Lennie like George has a dream to own there own land and be there own bosses. Lennie would tend to the rabbits whilst George looked after the technical side. This very dream shows both their weaknesses, as they both would stop at nothing to get it.
Later in the book Candy over hears George and Lennie talking about the dream. For the first time in his life he wants to be apart of something and offers to pay most of the price for the farm. After this moment the whole idea becomes more realistic and George and Lennie begin to make further plans. This means they will be together and will not be lonely any longer.
However this falls apart when Lennie kills Curley’s wife and George in turn has to kill Lennie. It all falls apart for both Candy and George, as they both know it’s not going to happen without Lennie. This makes them bitter, as they both will become lonely again.
Lennie’s strength gets him into trouble because when Curley tries to hit Lennie, George orders him to hit back. As he does so he grabs Curley’s wrist and breaks all the bones in his hand. He is so remorseful and scared for what he has done he panics and doesn’t let go of his hand. He has to be physically pulled away from Curley by Whit, Candy and George. While Slim sees to Curley.
“Curley’s fist was swining when Lennie reached for it. The next minute Curley was flopping like a fish on a line and his closed fist was lost in Lennie’s big hand. George ran down the room.”
“Leggo of him, Lennie.”
(91)
This relates to the question because Curley is jealous of George and Lennie's relationship because he's lonely so he lashes out at Lennie so he can try and spoil this.
George and Lennie are close friends and crave each other’s attention and approval.
"Whatta you want?"
"I was foolin', George. I don't want no ketchup. I wouldn't eat no ketchup if it was right here beside me."
(30)
George respects Lennie and Lennie is extremely respectful to George. George thinks Lennie is a good person at heart and doesn’t mean to do anything wrong but in the end he has no choice to save Lennie and does the only decent thing. Lennie thinks George is some kind of hero. This is linked to the question because George and Lennie crave each other's attention so that neither can be lonely nor feel lonely when they think of each other.
George likes Lennie being around most of the time although he refuses to admit it. He finds comfort in the fact that he will never be lonely and is soothed by this thought. Even in desperate times Lennie will always be there for him.
George is like a father to Lennie. He looks after him through the good and bad times and through the difficult and easy times. George looks after Lennie through all of these times because he feels protective of him and doesn’t want Lennie to get hurt. This is relevant to the question because George makes sure that Lennie is not lonely and by doing this stops himself being lonely too.
'Lennie stopped chewing and swallowed. His face was concentrated. " I…I ain't gonna….say a word."
"Good boy!"
George has brought Lennie up to behave and act like him. He's brought Lennie up like this because that is the only way George knows and all George's personality and characteristics have rubbed off on Lennie. This is shown in the first chapter when we first meet the characters. As George comes down the pathway into the clearing, Lennie follows in the same manner. Lennie wants to be just like George and any opportunity to do this he jumps at.
“They had walked in single file down the path, and even in the open one stayed behind the other. Both wore coats with brass buttons.”
(19)
This quote shows Lennie's clear intentions to be just like George and helps us imagine Lennie's insistence of being just like George.
Lennie loves George like a father, brother and friend all in one. He loves him like a father because George has brought him up and taught him the ways of the world.
He feels brotherly towards him because they have been together so long that they feel like they are related.
As a friend, George provides the support a friend would bring, like secrecy. Secrecy plays a massive part in the book because without it Lennie would be in jail or would have been hung and George would be travelling around on his own.
“But not us! An’ why? Because ………. Because I got you to look after me and you got me to look after you, and that’s why!”
(32)
In relation to the question this tells us that Lennie thinks that he's not alone because he's got George and George has got him. He thinks it is as simple as this.
George knows that at any time of an emergency he will have to look after Lennie and himself. Lennie likes to think that sometimes he has control over George but that is simply not true. Lennie is incapable of looking after himself and depends on George for everything.
"That's not what I meant. You remember where we slep' last night? Down by the river?"
