John Steinbeck’s novella, Of Mice and Men, takes place during the Great Depression in the 1930’s, in the Salinas Valley, California. It establishes the prospect of the American Dream, discrimination,loneliness, and disenfranchisement through its characters. George and Lennie provided the value of the American Dream, to which the leading female role, Curley’s wife, represents how women are exempt from the American Dream, and appeared as less than equal to men. She developed a form of loneliness throughout the course of the novel. The novella seeks to demonstrate the way of which life was like for the characters of all different statuses and backgrounds. Through Curley’s wife’s character, we are able to see how life was like for a women during
During the early 1930s, after a series of unfortunate events that caused the Great Depression, the United States economy plummeted. This, in turn, caused difficulties from severe unemployment to widespread poverty in the US. Racial discrimination was not uncommon because tensions between opposing races skyrocketed after the abolishment of slavery. Prejudice because of gender was a usual everyday thing; women recently received the right to vote along with working paying jobs. However, women were still treated similar too property. John Steinbeck’s book Of Mice and Men was set during the Great Depression, where it featured two protagonists through their journey to achieve their dreams. However, the minor supporting characters were the ones who suffered from social discrimination because of the historical, economic, and political forces during that period.
During the Great Depression, times were very tough in the United States for everyone. In “Of Mice and Men”, John Steinbeck illustrates the struggles of discrimination and the struggle of finding a job, in everyday life during the Great Depression through Lennie, Crooks, and Curley’s wife. In this novel Lennie, a not so bright but hard worker faces the challenges of trying to find a job during the Great Depression along with a mental disability. George says to Lennie at the beginning of the story, “If he finds out what a crazy bastard you are, we won’t get no job, but if he sees ya work before he hears ya talk, we’re set.”
“‘[Writers] are charged with exposing our many grievous faults and failures...for the purpose of improvement’” -John Steinbeck, Nobel Prize Speech. According to Steinbeck’s speech, the purpose of literature is communication and exposition of problems, and understanding and teaching of the ways to fix those faults in society. One of John Steinbeck’s books Of Mice and Men advances his speech’s purpose by illustrating how discrimination, especially sexism and racism, can alter one’s personality and destroy their desire to achieve anything greater in life than their current situation.
In the novella ‘Of mice and men’ by John Steinbeck, two men George and Lennie, have many limitations in life. George and Lennie end up on a farm where they meet people who also have limitations, one of those people happens to be a character known as “Curley 's wife”. Steinbeck crafts Curley 's wife as a sexualized object in order to reveal that women are dehumanized and thus excluded from the American Dream.
In today’s world, oppression of women, African Americans, and disabled people is still a problem, but since the era of the Great Depression society’s views of these people have greatly improved. In the novel, Of Mice and Men, written by John Steinbeck it is shown how oppression among these types of people was commonplace. This novel begins with two men named Lennie and George; these men travel together and George takes care of Lennie who is mentally disabled. George and Lennie have to flee out of the town, Weed, after an incident happened. They travel to a different town and begin working on a ranch, and shortly later another fatal occurrence happens. In the end, George is forced to make an extremely difficult decision that results in him taking on the rest of his life solo. This novel explores the effects of oppression on women, African Americans, and people with disabilities.
Of Mice & Men John Steinbeck’s Of Mice & Men is a novel packed with racial and gender inequalities. The way it portrayed the character of Curley’s wife is particularly interesting and spoken about, and for good reason. Throughout the novel, Curley’s wife – who, accordingly, was never called anything else – was consistently dehumanized, and forced to fit into certain stereotypes. It’s also worth noting that Curley is an abusive husband towards her. Curley’s wife is a victim of sexism, correctly depicted by Steinbeck’s illustration of how society used to be.
John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men follows George Milton and Lennie Small as they attempt to survive the destitution of the Great Depression. The two travel together, making them different from the rest of the ranch workers, who are alone in their hardships. However, their relationship is more complex than the surface: it presents a power struggle with the ulterior motive to help oneself. Through the characterization of the ranch workers, Steinbeck makes a claim about human’s innate characteristics: people in power will use their status in order to solidify their position over the weak.
Being the woman/ wife in the story makes curley 's wife a possession, and inanimate object,and nothing more than. This novella continuously beats the theme that women are objects to be used to the man’s desire and satisfaction into the reader. The statement Steinbeck makes in this novella should be familiar with everyone, but is especially close to the female population. Curley’s wife was not the first, nor is she the last woman to experience objectification and isolation due to her anatomy.
All over the world, in the past and even today, there has been a major problem called sexism. Women everywhere are being oppressed and marginalized. There are no real reasons for this, except for the fact that they are women. John Steinbeck’s exploration of a real-world issue, which is sexism, is clearly shown in Of Mice and Men and The Pearl through the characters of Curley’s wife and Juana.
The battle for equality has been a problem for many years. Many people have strived for many changes throughout history, which directly and indirectly changed how people treat each other. As people strive towards equality, more struggles with reference to sexism, ableism, and racism awaits. The novel takes place in the 1930s, the Great Depression. The Great Depression is the worst economic downfall in U.S. history. This was all caused due to an economic collapse. Many lost their jobs and money. The characters George and Lennie, set out in order to find work in California on a ranch. George was a small and smart person, while Lennie was a much larger person, but had the mind of a child. During this time, there was a lot of discrimination between characters in forms of segregation, or in more subtle ways such as slander. In spite of the fact that many still advocate for the purpose of equality, many other people believe that equality has already been earned, considering that it is the twenty first century in a first world country, segregation ended, women have more rights than ever, and people with disabilities are given more opportunities and benefits. In the book, the author shows how discrimination was back then, and they can connect with today’s events, despite the improvement of rights.
“The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for white, or women created for men.” - Alice Walker
“She’s gonna make a mess, they’s gonna be a bad mess about her. She’s a jailbait all set on the trigger”. Of Mice and Men show’s George and Lennie’s path to their American dream. They are starting off as laborers in California in the Salina’s Valley and live in a hand-to-mouth lifestyle on a ranch. The novel portrays many male characters than female. The women shown by Steinback are Curley’s Wife, Susy, and Aunt Clara and are given somewhat respect. Even though there are not many female characters, John Steinbeck symbolizes them as archetypes throughout the book he indicates sexism of women being at the bottom of the social hierarchy in a male workplace. Although all women in the novel are portrayed differently, on some level as authority figures, they differ in the amount of respect received
Being forced to kill someone would be really emotional, but imagine if that person was your best
Within the 1937 Depression-Era novel, Of Mice and Men, scribed by John Steinbeck, he implements complex, multi-dimensional characters in which they mutually possess an American Dream, yet they are distinctive in their most aesthetic, indigenous form. Characters including Curley’s Wife, Crooks, and George Milton have always theorized their life in Utopian lifestyles, in the setting of America, but is oppressed by external and internal means that is explored throughout the literature. Notably, George, the co-protagonist, has such ambition to live in a domesticated household in contradiction to the vagrancy he experience, while carrying the weight of having a fraternal-paternal relationship with Lennie, a man approximately his age with an evident disability. His