Killing A Friend In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

Killing a Friend

George and Lennie sat down, ‘“Lennie begged, Le’s get that place now.” “Sure right now. I gotta. We gotta….” He [George] pulled the trigger…”’ (Steinbeck 106). This is the part in Of Mice and Men when George kills Lennie peacefully. In John Steinbeck's, Of Mice and Men there are two men named George and Lennie. Lennie is a tall, large, strong, mentally disabled man, while George is a small, smart man. They travel from ranch to ranch together, George is Lennie's caretaker. George and Lennie have always had the dream of owning a ranch, they then would have a place to stay and not worry about Lennie getting in trouble. George knows his life would be a lot easier without Lennie. Lennie gets George into many situations because he does not know his own strength. Lennie means no harm, he is a nice, sweet person, he is just like a little kid. One situation Lennie gets himself into is killing Curley’s wife, Curley gets very mad at Lennie for this and wants to kill him

Lennie is never going to be cured from being mentally disabled, he also is never going to be let off the hook for killing Curley's wife. A man killed his wife knowing ‘her condition before entering the hospital had deteriorated so much that "there was a feeling she was never going to recover to any quality of life."’ (Lynch). This man killed his wife knowing she was not going to survive much longer. He took her life so she did not have to suffer anymore than she already was. When George kills Lennie, he does it so Lennie is not put into a brutal situation. He does not want Lennie to have to deal with being beat by Curly and the rest of the men. A mercy killing is the killing of someone who is suffering. George kills Lennie so he does not have to suffer, fitting the definition of mercy killing. If George would not have killed Lennie, Lennie would have been suffering from all the things Curley would have