"Yeah. I remember. Oh, sure I remember! I go there an' hide in the brush."
"Hide till I come for you. Don't let anybody see you. Hide in the brush by the river. Say that over."
(52)
We see the control of George over Lennie at the start when Lennie has a mouse in his pocket and is stroking it. George spots this and asks Lennie what has he got in his pocket.
“What’d you take outa that pocket!”
(22)
Lennie is so desperate to keep the mouse he lies to George and tells him there is nothing in his pocket.
“Ain’t a thing in my pocket,”
(22)
George is no fool and orders Lennie to give it him. As Lennie hands George the mouse, George throws it across the water. Leaving Lennie feeling resentful, but he soon forgets about the mouse.
“Lennie’s closed hand slowly obeyed, George took the mouse and threw it across the pool to the other side, among the brush.”
(23)
This quote tells us that George is thinking two steps ahead of every situation and is constantly helping Lennie to deal with any emergency, which may arise. This makes George feel lonely because he doesn't have anyone on the same wavelength to talk to about life, as he's constantly worrying of Lennie.
George and Lennie travel together for two reasons. The first is Lennie’s aunt Clara made George promise to look after Lennie on her deathbed and George honouring his promise has done so. The second reason is the fear of being lonely is great for both of them and neither of them wants to travel apart.
Lennie travels with George because he is his best friend and Lennie would travel to the ends of the earth with George. However he does become scared that George will leave him so he pretends that he will leave if George wants him to and he’ll go into the mountains and live on his own. George rejects this idea and apologises to Lennie.
“Well I could. I could go off in the hills there. Some place I’d find a cave.”
George is always in control of Lennie and doesn’t need to tell Lennie how disappointed he is with him.
"George gonna give me hell," he said. "George gonna wish he was alone an' not have me botherin' him."
(141)
Candy is a lonely disabled, old farm worker who knows everything about everyone who works on the ranch. Humble and weary, Candy seems to be feeling his age when Carlson shoots his best friend and his dog. He works in the bunkhouse making sure things are clean and tidy. He helps the story along through his gossiping.
When George and Lennie arrive at the ranch he is the first to befriend them and fills them in on all there is to know about most of the workers and Curley’s wife.
Candy is the first to befriend Lennie and George because he is the only one in the bunkhouse and is the first person to meet them. He also befriends them because he sees this as an opportunity to make friends and stop the feeling of loneliness taking over him.
“The old man looked cautiously at the door to make sure no one was listening, ‘That’s the boss’s son,”
he said quietly. “Curley’s preety handy. He done quite a bit in the ring. He’s a lightweight and he’s handy.”
I used this quote to show how friendly Curley is by warning them against the people who could get them in trouble. He does this so George and Lennie will be grateful and friendly towards him. Candy is a kind, old man who has no limit of friendship towards people who want to be friends with him. He like George wants to do the best by everybody but he finds that hard as he gossips non-stop.
Candy confesses to George and Lennie that he hopes for a similar fate in which his dog died. He wants this because before George and Lennie arrived he had no aims in life and was lonely and miserable. He thinks that he can be peaceful again. When he overhears George and Lennie talking of their dream, Candy offers all his money to be in on the dream. He wants to be in on the dream because totally out of the blue when his life had run its course, a chance to make something of himself pops up and he jumps at the opportunity to distinguish his aims in life. Candy clings to a hope of a future because before Lennie and George came along he was just going to die an old man with no meaning in his life.
He never really was going anywhere and settled for what ever seemed to be around. He tried to get out of this by entering into the dream that George and Lennie shared.
“Candy sat on the edge of his bunk. He scratched the stump of his wrist nervously. ‘I got hurt four years ago,’ he said. ‘they’ll can me purty soon. Jus as’ soon as I can’t swamp out on no bunk houses they’ll put me on the county. Maybe if I give you guys my money, you’ll let me hoe in the garden.”
