Top-Rated Free Essay
Preview

Of Mice and Men

Satisfactory Essays
316 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Of Mice and Men
Of Mice and Men
Friday 06 September 2013
· One of the main historical contexts in of mice and men is the references to the great depression
· Another is the biblical links Steinbeck uses throughout the novella
· After World War I, economic and ecological forces brought many rural poor and migrant agricultural workers from the Great Plains states, such as Oklahoma, Texas, and Kansas, to California.
· a seven-year drought that began in 1931, turned once fertile grasslands into a desertlike region known as the Dust Bowl.

· What is important about the title?
· What is the famous reference?
· Was the title misleading?
· What are some themes in the story and how do they relate to the plot and characters?

In the novel Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, setting plays a crucial role in the advancement of the plot. It helps the reader get a feel for the mood and tone. Steinbeck use of words describes setting in a way never before seen, it is complex and yet easy to understand. The novel Of Mice and Men shows Steinbeck's use of words brilliantly
The setting the reader first encounters in the novel is the clearing by the pond. This is one of the most important locations in the entire novel. "I want you to come right here and hide in the brush". The quote shows how important the clearing it, it will be the play where they meet when one is in trouble. "The deep green pool of the Salinas River was still in the late afternoon. Already the sun had left the valley to go climbing up the slopes of the Gabilan mountains, and the hilltops were rosy in the sun.". This sets a somber mood to the last chapter, it gives us a feel of quietness, sadness. Setting plays the main mood setter, it gets us ready for the death of Lennie.
Nqobile Mlotshwa

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    The 1920s were a time of prosperity for most Americans, but most farmers didn’t prosper. The price of farm produce fell below 40% and many farmers were struggling to keep their land, so as an alternative they moved. “During the 1920s there had been a net migration of 6 million people, most of them young or black, from farm and small village cities…and in 1932 the flow was actually reversed, as urban unemployment peaked.” (Worster pg 47). As a consequence of the depression, there were more people on farms than had ever been in the nation’s history; more people were affected by the Dust Bowl than otherwise would have been.…

    • 749 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Of Mice and Men

    • 579 Words
    • 3 Pages

    method set out procedure you followed: specify materials, equiptment, also what you did with them. easy stuff. use diagrams if needed. 100-150 words…

    • 579 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Of mice and men

    • 1075 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Steinbeck portrays Curley’s wife in multiple ways. In the first appearance of ‘Mice of Men’ he described her symbolically using a metaphor; ‘the rectangle of sunshine in the door way was cut off’. This is already foreshadowing to the reader that Curley’s wife is trouble, for example the metaphor Steinbeck used to describe her can be referred to as light and darkness. In this case Curley’s wife representing the darkness presenting her as destructive further in the book, an example of her being destructive further in the novella is when she threatens to get Crooks ‘Lynched’, when he asked her to leave his room. Steinbeck goes into more description of Curley’s wife; he describes her as having ‘full rouged lips’ and ‘heavily made up’. ‘Rouge’ being a very rich red and also ‘rouge’ being a French word, this makes it obvious to the reader that Curley’s wife doesn’t engage in doing laboured work like the other men on the ranch. He also described her as having ‘red finger nails’ and her shoes had ‘little bouquets of red ostrich feathers’ This shows to the reader that Curley’s wife clearly likes the whole theme of red and is well groomed. She also is playing a part of being a temptress, this being because her appearance mostly involves the colour red (red finger nails) which is usually said to be a seductive and also destructive colour. Another way Steinbeck describes her, is in her clothing. Her clothing symbolises her as a dangerous nature (red ostrich feathers) towards the men. On the other hand Steinbeck makes Curley’s wife seem rather promiscuous and flirtatious, for example; when she was addressing the men about where her husband, Curly was her body structure changed as she ‘put her hands behind her back and leaned forward on the door frame so her body was thrown forward’, she also talks to the men in a ‘nasal’ and ‘brittle’ tone. This shows that Curley’s wife is not only craving for attention from the ranch men but someone to confide in.…

    • 1075 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    OF MICE AND MEN

    • 412 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The novella “Of Mice and Men” was based around the time of Black Tuesday. Black Tuesday left Americans feeling vulnerable and powerless, so therefore any form of power was needed and respected. At the time, most places were male dominated such as the ranch were George and Lennie worked, so therefore men were the ones who had more power over women. Nature is presented as being more powerful than humans because it ongoing, cyclical and leaves traces, where as human life is transient and doesn’t leave a trace. In the novella, there are different types of power such as financial, mental and physical power. Throughout the novella, Steinbeck conveys the themes of human nature, friendship and the unachievable American dream.…

