Sandip Bhalsod 10SXM Mr.Honney Many of the characters in ‘Of Mice and Men’ had dreams, but how close were they to achieving these dreams?‘Of Mice and Men’ was written by John Steinbeck in 1937. The novel was originally written as a play and was then later published into a book. Steinbeck came from California and was familiar with the farmland and the ranches around Salinas; where the novel is set. Steinbeck was writing during the Great Depression and wanted to show many of the impacts this time period had on America and its people. The Great Depression was an economic slump in North America which lasted from 1929-1939.The Great Depression transpired because of the Wall Street Crash of 1929, one of the most devastating stock market crashes in American history. The Wall Street Crash was when all the share prices plummeted on the New York stock market. Millions of Americans lost all of the money they had invested in stocks and shares. As a result many businesses collapsed and people faced starvation. The President at that time, Franklin Delano Roosevelt tried to improve the situation with relief and recovery programmes to provide employment, housing and low-rate farm loans. President Roosevelt wanted to reduce the number of unemployed citizens from around 17 million to 7-10 million and and thanks to this scheme, a number of employment agencies (such as Murray and Ready) sprang up. These agencies would deal with casual farm workers, issuing them with work cards and travel tickets to their destination. From this situation grew a generation of desperate drifters, known as ‘migrant’ or ‘itinerant’ workers, most of whom headed to California, trying to escape from the Dust Bowls. In California, the soil was good and there was supposed to be plenty of room.Many of these itinerant workers dreamt of owning their own piece of land. Ever since the first colonies were established in America, people wanted their own land. Throughout the 1800’s families were travelling west, pushing their way right across the country. The Homestead Act of 1862 allowed a man to take on 160 acres of land, register it as a ‘claim’, farm it for five years then keep it as a heritable property. The act also made it possible for land to be bought cheaply, at $1.25 an acre. However, this act was flawed from the start as the workers found it difficult to make a living due to the amount of land they were given. This is very much like Lennie and George’s dream which had from the start always been unattainable due to the very idealistic nature of the dream.Many of the characters in the novel ‘Of Mice and Men’ pursued what is called ‘The American Dream’. The American Dream is the the idea that through hard work, courage and determination one could achieve prosperity and happiness. The dreams of all the characters in this novel derive ultimately from this deep belief. This conveys the attitude of the majority of Americans during the time of the Great Depression as they all wanted a secure base to rely on, which many people didn’t have during this time.The main characters in the story are George Milton and Lennie Small, two itinerant workers. At the beginning of the novel they are about to start work at a new ranch near Soledad. They were made to leave Weed in a hurry because Lennie couldn't control his actions and his fetish with soft things got him into serious trouble. He touched a women's dress because of his obsession and she cried rape. The townspeople chased George and Lennie out of town because they believed what the girl had said. Lennie was a nuisance to most people and
George had to constantly get him out of trouble. He had to take care of Lennie because without George, Lennie could not have survived. They had to travel from town to town because of Lennie's compulsive behavior. George and Lennie, like many other itinerant workers, dream of owning their own farm and working their own land, however because of Lennie’s frame of mind, the reader is given the impression that the dream will always be out of their reach. Chapter one is where we first hear about their plans for the future, ‘Some day – we’re gonna get the jack ...