(88)
The friendship at times is a real friendship because he generally wants someone to talk to and wants to stop being lonely. However it's sometimes a bought friendship because he knows it's his last chance of friendship so he assures it by offering to put money into the dream.
This dream rekindles life within him, but it also becomes an obsession and in his excitement he lets slip to both Curley’s wife and Crooks about the secret. When Lennie kills Curley’s wife and shatters the reality of the dream, Candy becomes hopeless again. Candy knows that George will never really want to live the dream without Lennie so this means he will be lonely again. He will probably go back to being lonely again.
Crooks is a lonely Negro stable buck who is cast out because he is black. He is called Crooks because of a crooked spine. He is a man who doesn’t really come into the story until the fourth chapter.
“proud, aloof man. He kept his distance and demanded that other people kept theirs.”
(99)
He is a proud man who likes to keep his belongings safe and just wants to have his own space where he can be alone. Crooks demanded people kept there distance because he wanted people to know that if they are going to be racist to him then he will give as good as he gets. Crooks looks after the stable and tends to the horses. He is respected like an equal by Slim and Lennie but everyone else treats him like dirt because he is black. He wears scruffy clothes, which are old and worn and have holes in from the years of wear. He also wears large round spectacles so he can read. This is relevant because this shows us why he is lonely. He keeps his head in books, which helps him to block out the world, which in turn makes him lonely.
Crooks is a bitter, indignant, angry and ultimately frustrated by his helplessness as a black man in a racist culture. Wise and observant, Crooks listens to Lennie’s talk of his dream of the farm. Although he’s tempted by Candy, Lennie and George’s plans to buy their own place, Crooks is constantly reminded by Curley’s wife and others that he is inferior to whites and out of pride refuses to take part in their future farm. This means that he thinks it will never happen and even if it does they will never take him seriously and treat him as if he's a lesser mortal.
He describes his past as being happy and fun. This is nothing compared to his modern day state. He seems to be very fond of his earlier life and probably wishes he could be back there. He was much happier being young because he had a family around him who loves him and a place he could call home and not be discriminated against for his colour, Sex, age or disability.
“Crooks leaned forward over the edge of the bunk. ‘I ain’t a southern Negro,’ he said. ‘I was born right here in California. My old man had a chicken ranch, ‘bout ten acres. The white kids come to play with them, and some of them was pretty nice.”
(102)
When he was younger nobody bothered about his colour but as he got older more and more white Americans became racist and now they treat him differently. Although he's still the same little boy inside.
Crooks describes his present state as being sad and unhappy. He is discriminated against for being a Negro and his back gives him endless problems. He feels that whenever he is talking nobody cares because he is a ‘nigger’.
“He leaned forward excitedly. ‘This is just a nigger talkin,’ an a busted-back nigger at that. So it din’t mean nothing, see? You couldn’t remember it anyways. I seen it over an’ over an’ over a guy talkin’ to another guy and it don’t make no difference if he don’t hear or understand.”
(103)
He is forced to spend time in his stable because none of the ranch workers will socialize with him. This obviously would be deeply upsetting and means that he is immensely lonely. He is very harsh on others because for most of his life they have treated him like dirt and with no respect. However once he has warmed to them he begins to accept them and welcomes them in.
“Crooks settled himself more comfortably on his bunk. ‘Set down’ he invited, ‘set down on the nail keg.”
(101)
Crooks invited Lennie to sit down because he feels that Lennie wouldn't be racist towards him and he felt secure around him because he was in charge of the situation.
Curley’s wife is a lonely woman who despite all her childhood dreams has ended up married to a vicious, vindictive, evil man on a ranch in Soledad. She is a woman of intensifying beauty who dresses like a film star. She also has no friends to speak of so she is alone most of the time. She is viewed as a troublemaker by anyone who knows her.
