at times, he was happiest with Lennie. George would repeat their dream to Lennie.
The nicest thing George ever did for Lennie was giving him hope, and thats what mentioning the dream farm did. Lennie always wanted to live of the fatta land (81), and have rabbits, and puppies, go on George. George saved a mans life, and in return he got nothing. Georges dream was destroyed when Lennie killed Curlys wife, forcing George to kill Lennie, because reality did not allow those two to fulfil their dreams. Curlys wifes dream was clearly presented in the novel. She wanted to be in the movies.
Curlys wife had no name. She was always referred to as Curlys wife. She had no identity and just until the end of the story, the reader knew very little about her. She tells Lennie that her dream was to be a famous movie star. She was a very pretty woman and that dream almost seemed probable, but she was born poor so basically reality told her that she was to just be a wife and do housework or work on a farm. One day a show come through here and I met one of the actors, and he told me I could be with that show.
(88) He was obviously lying to her and just had told her that stuff so that he might have a chance to have sex with her. She naively waited for the letter but it never came. Instead, she just married curly, a man she didnt love. She was a very unhappy woman and her dreams could never have come true because she was poor and uneducated. Crooks was the only black man in the story.
Everyone knows that up until the 1950s when the civil rights movements were popular, that blacks were discriminated against and had no chance of becoming successful people. Crooks had worked at the farm for a very long time and was very lonely. He also got treated worse then everyone else. Curlys wife was very mean to him. One time Crooks asked Curlys wife to leave his room and she wouldnt leave. But she responded harshly, Listen nigga, dont you know what I could do to you if you open your trap.
(80) That just shows how limited Crooks was in when speaking to other people. Of all of the characters, Crooks had the smallest chance of having his dream come true. Crooks dram was less obvious then some of the other characters, but he wanted it as much as anyone else. Crooks bought in to Lennie and Georges dream but a piece of Crooks died when Lennie was killed. Life was unfair in the thirties, and Of Mice and Men is a great example of that. Only a certain type of person could have lived how he wanted without being bothered or persecuted.
For unimportant reasons, George, Curlys Wife, and Crooks dreams were all destroyed by a cruel reality.Words/ Pages : 729 / 24
