We can tell that George is important to Lennie. He looks up to him and model’s his behaviour on George’s actions. For example, when they are sitting round the pool at the beginning of Chapter One Lennie had been watching him closely and ‘imitated George exactly.’ When George, feeling angry and frustrated, ‘explodes’ at Lennie and says to him, ‘God almighty, if I was alone I could live so easy’ Lennie’s face is ‘drawn with terror’- he cannot bear George to be angry with him. However, George, even though often frustrated at being tied to Lennie, cares about him and does not want to hurt his feelings. He ‘put his hand on Lennie’s shoulder’, after he threw the dead mouse away and made Lennie cry, and told him that he would get him another, ‘fresh’ one. He is also ashamed after he has shouted at Lennie and then sees his ‘anguished’ face. The bond between Lennie and George is very strong and their relationship is almost like a parent and child.
Lennie has a child’s mind but an immensely strong man’s body. This means his mind has never learned to control his body and he does ‘bad things’ without meaning to. Steinbeck describes the surrounding nature a lot to compare it with Lennie. In Weed, trying to stroke a girl’s dress, he frightens her and they have to flee the town. His innocence and vulnerability makes the reader, and George, feel sympathy for him. They’ve come from a town called ‘Weed’, which is a resemblance to its name. A weed is usually something that is not wanted, just like George and Lennie weren’t wanted at Weed itself.
Lennie and George, even though they are so different, need each other. George says to Lennie, ‘Guys like us that work on ranches are the loneliest guys in the world… With us it aint like that. We got a future. We got somebody to talk to that gives a damn about us.’ George explains that they are different to the other ranch hands as they’ve got someone to talk to. This is why the other ranch workers act suspicious when George and Lennie first arrive at the ranch. They are not used to two ranch workers travelling together and most of them do not understand the meaning of the friendship that George and Lennie share. The boss gets suspicious at George when he answers all of the questions that the boss asks Lennie: ‘He hooked his thumbs in his belt and squinted one eye nearly closed. ‘Say- what you sellin’?’ ‘ The boss wouldn’t have been surprised if George had been taking all of Lennie’s pay for himself as he has never come across two men that travel together before as this was an era of ‘every man for himself.’
Even though George and Lennie have each other George might still be considered as a lonely figure. He frequently plays solitaire by himself and talks about what life would be like without Lennie. George can’t have a proper conversation with Lennie, as Lennie would probably forget the topic of the conversation within five minutes. Lennie holds George back in a sense as George is unable to socialise with the other ranch workers because he has to take care of Lennie. The playing of Solitaire is used as a form of symbolism- representing the lonely lives of the ranch hand, and also the fact that George wants to be alone- no longer burdened with the duty of caring for Lennie.
Candy is one of the ‘Social Rejects’ in the novel and, as mentioned earlier, Candy has a disability. He only has one hand, which is why the nickname ‘the old ranch hand’ suits him best. Candy figures crucially at several key points in the novel. Candy is a bit of a gossip and talks for a long time when asked a simple question. This shows that he is a lonely man as he has no one to talk to normally and so when given the chance he talks for a while.
His one, true friend would be his dog and it is his dog who resembles Candy. His dog used to be young and healthy and he was once an excellent sheepdog, but he is now old and not much use to anyone. This also applies to Candy who also used to be young and healthy and an excellent ranch worker, but is now old and not much use, partially due to the fact that he has lost one of his hands.
Candy does not foresee a pleasant future and in truth one of Candy’s main fears is to end up ‘on the county’. This is why he wants to append with George and Lennie in their ‘dream’. He wants a secure future for himself and most of all he wants company, as by this point he no longer has his dog and he knows that he can be easily replaced when he’s older and the ranch doesn’t need him anymore. Candy really does show that he is a lonely man in this part of the novel as he is giving his money away to strangers.
The killing of Candy’s ‘ageing, smelly and rheumatic’ dog, done by Carlson, is an obvious metaphor and a foreshadowing device for what George must do to Lennie. Candy states to George just after his dog is shot that he never wanted Carlson to shoot his dog: ‘I ought to of shot that dog myself, George. I shouldn’t ought to of let no stranger shoot my dog.’ George takes this in mind and this is why he does the deed and kills Lennie himself.
Crooks is the only black man in the novel and it is through attitudes towards his character that we gain insights in to the position of blacks in America at the time. Crooks does not live with the other ranch workers in the bunkroom; instead, he is isolated in his own room in the barn. He is openly referred to as ‘nigger’ which is an example of the ‘casual racism’ directed towards him by the others- they do not set out to insult him deliberately but it shows us that black men like Crooks were constantly degraded by whites.
He shows a certain jealousy of George and Lennie’s friendship and has a desire to join in on the dream of theirs, as Crooks had the dream of ‘what had been.’ He describes his past as a happy one and it is ironic that Crooks once had everything, more than the other ranch workers could have ever imagined, and now he has nothing: ‘I was born right here in California. My old man had a chicken ranch, ‘bout ten acres. The white kids come to play at our place, an’ sometimes I went to play with them, and some of them was pretty nice. My ol’ man didn’t like that. I never knew till long later why he didn’t like that. But I know now.’
