...Loneliness: The quality of being unfrequented and remote; isolation. Being lonely can change a lot about a person. In a way, loneliness can define who someone is. Even the strongest person can crumble under the wrath of loneliness. Many characters in the book Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck have experienced times of extreme loneliness. One of the characters, Lennie Small, often feels very lonely. Loneliness drives Lennie to believe that he isn’t wanted by George, his companion. “If you don’ want me I can go off in the hills an’ find a cave. I can go away any time.” (Steinbeck 12) This quote shows that Lennie often feels as if he is unwanted by George. Lennie offers to go away and live in the hills where he wouldn’t bother anyone, including...
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...In the book Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck loneliness plays a key role in the book. Loneliness affects most of the character throughout the book. The characters Crooks, George, and Candy all experience loneliness throughout the book. In the book Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck Crooks, George, and Candy all experience loneliness. Being lonely can lead to being distrusted. Being lonely can lead to being distrusted because loneliness is a feeling and people can still feel lonely when surrounded by people. Crooks experienced loneliness by having his own room in the barn with no other workers around. Crooks feels lonely because he lives alone in the barn while all the other workers live in a bunkhouse. In the book Crooks says, “I ain’t wanted...
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...Loneliness and isolation; the unfortunate reality of having the slightest chance of success. All people face the provocation of having no one by their side, yet facing a world full of challenges. Every person must fend for themselves in order to achieve the great American dream. In the novel Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck shows loneliness and the need for companionship through characters, conflict, and setting. Steinbeck depicts the effects of loneliness through characters in Of Mice and Men. Curley’s wife is possibly the loneliest character demonstrated in the book Of Mice and Men. She says, “I never get to talk to nobody.” (Steinbeck 86) This quote suggests it isn’t just Lennie and George who distance themselves from Curley’s wife; it is...
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...Through a list of harsh truths, John Steinbeck’s novel Of Mice and Men casts humanity in an unfavorable light. These include loneliness, oppression, and imperfection. The grim realities of the hardworking characters are revealed through their actions to rise above challenges and in the end their defeats These truths are all used to build the complex main theme of friendship and the effect it can have on an individual's life. Of Mice and Men exposes the validity,loneliness, of people during the Great Depression. For instance Curly’s wife seeks attention ,positive or negative, from anyone on the ranch because of her isolation being the only woman present. When confronted with her isolation she says,“Wha’s the matter with me?Ain’t I got...
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...In the novel Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, loneliness is a powerful motif. This motif is constantly repeated throughout the story and helps the reader receive Steinbeck's view on isolation. John Steinbeck is saying that loneliness was normal during the Great Depression. As depicted in his novel, it was out of the norm to find two migrant workers travelling together, for everyone was scared of each other and many suffered as a result of being alone for too long. During the Great Depression, it was rare to see two migrant workers travelling together. When the two main characters, George and Lennie, were talking, they were saying that "Guys like us, that work on ranches, are the loneliest guys in the world. They got no family.... With us it ain't like that. We got a future. We got somebody to talk to that gives a damn about us" (Steinbeck 15). George and Lennie were saying that most migrant workers travelled alone and rarely had a companion. Unlike most, George and Lennie had each other...
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...deported people of mexican descent, 400,000 were repatriated, sometimes against their will. In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men, there are many overarching themes, these themes help the author show the hard times of the Great Depression. One such theme would be the prevalence of loneliness in many of the characters. Another theme would be the discrimination against a number of characters, in the different forms such as sexism and racism. Lastly, many dreams in the novel go unfulfilled leaving many characters with the weight of failure. Throughout the Great Depression human compassion was as rare as a job, this led to widespread loneliness, that, in turn, is apparent...
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...Great Depression. However, when John Steinbeck uses the dialogue of Crooks, the actions of Curley's wife, and multiple characters undergoing major inconveniences for friendship it openly depicts the need for companionship in his novel, "Of Mice and Men". The primary way that Steinbeck portrays loneliness and the need for companionship, is through the articulation of the character Crooks. Initially, this can be viewed when Crooks expresses that he feels unheard and that nobody listens...
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...Loneliness in “Of Mice and Men” Friends are needed in a person’s life for emotional stability whom without would lead to a life of loneliness and solitude. In the novel, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, the characters Crooks, Candy and Curly’s wife exhibit a form of loneliness. They are driven to George and Lennie’s friendship because they lack support and that emotional stability in their own lives."A guy goes nuts if he ain't got nobody. Don't matter no difference who the guy is, longs he with you. I tell ya a guy gets too lonely an he gets sick" (Steinbeck, 13). Throughout his novel, Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck shows that victims of isolation crave to fulfill a companionship to fill in that void of loneliness. Firstly, Crooks, a handicapped black man, experiences isolation because of his race and disability and seeks to be a part of someone’s life. Crooks is physically separated from the other men as he has his own room in the barn and has limited social contact because he tends the horses. Crooks’s loneliness forces him to translucently share his bottled thoughts to Lennie when he comes into his room, and asks to be a part of the dream George and Lennie share, "...If you...guys would want a hand to work for nothing--just his keep, why I'd come an' lend a hand..." (Steinbeck 88). This shows that Crooks wants to be engaged with other people in his life despite his inability to see beyond the prejudice and discrimination he has always experienced. Secondly, the character...