Curley’s wife is a nameless person because Steinbeck was trying to add to the feel of loneliness. Having no name made her insignificant and different from everybody else. She is discriminated against for her looks and her sex. The workers, George included, see her as having “the eye” for every guy on the ranch and they see this as the reason for Curley’s insecurity and hotheaded temper.
All the farm workers say that she is trouble because she is always around trying to get attention. This is apparent when Candy first tells George and Lennie about Curley’s wife. He says that she is trouble and that they should stay away. Everybody thinks she is trouble because she flirts but this is only because she's lonely. Curley feels insecure because he knows he can't control his wife and she could have an affair at any time. He also feels insecure because she has no respect for him. It is also apparent when George tells Lennie to stay away from her because she will cause trouble. George has a bad felling about her and just wants Lennie to stay out of trouble. Lennie is prone to attracting trouble and George is scared that she is about to spoil everything.
“Listen to me, you crazy bastard,’ he said fiercely.’ Don’t you even take a look at that bitch. I don’t care what she says and what she does. I seen ‘em poison before, but I never see no piece of jailbait worse than her before. Leave her be”
All the workers are scared to talk to her because she is Curley’s wife and he becomes very paranoid throughout the book because she is constantly flirting with everyone. Curley would kill them if he found out that one of the workers had been flirting with her. Curley gets especially jealous when he finds Slim is in the stable on his own and his wife is nowhere to be seen.
Curley’s wife marries Curley because she feels low and has run away from home because her mum wouldn’t let her become a film star. However in the real world she finds that she can’t get a job as an actress and needs to support herself in life. This is where Curley comes into it he offers her support financially and physically and she feels there is no other choice but to accept it she loves him on the surface but she isn’t in love with him. However this is different for him he loves her and even keeps his hand soft for her.
“You seen that glove on his left hand?’
‘yeah. I seen it.’
‘well, that glove’s fulla Vaseline.’
‘Vaseline? What the hell for?’
‘Well, I tell ya what-Curley says he’s keepin’ that hand soft for his wife.”
She doesn’t so much say why she hates the ranch but she talks a lot about the life she could be having at this very moment away from the ranch.
“Coulda been in the movies, an’ had nice clothes all of them nice clothes like they wear.’
(125)
When she was younger she was offered a place in the movies but her mother wouldn't let her so she thinks her life could be better if she could get away from the ranch.
Curley’s wife isn’t really a ‘tart’ she just longs not to be lonely and needs someone to talk to and as Curley is never around, the ranch workers are the only other people to talk to. Her appearance doesn’t make her a tart either she just wants to look like she would do if she was in the movies and was famous. She is seen as a tart though because nobody apart from herself knows about the film opportunities or her dreams so they just think she's acting like a flirt and is an attention seeker.
At the end of the novel her loneliness causes the death of both her and Lennie. As she is so lonely she tries to get away and that’s when she sees Lennie on his own. Her temptation to have a chat with someone persuades her to talk to Lennie. She then encourages him to stroke her hair and this makes him talk even more. As he strokes her hair he gets rougher and rougher and eventually breaks her neck after a struggle.
“Look out, now, you’ll muss it, ‘ and then she cried angrily, ‘ you stop it now, you’ll mess it all up,’
(127)
In this quote she gets flustered by Lennie's harshness and starts to panic that Lennie is getting too rough. This causes Lennie’s death, as George has to kill him, as he wouldn’t understand what was happening to him when he was put in jail or hung. This tells us that George is a great friend and that he knows Lennie well enough to know that he will not last long in jail. He will even risk jail for himself, which only a true friend would do.
The incident in the barn happens because Lennie and Curley’s wife’s loneliness brings them together. Lennie is there because George doesn’t think he should play horseshoe throwing and would be better of with his puppy. Curley’s wife’s there because she is trying to hide her luggage so she can escape in the night because she’s so lonely. When Curley’s wife spots Lennie she takes this opportunity to bare her soul to him.
“Her face grew angry.’What’s the matter with me?’ she cried. ‘ain’t I got aright to talk to nobody?”
