The dream is also useful for keeping lennie out of trouble, to some extent, George threatens ‘You aint gunna get in no trouble...I won’t let you tend the rabbits’. Getting to tend the rabbits’ is the most exciting prospect for Lennie, and George frequently tells the story of their dream to Lennie, to help distract and entertain him. When the story of their dream is told, it seems more attainable for both of them. The dream becomes even more realisable when Candy asks to be part of it with them. He offers ‘S’pose I went in with you guys. Tha’s three hundred an’ fifty bucks I’d put in. I ain’t much good, but I could cook and tend the chickens and hoe the garden some. How’d that be?’. With more money and another persons determination, there is new hope for the dream to become reality, perhaps even in the near future. Steinbeck uses this situation to convey that dreams are strengthened by companionship, and companionship is strengthened by a shared dream. At the end of the book when George intends to shoot Lennie, he distracts him by making him look into the distance and think of the dream, ironically just after the dream ceases to be possible for either of them, because of Lennie’s actions. The comfort of having a dream is partly about believing in the possibility of them, and being able to imagine a world where the dream exists.
Throughout Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck uses light and darkness to illustrate a powerful image; the spectrum of hope and dreams, despair and hopelessness. Dreams, as well as light, must fight against the darkness enclosing them to survive and shine through. Dreams, as well as the level of light, may be be viewed as small and even irrelevant, but are often hold a great significance. A description of light in key places thought out the novel, hints to the reader the gravity of the situation, and possibly allows the reader to predict what might happen, and to also illustrate the atmosphere of the setting or surroundings. In the bunkhouse, the ‘small square windows’ symbolise that there is little light let into the bunkhouse, and little hope for the men who live there. Also, ‘the sun threw a bright dust-laden bar through one of the side windows’, this represents that the little hope in the bunk house only helps to further illuminate the darkness and harshness of society. In a setting, such as the ranch, where dreams are suppressed and suffocated, they take on a greater importance and significance to the mens lives, they rely on the dreams to get by.
In the novel Curley’s Wife is portrayed as a source of trouble and danger for the men, not only in how she is described, such as ‘Curley’s married a tart’, but also in how Steinbeck portrays her affect on light and hope. Lennie and George first come across Curley’s wife when ‘the rectangle of sunshine in the door way was cut off. A girl was standing there looking in’. She is blocking one of the only light sources into the bunkhouse, which indicates that she is an obstacle on the path to realising hopes and dreams, for Lennie, George and the other men. George is wary of Curley’s Wife and so he warns Lennie ‘ Well you keep away from her, ‘cause she’s a rat trap ’. He suspects that someday she will cause Lennie to get into trouble, thus making it harder to reach their dreams. In the barn towards the end of the novel when Lennie kills Curley’s Wife, ‘ the sun streaks were high on the wall...and the light was growing soft ’. In this situation the light represents her hopes and dreams slowly ebbing away with her passing life, and in it’s place darkness an despair fills the barn. At the start of the ultimate chapter as the men begin their hunt of Lennie, ‘the sun had left the valley to go climbing up the slopes of the Gabilan mountains, and the hilltops were rosy in the sun’. The sun leaving the valley corresponds with any possibility of Lennie and George’s dream becoming reality disappearing ; there is no hope for either of them in this place anymore, especially not for Lennie, and the valley will soon be filled with darkness, hinting at the events to come. It is a metaphor for up-hill hard struggle required of a migrant worker to reach their dream, with the rosy hilltops a hope-filled paradise where their dreams are realised.
Whilst Steinbeck portrays that dreams cause happiness, companionship and determination, he also wants to demonstrate to the reader the fragility of dreams in this society. There are so many aspects that can contribute as to why the characters dreams are not realised, they are restricted by power of the people, prejudice against race, age, sex, mental or physical disability, and by social mentality. Steinbeck illustrates these things though Crooks. ‘The stable bucks a nigger’ and because of this Crooks has less hope than the other men. In his room he has a ‘small electric globe’, symbolising fake hope. Because of lack of a dream, or a broken dream in the past, Crooks has a synical and skeptical view towards the aspirations of others, leaving him isolated and alone. When Lennie tells him about his dream, Crooks responds ‘You’re nuts..nobody ever gets no land’. He believes that there is no possibility of this dream, the ‘american dream’, being realised, because everybody desires it, but it is seldom achieved. He is scornful of Lennie’s naivety and unwavering faith. A broken dream can lead to their own destruction, as in the case of Curley’s Wife and Lennie. Curley’s wife dreamt of going to Hollywood, ‘Coulda been in the movies’, and in her need and desire to talk to someone, anyone, about her dream, she put herself in Lennie’s potentially dangerous path. Lennie accidentally killed her when trying to silence her, so that he wouldn’t get into trouble. He begged ‘Please don’t...He aint gunna let me tend no rabbits. Their dependancy on dreams attributed to their deaths.
In Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck does not portray dreams as being completely futile. Using characters such as Lennie, George and Candy, he shows that dreams do not guarantee a better outcome to their lives, but they do help them to live their lives with purpose, determination and companionship. The way Steinbeck portrays Crooks and Curley’s Wife explicates that whilst it is important to remember that dreams are often fragile and in-accomplishable, a lack of a dream and too much synicism will attribute to a life of darkness, loneliness and isolation. Steinbeck’s key point is that dreams are worth having, but are unlikely to come to fruition. What’s importation is the aspiration of dreams, not the realisation.
