The American Dream In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

Of Mice and Men, written by award-winning author John Steinbeck, narrates the story of two displaced migrant ranch workers, George Milton and Lennie Small, who travel together from place to place in search of new job opportunities and a chance to achieve their shared dream of settling down on their own piece of land, where they can finally work for themselves. To fulfil their dream, they are given an opportunity to make some well-deserved money by working on a ranch in Soledad, California along with the other ranch hands, who are all trying to make a living for themselves. Life is especially hard for them because the plot takes place during America 's Great Depression, which lasted from the Stock Market Crash of October 1929 until 12 years later when World War II began. But even in America, the land of the free, the land of freedom, the land of opportunity, George and Lennie’s struggle for their little piece of the American dream is frequently emphasised as impossible and unrealistic.

Their chances of achieving the dream is lowered dramatically by the problems they run into in Weed. In which Lennie’s love for soft things leads him to a girl’s dress, and his’s innocence leads him to touching the girl’s dress. As a result, Lennie is accused of ‘rape’ and is chased away by the other workers. They manage to escape, and are left with nothing besides each other’s company. Steinbeck’s repeated mention of what happened in Weed, emphasises the problems they had to go through