(124)
This quote shows that she is lonely and vulnerable and she just wants some company. She needs somebody to talk to and Lennie is her ideal person because he won’t tell her to go away. As she begins to talk, Lennie warms to her and starts to talk back. He mentions he likes to stroke things and he then starts to get upset because of his dead puppy. She comforts him and tells Lennie he can stroke her hair.
“Course I brush it a lot. That makes it fine. Here-feel right here.’
(123)
This is relevant because Lennie is offering her friendship, which will stop her being lonely.
As he gets to like it he begins to get rougher and she starts to struggle. Lennie panics and starts to shake her to stop struggling and accidentally breaks her neck. He tries to hide her and runs of to the hiding place where George told him to go.
This affects the relationship between George, Lennie and Candy because George knows that he now has to go find and kill Lennie before Curley gets to him and hurts him. George has too go and kill Lennie because Lennie will not understand jail. George feels remorseful because of this but he knows it has to be done so he remains strong and shoots Lennie.
Once Lennie is shot both George and Candy know there dreams have been ruined and will never aspire to anything. They are discontent with being lonely but know its there only choice. George will lose his best friend and his dream of being happy. Candy will also lose a friend and a chance to be happy for once in his life.
Candy shows his disappointment through his words towards Curley’s wife because she can’t answer back and he thinks she’s to blame.
“You God damn tramp,’ he said viciously.
‘you done it, di’n’t you? I s’pose you’re glad.”
(132)
Steinbeck uses different types of language to project the theme of loneliness in the book. He uses monosyllabic sentences for most of the characters especially Lennie. This portrays them as being simple-minded people who are not of a high intelligence.
"That's what the boss says."
(56)
The language is also repetitive throughout the book, which helps the reader understand what's going on, and also again tells us the characters are not of a high intelligence. The author also shows ordinary everyday details and makes characters speak and believe as they might do in real life.
"Hell, yes," said George. "I ain't anything to scream about,"
(56)
Colloquial language is also used throughout the book because this is how they would speak in the American depression.
"Glad ta meet ya,"
(57)
Metaphors and similes are used to portray the characters strengths mainly, however this isn't the case when it comes to Lennie. I think Steinbeck found it hard to describe Lennie so he used metaphors and similes to help.
"Strong as a bull,"
(43)
Steinbeck often uses animal imagery to describe Lennie, as he wants to portray him being strong like a bear or as big as a bull.
“Dragging his feet a little the way a bear drags his paws”
(19)
Animal imagery helps us understand Lennie more as a person because it highlights his strengths and not his weaknesses. At the end when he is stroking Curley's wife's hair he snaps her neck like a bear would if he was killing something big.
In conclusion I think that most of the characters are lonely in one way or another.
George is lonely because his best friend has died and his one bit of happiness has been snatched away by a ‘tart’. Crooks is lonely because he is black and is a victim of racial discrimination. He is also un-equal to everybody else because he’s black and disabled. Candy is lonely because he has no family, he’s getting old, he’s disabled and his dog was brutally and unfairly killed. He is also un-equal because he is old and disabled. Curley’s wife is lonely because she has a bad husband; she’s the only woman on the farm and has no company. She is un-equal because she is female and suffers sexism. Slim is lonely because he has no real friends or family to talk of and throws himself whole-heartedly into his job.
When migrant workers come to a ranch they are often lonely because they are displaced from families, broken up by need for work and have little hope of settling down with a wife and family or even to have friends. Against this atmosphere the friendship between George and Lennie is more special because it’s rare.
Steinbeck often draws attention to how unusual their friendship is merely by making the other characters comment on it.
“Ain’t many guys travel around together,’ Slim mused ‘I don’t know why. Maybe ever’ body in the whole damn world is scared of each other.’
(57)
Steinbeck also finds another way of symbolizing ‘loneliness'-Soledad in Spanish means ‘lonely’.
