Tuesday 7 May 2013
Friday 3 May 2013
Monday 29 April 2013
Thursday 25 April 2013
'Of Mice & Men' - Portrayal of Women
The
portrayal of women in 'Of Mice and Men' is limited
and unflattering. We learn early on that Lennie and George are
on the run from the previous ranch where they worked, due to encountering
trouble there with a woman.
Misunderstanding
Lennie’s love of soft things, a woman accused him of rape for touching her
dress. George berates Lennie for his behaviour, but is convinced that women
are always the cause of such trouble. Their enticing
sexuality, he believes, tempts men to behave in ways they
would otherwise not.
A
visit to the “flophouse” (a cheap hotel, or brothel) is enough of women for
George, and he has no desire for a female companion or wife.
Curley’s
wife, the only woman to appear in Of Mice and Men,
seems initially to support George’s view of marriage. Dissatisfied with
her marriage to a brutish man and bored with life on the ranch, she is
constantly looking for excitement or trouble.
In
one of her more revealing moments, she threatens to have the black stable-hand
lynched if he complains about her to the boss. Her insistence on flirting with
Lennie seals her unfortunate fate.
Although
Steinbeck does, finally, offer a sympathetic view of Curley’s wife by allowing
her to voice her unhappiness and her own dream for a better life, women have no
place in the author’s idealized vision of a world structured around the
brotherly bonds of men.
'Of Mice & Men' - Loneliness / Dreams
Loneliness / Dreams
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Loneliness
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Dream
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George
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George is not lonely during the novel, as he has Lennie.
He will be lonely afterwards, without his best friend.
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George and Lennie share a dream - to own a little patch of
land and live on it in freedom. He is so set on the idea that he even knows
of some land that he thinks they could buy.
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Lennie
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Lennie is the only character who is innocent enough not to
fear loneliness, but he is angry when Crooks suggests George won't come back
to him.
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George and Lennie share a dream - to own a little patch of
land and live on it in freedom. Lennie's main desire is to tend the
soft-haired rabbits they will keep.
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Curley's wife
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She is married to a man she doesn't love and who doesn't
love her. There are no other women on the ranch and she has nothing to do.
She tries to befriend the men by hanging round the bunkhouse.
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She dreams of being a movie star. Her hopes were raised by
a man who claimed he would take her to Hollywood, but when she didn't receive
a letter from him, she married Curley.
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Candy
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When Candy's ancient, ill dog was shot, Candy has nothing
left. He delayed killing the dog, even though he knew deep down that it was
the best thing, as he dreaded losing his long-time companion.
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Candy joins George and Lennie's plan of owning a piece of
land. His savings make the dream actually possible to achieve.
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Crooks
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Crooks lives in enforced solitude, away from the other
men. He is bitter about being a back-busted nigger. He is thrilled when
Lennie and Candy come into his room and are his companions for a night.
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Crooks dreams of being seen as equal to everyone else. 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.
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'Of Mice & Men' - Key Characters
Lennie Small
Simple character with a powerful impact -- He is a big man,
in contrast to his name
"Behind him(George)walked his opposite, a huge man, shapeless
of face, with large, pale eyes, with wide, sloping shoulders; and he
walked heavily, dragging his feet a little, the way a bear drags his paws.
His arms did not swing at his sides, but hung loosely."
He
loves to pet soft things, is blindly devoted to
George
and their vision of the farm, and possesses incredible physical strength
He
earns the reader’s sympathy because of his utter
helplessness in the face of the events that unfold. Lennie is totally defenseless. He cannot avoid the dangers
presented by Curley,
Curley’s wife,
or the world at large
Doomed
from the beginning
His
innocence raises him to a standard of pure
goodness that is more poetic a character whose innocence only seems to ensure
his inevitable destruction
He is often described as a
child or an animal - he drinks from the pool like a horse and his huge
hands are described as paws.
George Milton
He is a small man, but has brains and a quick wit.
