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How do dreams affect the characters in Steinbeck's novel? This essay explores how dreams are both a source of hope and a source of misery for George, Lennie, and others. Read the analysis, examples, and contrast with Western fantasies.
George and Lennie: Friendship in of Mice and Men. Essay grade: Good. 2 pages / 1122 words. Introduction: The historical fiction novel, Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck is about the journey of two friends George Milton and Lennie Small.
Of Mice and Men is an extremely structured work in which each detail anticipates a plot development that follows. Almost every scene points toward the inevitable tragic ending. In the first scene, we learn that Lennie likes to stroke mice and other soft creatures, but has a tendency to kill them accidentally.
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Of Mice and Men recounts the story of two itinerant ranch hands who, despite their apparent differences, are dependent on each other. Lennie Small, by far the better worker of the two, suffers not only from limited intelligence but also from an overwhelming desire to caress soft objects. These traits, combined with his uncontrollable strength, set ...
When the reader first encounters Lennie and George, they are setting up camp in an idyllic grove near the Gabilan mountains. It is lush and green and inhabited by all varieties of wild creatures. It represents, as the ensuing dialogue makes clear, a safe havena place where both humans and beasts can retreat should danger threaten. This setting prov...
Steinbeck frames the desolation of ranch life by having George and Lennie comment on how different their lives are and having the other ranch hands comment on how unusual it is for two men to travel together. The hired hands have no personal stake in the ranchs operation and, for the most part, no stake in one anothers well-being. Although they bun...
To underscore the situation, Steinbeck adopts restricted third-person narration and employs a tone that can best be described as uninvolved. His technique is an outgrowth of his desire to fuse dramatic and novelistic techniques into a new literary format, which he called the play-novelette. Accordingly, he relies on setting and dialogue to convey h...
Significantly, Steinbeck begins and ends the novel at the campsite. This circular development reinforces the sense of inevitability that informs the entire novel. Just as Lennie is destined to get into trouble and be forced to return to the campsite so, too, will George be forced to abandon the dream of owning his own farm. Instead, he will be redu...
Explore the form and content of Steinbeck's novel, which depicts the friendship and tragedy of two ranch hands in California. Learn how Steinbeck uses setting, dialogue, and theme to create a play-novelette that reflects the human condition.
Full Book Analysis. Of Mice and Men tells the story of how George and Lennie’s friendship is tested by the isolating and predatory reality of life for poor migrant workers in Depression-era America. George and Lennie are the protagonists, and their friendship is unique in the world of the novella: almost every other character notes that they ...
Poetic Origins. The title of Of Mice and Men is drawn from a Robert Burns poem titled “To a Mouse, on Turning up in Her Nest with the Plough, November, 1785,” which features the line “The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men, / Gang aft agley.”. The poem describes its speaker’s shock and regret upon realizing they have disturbed a ...
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Find sample essay outlines for analyzing themes, literary devices, and characters in John Steinbeck's novel Of Mice and Men. Explore topics such as loneliness, drama, realism, naturalism, and the American Dream.
