Of Mice and Men

Detail

John Steinbeck uses the first paragraph in the book Of Mice and Men to set up the entire story. He uses parallels to give clues about the characters that come up in the book.

"the Salinas River drops in close to the hillside bank and runs deep and green". This quote means many different things to me. When I think of the word deep, I think strong or something deep in depth like water or words being spoken to me can be deep. George is the deep one in the book because he has a great depth of mind. Green can mean jealous, sickly, or new life. Lennie is the green one because he is sick in the mind. He does not think very deeply.

"slopes curve up to the strong and rocky Gabilan mountains" is another quote that was used as a parallel in the first paragraph. The word strong reminds me of something stable. Rocky reminds me of something rough and unstable like loose boulders that could fall at any time. George is the strong and stable character. He is mentally strong unlike Lennie who is rocky in the mind and can not think for himself.

Another parallel is used in the quote "under the trees leaves lie deep and so crisp". Deep still means strong or great in depth. Also deep can mean stable. If a rod is deep in the ground then it is more stable than if it was closer to the surface. George's mind is deep. He has a very stable mind and his opinions cannot easily be broken. Something crisp like a leaf can be easily broken and ripped apart. Lennie's mind is crisp. He does not have his own opinion about anything. George makes all of the decisions and cannot be put down easily or made to believe something very easily.

In the quote "a path beaten hard by boys coming down from the ranches to swim in the deep pool, and beaten hard by tramps who come wearily down from the highway" there are different people being talked about with the same dream and have a lot of struggles to get to their dream. Lennie, George, and Candy are all completely different people coming from different places with the same dream to own their own land. They have financial problems and struggle to reach their dream.

The last quote that spoke to me with a parallel is "the limb is worn smooth by men who sat on it". A limb that has been sat on many times gets used to being sat on and gets worn smooth. George has taken care of Lennie so long that he has gotten used to being around him and taking care of him that he has a permanent wear.


Point of View


The third person point of view helps me to see the life that the men in the book Of Mice and Men lead.

From a passage on page 68, the quote, "Crooks did not see him...on raising his eyes...a scowl came on his face" shows that Crooks does not like company and that he is more of a loner than a person that likes company. He values his privacy. Since his reaction was a scowl instead of a "hello" or a smile, I assume that Crooks was not looking to find a friend or a relationship of any kind. "Lenny smiled helplessly in an attempt to make friends," shows that Lenny was knowingly walking in on Crooks when he was not supposed to but he went in anyways because he was looking for a friendship. He seems like the type of person that does not like to be alone and needs a relationship.

On page 100, another passage shows how lonely Lenny is and how he does not like to be alone. "And then from out of Lennie's head there came a little fat old woman," shows that when no one is around, Lenny feels so lonely that people come to mind and speak to him to keep him company. "You do bad things," is a quote from Aunt Clara. George or somebody else is always criticising Lennie so he got so used to being yelled at that Aunt Clara comes to his mind to yell at him because he probably feels uncomfortable when he is not being yelled at.



Tone

A devotional and hopeful tone was put in Steinbeck's novel that describe the relationship of two men, Lennie and George.

"No-look! I was jus' foolin', Lennie. 'Cause I want you to stay with me," is a what George says to Lennie on page 13 after they get into a fight. George obviously wants Lennie to stay with him no matter how bad their fights are. George has a devoted relationship to Lennie. On page 72 Crooks is telling Lennie that George could get hurt. Lennie then says, "Ain't nobody goin' to suppose no hurt to George," and " Ain't nobody goin' to talk no hurt to George." These two quotes show Lennie's devotion to George. Not only does he not want George hurt, but he does not want anyone to even talk about George even being able to get hurt. Lennie believes that as long as he is around, no one can hurt George.

Lennie is repeatedly wanting George to tell him of a place that they are going to live on their own. In their words they are going to live on 'the fatta the lan'. When George is giving details on their future home that has rabbits and alfalfa and cows and chickens and more, they both get hopeful and start to think that they could someday have the home that they fantasize about. They get so hopeful that they even make a plan to go after their dream land.