Three main settings:
- The clearing – A serene partially non-wooded area in the California foothills that George and Lennie find refuge on the first night of their journey. George tells Lennie that if, during their stay on the ranch, he gets into any trouble, to retreat to the clearing and hide behind a bush until George can meet him there. This novel beings and ends in this setting.
- The Dream farm – George dreams of land that he and Lennie (and later Candy) will someday own and farm. The land is only a few acres upon which they will grow the food they need to survive. George intentionally forgets to mention to Lennie and Candy that the farm is just a dream.
- The bunkhouse – The place where the farm hands sleep. They are allotted a small apple box nailed to the wall for their personal belongings and a burlap sack filled with padding as their bed. Because of the racial prejudices of the time, blacks were not allowed in the bunkhouse. Many meetings and dreaming occur in the bunkhouse.
Plot Outline:
The events of Of Mice and Men begin with the two main characters, George and Lennie, walking beside a riverbed in California on their way to their new job at The Ranch. George keeps the slightly mentally retarded Lennie in high spirits by telling him of his plans to save up money and buy land. Lennie is infatuated with this dream and repeatedly through the book asks George to tell him about the land. George tells Lennie that if he ever encounters trouble on The Ranch to run back to the clearing and wait behind a bush for him. Later on the farm, George and Lennie meat the rest of the farm hands, the boss, his son Curly and his wife (whose name we never hear mentioned). As time passes, George becomes closer with Slim the mule driver and Candy, the one handed farm hand. Near the end of the novel, most of the ranch-hands have gone to the local brothel and Lennie is left alone in the barn. Curly’s wife enters and talks with Lennie. Knowing that he is slightly mentally retarded, she has no qualms with telling him exactly what is on her mind even though she is of a much higher class in the ranch caste system. Lennie mentions to her that he loves to touch soft things and she offers him the chance to touch her hair. When he does, he pulls a little too hard and she screams. Trying to stop her from screaming, he covers her mouth but this only makes her scramble about, trying to get free. Lennie finally resorts to shaking her body until she becomes quiet, then he realizes that she is dead. Lennie knows that he did wrong and leaves for the bush in the clearing. George meets up with him, not angry but accepting, and starts to calm Lennie by telling him his favorite story of the farm they are going to own someday. George then takes out a gun and shoots Lennie out of mercy.
Symbols:
- The animals used in this novel are symbols that represent the victory of the powerfull over the powerless. An example is Lennie’s underestimation of his own strength connected to the disasters that occur when he pets soft objects. When he is in the barn in the last scene, Lennie is holding a dead puppy whose death he was responsible for.
- Candy’s old dog, for example, was not only of high age, but was partially blind and pungent. Because of his appearance, some thought he was useless and they decided it would be best to kill the old dog. This is synonymous with the firing of farm-hands based solely on the ‘past their prime’ thought process.
Style:
The structure of this novel is very basic. Written in the novel-play form, there are three “acts” with two chapters per act. Each chapter or scene contains few descriptions of place, character, or action. Therefore, the novel's strength lies in its restrictions. Action usually occurs within the bunkhouse. The span of time is limited to three days in order to intensify the sense of suspense and drama. The point of view of the novel does not identify with a single character and is limited to external descriptions (the narrator is third-person limited). “The third-person point of view creates a sense of the impersonal. With few exceptions, the story focuses on what can be readily perceived by an outside observer: a river bank, a bunkhouse, a character's appearance, card players at a table. The focus on time, too, is limited to the present: there are no flashbacks to events in the past, and the reader only learns about what has happened to Lennie and George before the novel's beginning through dialogue between the characters.” It is only through direct expression by the characters that we learn their thoughts, recollections, and fantasies, except, in chapter 6, when Lennie hallucinates about seeing an enormous rabbit and his long dead Aunt Clara.
Theme:
Throughout Of Mice and Men there is a critiquing of the American Dream. Most of the characters in Of Mice and Men admit, at one point or another, to dreaming of a life different than theirs. Crooks, escaping his normal hostility, fantasizes of hoeing a patch of garden on Lennie’s farm one day, and Candy emphatically holds on to George’s vision of owning a couple of acres. Curley’s wife confesses her old goal to become a movie star. The characters of the novel were robbed of their wishes by circumstances that occurred before the action of the novel begins. For instance, Curley’s wife has resigned herself to an unfulfilling marriage. These dreams are typically American because the dreamers wish for perfect happiness. Lennie and George’s dream of buying land and owning a farm, enabling them to sustain themselves represents a standard American ideal. George becomes aware of the impossibility of this dream as a result of his and Lennie’s journey. This sadly proves that the bitter Crooks is right: that such paradises of freedom, happiness, and safety are not found in this world.
Four short quotations:
- “Whatever we ain’t got, that's what you want. God a’mighty, if I was alone I could live so easy. I could go get a job an' work, an no trouble. No mess at all, and when the end of the month come I could take my fifty bucks and go into town and get whatever I want” – George pages 11 – 12
- “I ain’t got no people. I seen the guys that go around on the ranches alone. That ain’t no good. They don't have no fun. After a long time they get mean. They get wantin’ to fight all the time. . . ‘Course Lennie's a God damn nuisance most of the time, but you get used to goin’ around with a guy an’ you can’t get rid of him” – George page 45
- “I think I knowed from the very first. I think I knowed we'd never do her. He usta like to hear about it so much I got to thinking maybe we would” – George page 103
- “Never you mind. A guy got to sometimes” – Slim page 117
Of Mice and Men: Style. <http://www.enotes.com/ofmice/27771/print>
Of Mice and Men. <http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/micemen/themes.html>