Of Mice and Guy Characters
OF MICE AND MEN CHARACTERS Of Mice and Male the characters are plainly drawn and memorable. Some might be the subject of a whole essay, while others would not. Obviously a concern on a theme (see below) might need you to blog about characters, anyway: for example, to discuss solitude, you blog about lonesome individuals. George and Lennie The primary characters are George Milton and Lennie Small (whose name is the topic of a weak joke: “He ain’t little”. Who states this? ). Lennie is immensely strong.
He is easy (has a finding out problem) though he is physically well co-ordinated and efficient in doing repeated manual tasks (bucking barley or driving a cultivator) with skill. Lennie has a guy’s body, however a child’s outlook: he acquires satisfaction from “pettin'” soft things, even dead mice, and enjoys young puppies and rabbits. He relies, emotionally, on George, who arranges his life and reassures him about their future. Lennie can be quickly managed by company but calm instructions, as Slim discovers.
However panic in others makes Lennie panic: this happened when he attempted to “family pet” a girl’s gown, in Weed, and occurs once again two times in the story: initially, when he is assaulted by Curley, and 2nd, when Lennie strokes the hair of Curley’s other half. Lennie’s deficiencies allow him to be accepted by other faulty characters: Sweet, Crooks and Curley’s spouse. He poses no risk, and seems to listen patiently (due to the fact that he has actually discovered the requirement to pay very close attention, as he remembers so little of what he hears).
As a child is comforted by a bedtime story, so George has actually come to comfort Lennie with a tale of a golden future. To the reader, especially today, this pictured future is really modest, yet to these guys it is a dream practically impossible of fulfilment. As George has repeated the story, so he has used set words and expressions, and Lennie has learned these, too, so he has the ability to take part the telling at essential minutes (once again, as children do). George is a diligent minder for Lennie however is of course not with him at all times; and at one such time, Lennie makes the error which causes his death.
He strokes the hair of Curley’s other half (at her invite) but does it too approximately; she worries and tries to cry out, and Lennie shakes her strongly, breaking her neck. There is no appropriate asylum (safe place) for Lennie: Curley is cruel, however even if he could be restrained, Lennie would deal with life in a degrading and terrible organization– a psychological medical facility, prison or house for the criminally insane. George’s killing of Lennie, supported by Slim (who says “You hadda’ “) is the most merciful strategy. In the novel’s last chapter we have an intriguing insight into Lennie’s thought.
Until now we have needed to read his mind from his words and actions. Here, Steinbeck describes how first his Auntie Clara and 2nd a fictional talking rabbit, lecture Lennie on his stupidity and failure to respect George. From this we see how, in his confused fashion, Lennie does understand, and try to deal with, his mental weak point. George is called a “clever little guy” by Slim, but fixes this view (as he also fixes the idea that Lennie is a “cuckoo”: that is, a lunatic– Lennie is rather sane; his weakness is a lack of intelligence). George’s modesty is not false– he is bright enough to understand that he isn’t especially intelligent.
If he were clever, he states, “I wouldn’t be buckin’ barley for my fifty and discovered” (=$US 50 each month, with totally free board and lodging). George is not silly, however there is no genuine chance for self-advancement, as might be attained in the west today by education. He is, in a basic way, imaginative: his image of the small-holding (little farm) he and Lennie will one day own, is clearly-drawn and vivid, while some of the expressions have a near-poetic quality in their simplicity, as when he begins: “Guys like us … are the loneliest people worldwide”.
Lennie is a concern to George, who regularly shows irritation and, in some cases, outright anger to him. But it is clear that George is not going to leave him. What began vaguely as a responsibility, after the death of Lennie’s Auntie Clara, has become a lifestyle: there is companionship and trust in this relationship, which makes it nearly unique among the ranch-hands. George admits to Slender how he once abused this trust by making Lennie carry out degrading tricks; however after Lennie nearly drowned, having (although not able to swim) leapt, on George’s orders, into the Sacramento River, George has actually stopped making the most of Lennie’s simplicity.