He
is short-tempered but a loving and devoted
friend, whose frequent protests against life with Lennie never
weaken his commitment to protecting his friend. George’s first words, a stern
warning to Lennie not to drink so much lest he get sick, set the tone of their
relationship. George may be terse and impatient at times, but he never strays
from his primary purpose of protecting Lennie.
He has
been a good friend to Lennie, ever since he promised Lennie's Aunt Clara that
he would care for him. He looks after all Lennie's
affairs, such as carrying his work card, and tries to steer him out of
potential trouble.
He
needs Lennie as a friend, not only because Lennie's
strength helps to get them both jobs, but so as not to be lonely. His
threats to leave Lennie are not really serious. He is genuinely proud of Lennie.
He shares a dream with Lennie to own a piece of
land and is prepared to work hard to build up the money needed to buy it.
"...with
us it ain't like that. We got a future. We got somebody to talk to that gives a
damn about us. We don't have to sit in no bar room blowin' in our jack 'jus
because we got no place else to go. If them other guys gets in jail they can
rot for all anybody gives a damn. But not us."
Crooks
Crooks’ room shows how Crooks is different from the other ranch hands. Much of the room is filled with boxes, bottles,
harnesses, leather tools, and other accouterments of his job. It is a room
for one man alone. But scattered about on the floor are his personal
possessions, accumulated because, unlike the other workers, he stays in
this job. He has gold-rimmed spectacles to read (reading, after all, is a
solitary experience – “Sure you could play
horseshoes till it got dark, but then you got to read books. Books ain’t
no good. A guy needs somebody—to be near him … . A guy goes nuts if he
ain’t got nobody. Don’t make no difference who the guy is, long’s he’s
with you … . I tell ya a guy gets too lonely an’ he gets sick”
Physical disability sets him apart
from the other workers ( makes him worry that he will
soon wear out his usefulness on the ranch )-- his isolation is
compounded by the fact that he is a black
man. “S'pose you didn't have nobody. S'pose you couldn't
go into the bunk house and play rummy 'cause you were black...A guy needs
somebody-to be near him....I tell ya a guy gets too lonely an' he gets
sick."
Curley’s wife uses
race against Crooks to render him completely powerless. When she suggests
that she could have him lynched, he is unable to mount any defence.
"Well, you keep your place then, Nigger. I
could get you strung up on a tree so easy it ain’t even funny.”
He
is bitter about his exclusion from the other men, Crooks feels grateful for
Lennie’s company. Yet, as much as he craves companionship, he cannot help
himself from lashing out at Lennie with unkind suggestions that George will
leave Lennie.-- Crooks’s behavior exemplifies the predatory nature of the ranch-hands’ world. The strong attack the weak but the weak will attack
the weaker.
Crooks exhibits an
insight that other characters lack. He is openly sceptical of Lennie's
claim that he will soon own a piece of land, telling him that such dreams
never come to fruition -- Just
like heaven. Ever’body wants a little piece of lan’. I read plenty of
books out here. Nobody never gets to heaven, and nobody gets no land. It’s
just in their head. They’re all the time talkin’ about it, but it’s jus’
in their head.”
Crooks acts brusque
not because of any dislike for others; rather, he uses it as a defence
mechanism.
Curley's Wife
Steinbeck describes
Curley’s wife in terms of her appearance and the reactions of the ranch hands
toward her. She has been alternately a “tart,” “jailbait,” and various other
derogatory terms, used often by George. In the end she is seen as another
victim of loneliness.
Although
her purpose is rather simple in the novel’s opening pages—she is the “tramp,”
“tart,” and “bitch” that threatens to destroy male happiness and longevity—her
appearances later in the novel become more complex. When she confronts Lennie,
Candy, and Crooks in the stable, she admits to feeling a kind of shameless
dissatisfaction with her life.
Her
vulnerability at this moment and later—when she admits to Lennie her dream of
becoming a movie star—makes her utterly human and much more interesting than
the stereotypical vixen in fancy red shoes. However, it also reinforces the
novel’s grim worldview. In her moment of greatest vulnerability, Curley’s wife
seeks out even greater weaknesses in others, preying upon Lennie’s mental
handicap, Candy’s debilitating age, and the color of Crooks’s skin in order to
steel herself against harm.
Sympathetic treatment of Curley’s
wife prior to her death – once she lies lifeless on
the hay, Steinbeck writes that all the marks of an unhappy life have disappeared
from her face, leaving her looking “pretty and simple . . . sweet and young.”
After maligning women about their flirtatious natures; it is disturbing, then,
that Steinbeck seems to subtly imply that the only way for a woman to redeem
that nature and restore her lost innocence (?) is through death.
Candy
The
old handyman, aging and left with only one hand as the result
of an accident, worries that the boss will soon declare him useless and demand
that he leave the ranch.
Life
on the ranch—especially Candy’s dog, once an
impressive sheep herder but now toothless, foul-smelling, and brittle with
age—supports Candy’s fears. Past accomplishments and current emotional ties
matter little, as Carson makes clear when he insists that Candy let him put the
dog out of its misery. In such a world, Candy’s dog serves as a harsh reminder
of the fate that awaits anyone who outlives his usefulness.
For a brief time, however, the dream of
living out his days with George and Lennie on their dream farm distracts Candy from this harsh reality. He deems the few
acres of land they describe worthy of his hard-earned life’s savings,
which testifies to his desperate need to believe in a world kinder than
the one in which he lives.
Like George, Candy clings to the idea
of having the freedom to take up or set aside work as he
chooses. So strong is his devotion to this idea that, even after he
discovers that Lennie has killed Curley’s wife, he pleads for himself and
George to go ahead and buy the farm as planned.
'Of Mice & Men' - Comparing Chapter 1 & 6
ANIMAL IMAGERY:
- Lennie – “like a bear drags his
paws” “Lennie dabbled his big paw in the water…”
CHAPTER 1 CHAPTER
6
Energetic wild animal Lennie is
like a hunted animal – “came as silently as a creeping bear moves”
Strong Characteristics are more
cautious
Clumsy Reader’s sympathy grows
towards him further
- Death of animals – Candy’s dog /
Mice / Puppies: Hints (foreshadowing) that George’s ‘pet’ (Lennie) must die
too?
- DIGNITY AND RESPONSIBILITY – Candy
wishes he had shot his dog himself – Links to George taking responsibility for
Lennie.
REPETITION OF FARM STORY:
- Chapter 1 represents hope and
dreams when Lennie and George are discussing the farm.
Whereas:
- In Chapter 6, George uses the farm
to comfort Lennie.
§ Very poignant and emotive – George
and the reader know that the dream will never come true. The reader empathises with George’s situation
and decision.
§ The sadness surrounding the death
of Lennie and the dream is furthered because the reader is aware that
the dream was about to come a reality with the help from Candy.
CIRCULAR PLOT:
- Novel starts and ends in the same
setting – brush
- This emphasises that no matter what
dreams they have, the ranch workers are destined to just move round from ranch
to ranch until they eventually die – Reader feels increasing sympathy for these
helpless and isolated characters.
SETTING: HERON AND WILDLIFE
- Same setting in chapter 1 and 6 –
chapter 6 is written with a more negative perspective:
CHAPTER 1: peaceful “twinkling
over yellow sands…”
CHAPTER
6: Sense of peace from chapter 1 turns to isolation:
“the
golden foothill slopes…”
“Sun
had left the valley…”
“Still
late in the afternoon”
-
Lennie
is in the middle of the setting in a vulnerable childlike position:
· “…he embraced his knees and laid
his chin down on his knees…” – builds sympathy for character
HERON (Chapter
1): Heron
spares snake’s life
Reflected - George saves Lennie’s
life by helping him escape Weed.
(Chapter
6): Heron stands motionless in the
water then kills the snake
Shows
smarter animal killing helpless animal.
FORESHADOWING – George and Lennie
Circle
of life / nature
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