    • 412 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Of Mice and Men

    • 924 Words
    • 4 Pages

    John Steinbeck (born in 1902) was a talented Californian writer. Steinbeck spent much of his time in New York and the Salinas Valley. Although he spent a few years at Stanford University, he desperately wanted to be a writer, therefore he started writing. His work includes The Grapes of Wrath, Cannery Row, The Red Pony, East of Eden and of course, Of Mice and Men. Hollywood loved Steinbeck and even made these very books in to film adaptations. Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1962 for his realistic but imaginative writings. In this essay I will be talking about one of John’s well known books, Of Mice and Men. This story is about two travelling ranch workers, George and Lennie, trying to earn enough money to get their own house and farm. The tale is based is 1930’s America during the Great Depression. This book encompasses themes of prejudice, racism and the fight for personal independence.…

    • 924 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Of mice and men

    • 928 Words
    • 3 Pages

    How does Steinbeck use details in this passage to present the bunkhouse and its inhabitants?…

    • 928 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Dust Bowl Odyssey

    • 921 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Jobs and food were scarce, and the migrants faced prejudice and hostility from the Californians, who labeled them "Okies." These workers and their…

    • 921 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Of Mice and Men

    • 769 Words
    • 4 Pages

    In the novel ‘Of Mice and Men’ the character of Crooks is subject to constant racial discrimination. This shows the time period of the book as 1930’s America was a very prejudice and racist place.…

    • 769 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Of Mice and Men

    • 356 Words
    • 2 Pages

    To use violence or not to use violence, that is the question that every author aspiring to write a novel must ask. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck is about two men working ranches out west and How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas Foster is about literary symbolism, and they both refer to violence. How to Read Literature Like a Professor explains violence and its significance, and Of Mice and Men includes violence as major plot events. How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas Foster in Chapter 11 refers to violence and what it means. In this chapter Foster writes “Violence is one of the most personal and even intimate acts between human beings, but it can also be cultural and societal in its implications.” ( Foster 88) This quote describes how violence is always meaning more than just simply violence. Violence can be symbolic, thematic, or even biblical in its meaning, but it is never just violence for violence’s sake. In Of Mice and Men’s case, the violence was symbolic in a foreshadowing way. This quote takes place while George and Lennie are in the wilderness thinking of memories, and Lennie remembers this memory. “I’d pet ‘em, and pretty soon they bit my fingers and I pinched their heads a little and then they was dead—because they was so little.” (Steinbeck 10) This quote is foreshadowing of how Lennie will kill Curly’s wife later in the book, because she does something mean to him like the mouse and then he does something to stop her, just like he stopped the mouse. He also ended up killing both the mouse and Curly’s wife. To the reader this shows that Steinbeck carefully intertwined symbolism into his novel in the form of foreshadowing. As demonstrated, How to Read Literature Like a Professor was right in saying that violence is always more than violence, and Of Mice and Men is an excellent example of that. Whether violence is biblical, thematic, or symbolic in its usage, it always adds the electricity…

    • 356 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The American people showed great determination during the Dust Bowl, by migrating to find new jobs. The Dust Bowl was a series of dust storms that started in 1934 due to a long drought, high heat, farming practices, and high winds (“Dust” 466). These dust storms battered the Great Plains, which run from South Dakota to Texas, creating “dust pneumonia” for the people who lived there (“Dust” 466, 467). Many people living in the Great Plain during this time decided to migrate to California, desperate to get a job, even if it was picking crops for low wages (“The Dust” 1). The millions of Americans living in the Great Plains during the time of the Dust Bowl had to endure extreme hardships, but they did not give up. Many left all that they had ever…

    • 622 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dust Bowl

    • 510 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In 1930, California had 5.7 million residents, and the population shrank as 120,000 Mexicans were banished. In the 1930s, farmers from the Midwestern Dust Bowl states, especially Oklahoma and Arkansas, began to move to California; 250,000 arrived by 1940, including a third who moved into the San Joaquin Valley, which had a 1930 population of 540,000. During the 1930s, some 2.5 million people left the Midwest states.…

    • 510 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Great Depression

    • 466 Words
    • 2 Pages

    13. What created the “Dust Bowl” of the mid-1930s? What were its effects on the people…

    • 466 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Therefore, in the early 1930s, thousands of Dust Bowl refugees packed up their families and migrated west hoping to find jobs. Entire families migrated together in search of a better life (Calisphere, 2013). There were about 200,000 out of 2.5 million immigrants that left the Midwestern states that migrated to California. They joined a population that was already facing massive unemployment and low wages, so these migrants were made employment even more difficult, and more strikes occurred. Many of the 200,000 migrants have heard that California had better working and living conditions than other western states. One of the migrants, Edgar Combs, mentioned that he first moved to Washington but then he moved to California because of the working conditions. He said, “I lived in the state of Washington for ten and a half years, and I…

    • 782 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    How did it occur? Well, in 1900 to 1930 a lot of families rented or obtained small pieces of land in the Plain states and built farms. The area was mainly arid grasslands. Luckily overtime the farmers were lucky to produce wheat, corn, and to raise cattle.…

    • 425 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Of Mice and Men

    • 1214 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Because salt water makes the plants weaker and absorb less nutrients, and when sodium and chloride ions separate then it might harm the plants.…

    • 1214 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays