The Hunchback of Notre Soledad

Lennie because he’s stupid and Crooks because he’s black.  They are the ones that get left behind when the others go to the town, and Curley’s wife comments on this, and calls them “a dum-dum, an old sheep and a nigger”.He seems very trustworthy, maybe because he knows what it’s like to be let down and would never do it to anyone else.He is very mysterious like Slim, but his mystery is unlike Slim’s in that people might bother to find out about Slim’s as he is white.  Nobody has attempted to find out any more about Crooks.What does he think and how does he feel about working with white men, and in specific the ones on that particular ranch? He probably feels that they are in some way superior as that’s what he’s been taught to think.  He has no free will, of thinking or actions.  In the scene in his barn, he tries at first to get rid of Lennie but then doesn’t seem to mind that much when he doesn’t take the hint.  This may be because he didn’t feel like talking to anyone, but his loneliness got the better of him.  Maybe he is prejudiced against white men as a whole, but has found that sometimes are okay on their own, so he was slightly wary of Lennie.  Him being a hunchback makes it even harder for him to find work, and decreases his self-confidence even more than that of the average black man at the time.  It may be the cause of him being fired early as he can’t work any more.You hear about him before you meet him, this is probably for you to form a better image in your mind of how he looks, is treated etc as he isn’t described very well apart from him being black and having a hunchback.He seems very trustworthy, maybe because he doesn’t talk much to other men and wouldn’t get the chance to gossip, or perhaps he knows what it’s like to be let down and wouldn’t do it to anybody else.His past.  You don’t know anything about his family, or his education, or how he got his hunchback, or where he grew up, or how much money he has, or anything.  He likes a very repetitive lifestyle, like you hear the horseshoes clanging on the wall, and the horses stamping their feet outside his room.  He gets a little upset at first when men come into his room because it may disrupt his schedule if they stay to chat, and he doesn’t much like white men anyway.He changed his mind about being in the dream, maybe because he felt they’d only asked him to be in it for the same reasons that the boss hired him: to do the jobs that everybody else hates, as a scape goat or punch bag, or out of pity.  He may have felt that he’d be a little left out of everything they did.What would he be like as a white man? This is very important as your colour then decided how you would be treated for your entire life.  He would have more confidence, maybe a better job, wouldn’t have the same dream as black people... he might even be racist himself.  He would still have a hunchback though, so he wouldn’t be as able as other men.  He would be less lonely, more social... He might even have gone with the dream.What his future will be.  Does he have any relatives he can live with once he gets too old and weak to live on the farm? Will someone take pity on him and let him live with them? Or will he just die on the streets?...Crooks, Candy and Lennie united in their fight against Curley’s wife when she came to Crooks’ room, but were picked apart by her surprising power, being the daughter-in-law of the boss.  In the power structure of the ranch, at the top is the boss, then Curley, then Curley’s wife, then the white ranch workers who are fit and young, then Lennie and Candy, then Crooks.  Curley’s wife says: “I could get you strung up on a tree so fast it ain’t even funny.”- This shows the bad side of Curley’s wife, and the shocking trueness of this causes Crooks to “reduce himself to nothing”, something which he has perhaps had lots of practice at.   Maybe this has happened before, he has gotten a bit more sure of himself than usual, only to be stomped on by some evil person, or maybe it was just a one-off because Candy and Lennie were making him feel important.  Why doesn’t he like Curley’s wife? Did he form his judgement on his own distrust of whites, or on her attitude and how she treats him, or does he hear things from the other workers, or maybe do the others teach him how to think of her?His dream is obviously for black and white to come together, but does he have maybe a smaller dream, closer to home? Perhaps to have one close friend, or a family, or a place to go when he gets too old to work...“A black man’s gotta have some rights, even if he don’t like ‘em” – he has accepted that as a black man he is unwanted and has different rights to other men, and has decided to use his few rights to his advantage.How nobody seems to know anything about him, where he worked before, his hometown, his past, how he feels, what he thinks... nobody even knows his favourite colour.  In fact I doubt anybody cared. I think Crooks was put in the novel so you can make a contrast between white and black, and to show how black people were treated and what jobs they usually took.  It may also be to show you what little understanding Lennie has of racism and other social issues of the time, and what a kind person Candy is.   Racism in the 1930s   A saying then was: “The Negro is the last to be hired and the first to be fired.”  This was very true, unemployment of black people living in America during the Depression rose and rose, until it slowly began to get better, but even now it is not as low as some people would prefer it to be.  By 1932, 38% of black people living in America were in need of government support.  An organisation called The-Jobs-For-Negroes began, and boycotted white-owned department stores that would cater to Negroes but refused to employ them.  Though it started in St Louis it spread through the Mid-West and when it reached Harlem, a bigger version was founded.  Some of the blacks in this group wanted black capitalism, some favoured repatriation to Africa, and still more wanted the Negro to achieve full rights and dignity within the American system.  They picketed white-owned stores on 125th Street. They carried signs saying, "Don't buy where you can't work," and Powell claimed that they were able almost to stop trade totally at any place they chose to picket.  But then Roosevelt promised a New Deal, for the unemployed, the workers, and the Negroes.  He hired black people in government positions, as well as other changes, and though Negroes had before been hired in these positions, he did it for different reasons, not for poli tical ones so much but because they were experts in their fields of knowledge.  Soon the country was doing well.  But though the New Deal helped the Negro, it also decreased his independence and self confidence.  The large number of Afro-Americans who were receiving government aid in one way or another were aware of their dependency.  Afro-American communities, which had been regarded as "The Promised Land," slid into poverty and dejection.