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..."Too much self-centered attitude, you see, brings, you see, isolation. Result: loneliness, fear, anger. The extreme self-centered attitude is the source of suffering." (Dalai Lama). John Steinbeck's novel, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, prominently characterises loneliness. Steinbeck conveys that selfish intentions cause loneliness as seen through friendship and desire. For example, In Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, George and Lennie's friendship is rooted in selfish purposes. Steinbeck promotes this concept when George speaks to Lennie, “ Cause I want you to stay with me.”(Steinbeck 13). Indicating to the reader that while George had a “want” for Lennie to be his companion, there was no need for Lennie to stay with George other than...
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...Of mice and men is a novel written by John Steinbeck, published on 1937. The novel portrays the theme of loneliness throughout the story. The story of mice and men was begun at South Soledad, which means loneliness. The story evolves in a two man namely George Milton and Lennie Small, who displaced migrant ranch workers. They move from one place to another in searching for a new job opportunities. Before their arrival in Soledad, however, Lennie and George lived and worked in Weed, California, but fled after the authorities there accused Lennie of attempted rape. Physically, Lennie and George differ as much as night and day. George is small in stature but quick-witted and sharp. What George lacks in height Lennie makes up for, but he lacks...
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...John Steinbeck’s 1937 novel Of Mice and Men is a tale of two migrant workers in the Great Depression, who despite being complete contrasts of one and other, work together to survive the difficult lifestyle. George, the vastly more intelligent of the two, is a warden to Lennie, the colossal working machine who suffers from a mental condition. Steinbeck demonstrates the crippling loneliness the people of the ranch suffer from through his impeccable style. Steinbeck reveals via meticulous dialogue that discrimination is a leading cause of loneliness among the people of the ranch. For example, In Chapter 5, Curly’s wife goes to the barn to talk with Lennie while the other ranch hands play horseshoes, she proclaims, “Why can’t I talk to you? I never get to talk to nobody. I get awful lonely. (Steinbeck 86)”...
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...animals, and this longing to be anything but alone is the subject of many literary works. In Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck portrays the need for companionship using character interactions, characters, and the setting. First, using character interactions, John Steinbeck expertly displays the need for companionship in his novel Of Mice and Men. One way Steinbeck does this is through character dialogue. Early in the story, George refuses Lennie's proposal to abandon George and "go off in the hills an' find a cave" (Steinbeck 12). This passage suggests...
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...The classic novel, Of Mice and Men, written by John Steinbeck was made into a movie in 1992. The novel, which takes place in the 1930’s, follows the lives of two men, George Milton and Lennie Small, as they try to attain their dream of owning their own farm and “live off the fatta the lan’”. George is a smart man who always seems to have things figured out. Lennie is massive, a contradiction of his last name, but has the mind of a young child. George looks after him, but it is not easy since Lennie always seems to get himself in some kind of trouble. As they struggle towards their dreams, George and Lennie face obstacles that test their friendship. In the end, with Lennie dead, George finds out that dreams aren’t worth striving for, and eventually, loneliness overcomes everything. The book Of Mice and Men differed from the movie adaptation, with the portrayal of Curley’s wife, and Lennie’s death scene. Along with those differences there are aspects in the movie that show a strong resemblance to those in the book, like how the characters were written, and how they were acted. The movie of Of Mice and Men had many differences while still giving the same messages that the book intended on having. A major difference between the book Of Mice and Men and the movie was Lennie’s death scene. In the book there was a scene in which Lennie was alone, where George told him to go in case he ever got in trouble. At that moment Lennie was hallucinating about his Aunt Clara and rabbits. This...
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...principal characters in Of Mice and Men, he is perhaps the least dynamic. He undergoes no significant changes, development, or growth throughout the novel and remains exactly as the reader encounters him in the opening pages. Simply put, he loves to pet soft things, is blindly devoted to George and their vision of the farm, and possesses incredible physical strength. Nearly every scene in which Lennie appears confirms these and only these characteristics. Although Steinbeck’s insistent repetition of these characteristics makes Lennie a rather flat character, Lennie’s simplicity is central to Steinbeck’s conception of the novel. Of Mice and Men is a very short work that manages to build up an extremely powerful impact. Since the tragedy depends upon the outcome seeming to be inevitable, the reader must know from the start that Lennie is doomed, and must be sympathetic to him. Steinbeck achieves these two feats by creating a protagonist who earns the reader’s sympathy because of his utter helplessness in the face of the events that unfold. Lennie is totally defenseless. He cannot avoid the dangers presented by Curley, Curley’s wife, or the world at large. His innocence raises him to a standard of pure goodness that is more poetic and literary than realistic. His enthusiasm for the vision of their future farm proves contagious as he convinces George, Candy, Crooks, and the reader that such a paradise might be possible. But he is a character whom Steinbeck sets up for disaster, a character...
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...that era. John Steinbeck lived during this era and was writing about his daily life during the Great Depression. In the novella, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, the themes and characters demonstrate Peter Brodie's quote to be true for the biographical lens, because many characters mirror the life of many during the Great Depression. Characterization is stressed perfectly with Curley relating to the biographical lens. In the novella Curley had to act, look, and sound tough. "'You keep outta this les' you wanna step outside'"(Steinbeck 62). Curley is trying to build a tough reputation. This is because during the Great Depression, employers were looking for the toughest workers. Another reason is that he is the boss's son and can do/say whatever he wants and will not get fired. Curley also treated his wife poorly like many others during the Great Depression. "'Why'n't you tell her to stay the hell home where she belongs?'"(Steinbeck 62). This quote shows that before/during the Great Depression men could treat women like dirt and as if less than a person....
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