He also describes his present life to Lennie talking about the other ranch hands and the racism which is directed towards him. It is the contrast between his past and present life that affects the way the audience feel about him. The audience shows compassion and pity for Crooks, as it is the irony, which is the main reason for this sympathy. His dream shares the same qualities as George and Lennie’s dream, as he wants a place of his own and to be free again.
Crooks is forced to spend his time reading books and battered magazines which he says are no good and what he really needs is some one just to hear him: ‘S’pose you couldn’t go into the bunkhouse and play rummy ‘cause you was black. How’d you like that? S’pose you had to sit out here an’ read books. Sure you could play horseshoes till it got dark, but then you got to read books. Books ain’t no good. A guy needs somebody –to be near him.’ Crooks uses a lot of rhetorical questions in this quote, which makes both Lennie and the audience think about his situation. This is what Crooks would want most of all and says that a ‘guy goes nuts if he ain’t got nobody.’ He says a man who is lonely gets sick and expresses loneliness as an illness. He is so used to being by himself and having to live by himself in a separate room that he gets aggressive with Lennie when Lennie enters the doorway of Crook’s room. Crook’s immediately wants to know what Lennie want’s and tells him to get out of ‘his room.’ He thinks Lennie is just like the other ranch workers and it is the ranch workers that Crook’s hates. If Crooks is not aloud in their room then why should they be let in his but when Curley’s wife enters the room he does not say anything. Curley’s Wife intimidates them both and when threatening Crooks, he backs away getting further and further away from her as possible.
Curley’s wife is a pivotal character and her hasty marriage to Curley proves to be a failed attempt to escape from her own ‘spiral of loneliness’. This is a reason to why she is given no name and is always addressed as ‘Curley’s wife’ as she is Curley’s possession; just a girl with no name. They do not have a close relationship, just a sexual relationship in which he shows no respect for her. Further, his failure to satisfy her leads her to seek solace with the other ranch workers, even with those at the bottom of the hierarchy. If she had a choice then she wouldn’t have married Curley and when speaking to Lennie she says, ‘Well, I wasn’t gonna stay no place where I couldn’t get nowhere or make something of myself, an’ where they stole my letters…So I married Curley’ as if she didn’t really have a choice and that seemed like the only option to get away; she had chosen second best on the rebound.
Curley’s Wife shows no affection for Curley, she says ‘He aint a nice fella’ and describes him as ‘not a nice man.’ She is treated badly on the ranch and even the other ranch workers show no respect for her. ‘Seems like they ain’t none of them cares how I gotta live.’ Since she is the only female on the ranch she has no one to confide in.
Curley’s wife cannot escape the sexual image that the other ranch workers have of her, as she is described as a ‘purty woman,’ but they are all too afraid too talk too her because of what Curley will accuse them of. She befriends the men by acting flirtatiously towards them and leads them on as she has no one else to speak to, no one to talk to about her loneliness, she is the only woman on the ranch; this is why she turns to Lennie which results in both of their deaths. She is not a ‘tart’ as everyone sees her, just a lonely, young lady who is living on the dream of ‘what could have been.’
Loneliness is what brings Lennie and Curley’s wife together in the barn. As they are both lonely figures in the novel they can not go out with the other men and they turn to each other for someone to talk to. Curley’s wife knows what Lennie is like and how he is mentally unstable and so confides in him by telling him how she really feels and what ‘could’ve’ become of her; of course Lennie would have forgotten the conversation within minutes of talking about it. A foreshadowing device in the scene, which is set in the barn, is the dead puppy. Like the puppy, Curley’s wife’s hair is soft and smooth, which leads to Lennie continuously stroking it: ‘Lennie’s big fingers fell to stroking her hair.’ Lennie does not know when to stop and his addiction of stroking soft and smooth objects results in Curley’s Wife’s death. She no longer wants him to mess her hair up and fights to pull away from Lennie’s strong grip. This of course affects the relationship between George, Lennie and Candy. They can no longer go through with their dream. Their aspirations are shattered into thousands of pieces when Lennie’s life comes to an end.
After reading this book it has finally come to my mind that loneliness is an important theme in the novel and how many characters are affected with loneliness. There are a variety of reasons why the people are lonely. For Crooks it is because of his race and disability and so no one wants to befriend him. For Lennie and Candy it is also a disability and Lennie can’t have a proper conversation with anyone. Curley’s Wife is the only female on the ranch and with no other females around she finds herself almost too lonely as she reflects back on her past.
Steinbeck has a certain skill in his writing as he makes us empathise and sympathise with the characters. This is what gets us reading the book and how we get so engrossed in it, it’s because it feels like we know the characters and how we feel sorry for them when there times are hard.