At the end of the novella George challenges a great moral dilemma, and acts decisively, eliminating Lennie as a last act of relationship. Other characters Slim All the other characters are necessary for their negotiations with these two, but some are worthy of remark in their own right. Unlike all the other characters, however, is Slim. This man is not simply a worked with labourer, however a craftsman (he drives a team of mules or horses). He is “the prince of the cattle ranch” and he is regarded as an authority. For the majority of the novel he is a removed figure who observes Lennie’s and George’s relationship.
At one point he is contacted us to make a judgement, when he chooses that Sweet’s canine need to be shot. By listening to George in the ranch house, Slim enables him to reveal a good deal about his relations with Lennie, and to describe events from their past. The One In Charge and Whit The Boss appears briefly, voicing suspicion at George’s speaking for Lennie, while Whit is important for one occurrence. He reveals the other ranch-hands a letter in a publication, composed by a worker he had known on the cattle ranch previously.
He delights in the memory of this guy (Bill Tenner) and shows his own loneliness, and yearning for relationship; yet even as he shows the magazine to George, he will not let go of the page. Sweet Much more crucial is a trio of misfits or outsiders: Sweet is an old male, reduced to cleaning up the bunkhouse after losing his hand in a mishap at work. He has been compensated by his employer and has actually saved the cash, which he uses to offer to George, in return for a share in his and Lennie’s dream. George is happy to consent to this, however is not interested in purchasing the smallholding with Candy alone, after Lennie has actually killed Curley’s partner.
Candy is left out from the social life of the ranch-hands, by his age, his impairment and demeaning job, and by his own option (“I ain’t got the poop any more”, he says when the others go into town on Saturday night). His absence of status appears when he is helpless to save his old pet from being shot. He bitterly (and unfairly) reproaches Curley’s wife for the loss of his dream. Crooks is also disabled and a Negro, unusual at this time in California. (He explains that he is not a “southern negro”, referring to the “deep south”, states like Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia, where coloured individuals reside in great deals).
He is omitted by his colour from the bunkhouse (he is allowed in at Christmas, however needs to fight among the men, it seems). Scoundrels secures his feelings by keeping to himself. When Sweet tells him of the dream ranch, he offers to work for nothing. However Curley’s partner reminds him that he has no hope of sharing the dream, and he pretends the deal was made as a joke. (But it appears clear that he indicates it when he says it.) Curley’s spouse Curley’s other half is the most pitiful of the outsiders: unlike the others, even Lennie, she seems not to comprehend her limitations– or she declines to confess them.
She still imagines what might have been, seeing herself as a prospective film-star. But she has no acting talent, males (one from a travelling program, one who claimed to be in the films) make fake offers as a chat-up line, and now that films need actresses to talk, her coarse speech would be a handicap. Her naivete displays in her belief that her mother has taken a letter (from her “contact” in Hollywood) which was obviously never ever composed; her immaturity appears in her instantaneous response of weding the pesky Curley. Desperate for companionship she does not find in the house, she flirts with the ranch-hands.
They are anxious about this, as they think her to be seriously promiscuous, and are afraid of Curley’s response. Her inappropriate gown on the ranch and her coquettish way brand name her as a “tart”. She is, possibly, the most pathetic of all the characters. Curley Curley, her hubby, is a rather two-dimensional villain. Conscious of his own failings, he attempts to earn respect by choosing fights, but is vain, boastful and aggressive. He thinks everyone of making fun of him. His wife’s behaviour ensures that they do laugh, even Sweet. Carlson represents the men George refers to as “the loneliest men on the planet”.
He is outwardly friendly, but essentially self-centered. He discovers the odor of an old pet dog offensive so the pet dog need to be shot. He has little regard for the feelings of the pet dog’s owner. At the end of the novella, as Slim goes to buy George a drink, and convenience him, it is Carlson who states to Curley, “What the hell … is eatin’ them two men?” There is, clearly, only one real relationship depicted in the novel. All the characters, save George and Lennie, are more or less in search of a relationship. We see how far their failure to find friendship or company, even, is due to general mindsets, to their situations, and to themselves.