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George had to constantly get him out of trouble. He had to take care of Lennie because without George, Lennie could not have survived. They had to travel from town to town because of Lennie's compulsive behavior. George and Lennie, like many other itinerant workers, dream of owning their own farm and working their own land, however because of Lennie’s frame of mind, the reader is given the impression that the dream will always be out of their reach. Chapter one is where we first hear about their plans for the future, ‘Some day – we’re gonna get the jack together and we’re gonna have a little house and a couple of acres an’ a cow and some pigs and...An’ live off the fatta the lan’.George and Lennie’s dream reflects on the idea of the American Dream. Fantasising about their dream provides an escape from the harsh reality of their lives. Also, we can see from the quote, ‘An’ it’d be our own, an’ nobody could can us. If we don’t like a guy we can say: “Get the hell out,” and by God he’s got to do it.’, that they crave security and the dignity of being answerable to nobody but themselves. Their dream also features stability as we can see from this quote, ‘We’d have a little house an’ a room for ourself. Little fat iron stove, an’ in the winter we’d keep a fire goin’ in it. It ain’t enough land so we’d have to work too hard. Maybe six,seven hours a day. We wouldn’t have to buck no barley eleven hours a day.’ This shows the resentful attitude towards conditions that ranch workers faced in order to survive.We can tell that George is constantly reciting the dream in his mind as when he speaks of it he elaborates every single detail. Also, when George speaks of the dream it is usually in long sentences and lists, whereas Lennie is usually repeating whatever George says and is only concerned about looking after the rabbits. This gives us the impression that Lennie is very animated and comes across as very childlike. George simply states, ‘We’d jus’ live there. We’d belong there.’, this is what George really craves, a sense of love and belonging. Unfortunately, George and Lennie’s dream has a climatic end. George knows that Lennie has committed murder, and is forced to shoot Lennie at the end of the novel. This is a very emotional scene in which George once again repeats the dream to Lennie. George tells Lennie to look across the river and think of the dream farm. George shoots Lennie in the back of the head. The gunshot symbolises the death of Lennie but also, the death of their dream.The death of Lennie has a massive impact on George, he lost his only companion. But this gives George a chance to fulfil a secret dream of his own, his desire to be free. He first gives us an insight at this secret wish at the beginning of the novel, ‘I could get along so easy and so nice if I didn’t have you on my tail. I could live so easy and maybe have a girl.’ This shows George’s regret at looking after Lennie and bailing him out of trouble all the time. George’s friendship and loyalty to Lennie’s kept him from achieving his own dream. His dream was unattainable as long as Lennie is alive, but now that Lennie is gone he will be able to go about carrying it out. In chapter three Candy the old swamper overhears George and Lennie discussing their dream. Candy is instantly entranced at the thought of being part of their dream. He tells them about the money that he has saved up, ‘Tha’s three hundred an’ fifty bucks I’d put in. I ain’t much good, but I could cook and tend chicken and hoe the garden some. How’d that be?’,Candy is desperately wants to be a part of their plan, he’ll do anything to escape loneliness on the ranch. Candy’s dog was his only companion and his best friend on the ranch. After he was shot in chapter three, Candy only forsees loneliness in his future, which is why George and Lennie’s dream seems so appealing. ‘When they can me here I wisht somebody’d shoot me ... I won’t have no place to go, an’ I can’t got no more jobs.’ This is a chilling reminder of the migrant worker’s fate in old age.However, the prospect of leaving the ranch and fulfilling his dream gives Candy strength, which is shown clearly in chapter four when he is confronted by Curley’s wife. Steinbeck states that, ‘a change came over Candy’, his belief in the dream has given him enough confidence to stand up to Curley’s wife. George calcuates that if he and Lennie work at the ranch for the month they will be able to purchase their plot of land.George states that, ‘Right squack in one month. I’m gon’ta write to them old people that owns the place that we’ll take it. An’ Candy’ll send a hundred dollars to bind her.’, George truly believes that their dream is within their grasp. At this point in the novel the reader is also convinced that the dream is close to coming true as Steinbeck writes, ‘This thing they had never really believed in was coming true.’ Candy’s dream comes to a close when Lennie murders Curley’s wife. When Candy realises the situation he asks George, ‘You an’ me can get that little place can’t we, George? You an’ me can go there an’ live nice, can’t we, George? Can’t we?’ He asks out of desperation, as he already knows the answer. It seems as if the dream was always too good to be true. Another important character in the novel that has a dream is Crooks the negro stable buck, he represents many of the themes that can be found in the book including loneliness, discrimination and predjudice. During the twenties and thirties, there were very strong racist views held by white people against Negro and Oriental labourers. The Negroes were insulted and segregated. The word ‘nigger’ was not meant as a deliberate insult, as it is today. It was common placed and totally acceptable for a white person to call a black American a ‘nigger’. Crooks was the only black worker on the ranch. Like George and Lennie, Crooks the stable buck is an outsider, but whereas they can find easy acceptance in the bunkhouse, Crooks is confined to his own quarters, segregated on account of his colour. In real life only very few black people worked the fields in California. Crooks is socially isolated from the rest of the ranch and has little interaction with the rest of the workers. When Candy says, ‘Ya see the stable buck’s a nigger’, we can see how racist comments were more acceptable in this time period. This must add to Crooks’ isolation and loneliness from the other men. ‘I can’t play (cards) because I’m black. They say I stink.’ This quote illustrates that Crooks feels the pain of rejection, more than he leads people to see. In fact, he protects himself by acting like a ‘proud and aloof man.’When Lennie visits him in his room, his reaction reveals this fact. At first, he turns Lennie away, ‘You got no right to come in my room.This here’s my room. Nobody got any right in here but me.’ Crooks, out of bitter pride, exercises his only right - that of privacy in his own room. ‘I ain’t wanted in the bunk house, and you ain’t wanted in my room.’ Crooks is trying to prove a point that if he, as a black man, is not allowed in white men’s houses, then whites are not allowed in his, but his desire for company ultimately wins out and he invites Lennie to sit with him. ‘His tone is a little more friendly’, Crooks is the only character, other than George, to understand Lennie, and befriends him. He looks past Lennie’s mental handicap and Lennie looks past Crooks’ physical handicap. Lennie tells Crooks that all the other work hands, apart from Candy, have gone into town. Crooks immediately spots a mental weakness in Lennie. Crooks is a disempowered character who turns his vulnerability into a weapon to attack those who are even weaker. He plays a cruel game with Lennie, suggesting to him that George is gone for good, this was probably done out of envy of George and Lennie’s friendship. This shows that prejudice isn’t simply a characteristic of the white ranch hands, it is a human characteristic, and Crooks needs to feel superior to someone also. Only when Lennie threatens him with physical violence does he relent. We can see the extent of Crooks’ loneliness when he states that, ‘Its just the talking. It’s just bein’ with another guy. That’s all.’ Crooks speaks for all men here. They are all lonely to different degrees, any human company is preferable to none at all. Crooks exhibits the corrosive effects that loneliness can have on a person, his character evokes sympathy as the origins of his cruel behavior are made evident. Perhaps what Crooks wants more than anything else is a sense of belonging—to enjoy simple pleasures such as the right to enter the bunkhouse or to play cards with the other men. When Lennie tells Crooks of the dream farm Crooks is very cynical in his reply, ‘You’re nuts ... I see hundreds of men come by on the road an’ on the ranches with their bindles on their back an’ that same damn thing in their heads..an’ every damn one of ‘em’s got a little piece of land in his head’. Crooks is very scornful that Lennie, George and Candy will be able to fulfil this ‘impossible dream’. This may be because he has spent so much time on the ranch that he cant see past ranch life, or he may just be too scared to put his hopes into believing the dream, due to the unlikelihood of the dream coming true. ‘He hesitated.”... If you ... guys wouldn’t want a hand to work for nothing – just his keep, why I’d come an’ lend a hand. I ain’t so crippled I can’t work like a son-of-a-bitch if I want to.”’ Despite Crooks’ initial reservations, just like Candy, he can’t help but being drawn into the dream. However, his hesitation shows that Crooks is still unsure about the reality of the dream coming true. Crooks’ dream is one in which he is acknowledged as an equal individual. He knows his civil rights. He remembers fondly his childhood, when he played with white children who came to his family’s chicken ranch, and longs for a similar relationship with white people again. He feels that he can find this acceptance at the dream farm. Unfortuantely, as easily as dreams can be formed they can also be shattered, which Crooks soon found out. Curley’s wife soon brought Crooks back to reality by threatening to get him lynched, ‘... keep your place the, Nigger. I could get you strung up on a tree so easy it ain’t even funny.’ This reminds Crooks that in the society he lives in, his dream will never come true. Crooks is quiet, knowing that he has no reply to this threat. He deals with the destruction of his short lived dream the only way he knows how, by accepting the only rights he has, those of a coloured man; ‘A colored man got to have some rights even if he don’t like ‘em.’ The character of Crooks’ reflects the universal need for human connection as well as the brutalizing effects of racial prejudice.Like Crooks, Curley’s wife is also very lonely. However, she is lonely for different reasons. She also suffers from prejudice from the other workers but this is due to the fact that she is the only woman on the ranch. Her loneliness stems from her objectification by Curley; all the other workers only look to her as ‘Curley’s wife’, someone they should stay away from as she is the wife of the boss’s son. She lives an isolated life, not allowed to talk to anyone except Curley, ‘I get lonely ... I can’t talk to nobody but Curley.’ This disconnection from people has left her with a yearning for company and somebody to talk to. The fact that throughout the whole novel we are not told the name of Curley’s wife indicates that Steinbeck may have wanted to show she lost her identity when she entered the ranch environment. This ties in with the overall loss of identity by many of the itinerant workers as they wondered the plains of California in search of work. Therefore it is easy to understand Curley’s wife’s dream of fame and stardom, which is ultimately the total opposite of her anonymous life in the ranch.Curley’s wife still hankers after her dream of being a film star. She states that she ‘coulda been in the movies’, which was a common dream for young American girls. Curley’s wife tells Lennie, ‘I coulda made somethin’ of myself ... Maybe I will yet’, this is evidence of her naive nature, she still believes that in her current situation her dream is still possible. Steinbeck then writes, ‘And then her words tumbled out in a passion of communication, as though she hurried before her listener could be taken away.’ This sentence emphasises her loneliness and need to be heard, using the word ‘passion’ to show the depth of her feelings towards her dream and even more so to the fact that she has someone to tell it to. When Curley’s wife talks about her past experiences with stardom, she speaks of a promising future, ‘he was gonna put me in the movies’ however the underlying theme of failed dreams is evident in the way that Curley’s wife dismisses her missed oppurtunities by shifting the blame onto her mother, ‘my ol’ lady wouldn’t let me’. Also, she speaks of ambitions of becoming famous and well-known, ‘When they had previews I coulda went to them, an spoke in the radio’. She also has a very gullibe side to her personality which is shown by the quote, ‘’Nother time i met a guy, an’ he was in pitchers ... He says he was gonna put me in the movies ... Soon’s he got back to Hollywood he was gonna write to me about it.’ She then tells us that she never recieved a letter. However, she rejects the fact that the person did not send the letter, but instead blames her mother for stealing it, ‘I never got that letter ... I always thought my ol’ lady stole it.’ She then reveals that she married Curley, to spite her mother. Marrying Curley extingiushed all her hopes of becoming a film star. Curley’s wife makes a connection with Lennie as they both have dreams and are both misunderstood by the other ranch workers. This is ironic as Lennie is ultimately the person who ends her dream. She understands Lennie, and in understanding him lets him touch her and dies by his hand. The irony of her death is that it is dramatic enough for a movie, and that her sad end would credit any decent Hollywood film.Curley’s wife dies after confessing her lifelong dream to Lennie. It was very obvious that her dream was doomed from the start because of her rocky relationship with her mother and her sealed fate in marrying Curley.The only outlet for the characters in this book to rise above their troubles is a shared dream of a better place. From the beginning of the story Lennie and George ride high on the thought of someday owning a farm. For George, it is the expectation of being his own boss and taking care of his own place. For Lennie, it is the expectation of simply being able to pet animals all day long. When this dream is shared with others, it becomes contagious. Candy and Crooks sign on to this fantasy, which helps them also to transcend their circumstances. Without dreams these characters would have nothing. It provided them with some sort of comfort and hope in which they could escape from their harsh lives.
