George and Lennie are two very different characters. George is described as a "slim, small, quick, dark-featured, and restless man with sharp, strong features" (Steinbeck 2). Lennie is the exact opposite, described as a huge man with a shapeless face, with large, pale eyes, and with wide, sloping…
Within Paragraph three there are the fundamentals that Steinbeck has allowed for us to understand Lennie as a character. We can begin to see that Lennie is simple minded. Lennie asks a very important question “why do you got to go get killed” This gives us a brief insight into what he is thinking. Lennie genuinely does not understand how or why he killed the puppy. He doesn’t even consider that he killed the puppy at this point. He is confused because he doesn’t understand his own strength. The rhetorical question Steinbeck weaves into this passage is very effective as it voices Lennies thoughts and concerns. This presents Lennie as unsophisticated and a threat to others because of his unfamiliar strength.…
Leading up to their dream Steinbeck builds up a clear image to who Lennie and George are. Immediately the main point is made to us that George is an intelligent, curious man who is portrayed as a motherly character who looks after Lennie and shows him what to do. Lennie is portrayed as the complete opposite as he is compared to a horse (huge, powerful) and a bear (massive, powerful, clumsy and potentially aggressive/protective). His huge size and strength combined with his slow mind and a lack of understanding of his own strength is a recipe for disaster.…
For example, “Slowly, like a terrier who doesn't want to bring a ball to its master, Lennie approached, drew back, approached again” (Steinbeck 9). This individual quote is significant in the book because it shows Lennie’s understanding of obedience rather than loyalty. Throughout the novel he is called a terrier, is said to resemble a horse when he drinks, and several times is described as having paws. The animal imagery goes to show that Lennie can’t control himself any more than an animal can. He is enormous and doesn’t always understand what he is doing.…
Lennie is a grown man with a mental disability.”Give it here”(Steinbeck,6). He acts like he is 6 or 7 years old. But he isn’t weak.”No,he ain’t,but he sure is one hell of a good worker.Strong as a bull” (Steinbeck,22). Lennie represents death/bad guy in this book even though he doesn’t know what it is. He always accidently kills animals like mice and pups.…
The mice contribute to the author’s purpose by symbolizing the precious things in life and how easily they can be taken from us. They also foreshadow Lennie’s destructiveness and inability to fit into a normal…
Grief, shock, and sorrow describe how I feel at the end of the famous novel, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck (1937). This favorable book is about two farmers named George and Lennie who dream of owning a house on a farm, and live a better life, until an accident occurs. George has to do something so terrible that it's hard to handle. Characterization, setting, and figurative language mark out why George did the right thing.…
Published in 1937, John Steinbeck wrote a moving and powerful novel titled, Of Mice and Men. Steinbeck’s reliance on textual description makes the work accessible to young readers, as does his use of foreshadowing and reoccurring images. Equally important is the way Steinebeck intertwines loneliness, friendship, and sadness. A professor at the University of San Jose stated, “The near impossibility of attaining the American Dream in the face of the huge and random challenges, like natural and economic disasters became the central theme of Steinbeck’s novel” (“Of Mice and Men – Critical Reception” 1). Marxist and New Criticism were the two approaches applied to the novel Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck.…
A large, lumbering, childlike migrant worker. Due to his mild mental disability, Lennie completely depends upon George, his friend and traveling companion, for guidance and protection. The two men share a vision of a farm that they will own together, a vision that Lennie believes in wholeheartedly. Gentle and kind, Lennie nevertheless does not understand his own strength. His love of petting soft things, such as small animals, dresses, and people’s hair, leads to disaster. Lennie is unnaturally large and has a shapeless face. He drags his feet when he walks and lets his arms hang. He is mentally retarded and needs George's constant attention and care. (2, Steinbeck)…
Even though the story ends with heartache, it still doesn’t remove the fact that Lennie and George knew that their friendship kept them going. John Steinbeck brings the time period of the 1930s to life in Of Mice and Men. The story captures the tale of two men, George and Lennie, use friendship and a dream to overcome challenges. Piece by piece as challenges add, it ends with serious consequences. Steinbeck displays that weakness leads to cruelty through the characters in Of Mice and Men by Crooks trying to acquire a position over Lennie, Candy’s dog dying, and Curley’s wife speaking to Crooks.…
To begin with, Steinbeck describes Lennie as an animal. This is because whilst he is drinking from a river and this shows that he has a wild personality as he is drinking from a dirty river. He drank using his ‘big paws’. ‘Paws’ implies that he hasn’t got hands like a human but paws like a bear or a dog. This would link back to the time period as people used dogs to heard sheep. ‘Big’ suggests that he is quite large which contradicts his partner as George of small. George respond to this by saying ‘you’d drink out of a gutter’. ‘Gutter’ suggests that he is quite animalistic as animals don’t have much sense to drink clean water. This also puts a lot of emphasis to his wild personality and simplicity. Therefore, through the use of the theme of animalistic and his disability, Steinbeck shows the importance of animals.…
Also describing his eyes as ‘pale’ could be indicative of the knowledge behind them, or more accurately the lack thereof. Suggesting that in reality he has a tendency to be absent-minded. Within this description of Lennie, we come across the first piece of animal imagery, where Steinbeck presents Lennie as a bear who ‘drags his paws’. Using the verb ‘drags’ gives connotations to slowness, and could be suggestive of Lennie’s slowness, both physically and mentally. Lennie also has other similarities with bears, they are conceived as dangerous, yet they only become so when they feel threatened, in self-defence. As is true when Lennie attacks Curley, here Steinbeck is subtly foreshadowing this event. After being described as a bear, he is later described as a horse ‘snorting into the water’. This can again tell us a few things about Lennie. It could be suggestive of his relationship with George, and how Lennie, as the horse is able to be controlled by his owner. It also reinforces his strength and power, and how it is only utilized when he feels vulnerable. The use of the verb ‘snorting’ shows hurriedness in his actions, but also could be referring to the way he acts from instincts rather than acting from intelligence. Later in the chapter Steinbeck uses a simile to describe Lennie as a ‘terrier who doesn’t want to bring a ball to his master’ that again talks of George’s control over Lennie, speaking of him as a ‘master’. The phrase also alludes to Lennie’s subservience to George, and indicates the lack of control he has over his own…
John Steinbeck uses an abundance of symbolism in Of Mice and Men to convey his central idea of humans being extremely diverse and…
First Lennie Philologically is much larger then George. Physically George is not that big. The best way to describe George would be he is a small quick man “The first man was small and quick, Dark of face, with restless eyes and sharp, strong features” (2). Steinbeck made George smaller just to portray brains vs. bronze. With George being so small he has to rely on his own mind more than his strength. Lennie is a giant of a man that towers over every one. Lennie is a monster of a man that towers over every one. Lennie is a monster of a man “Behind him [George] walked his opposite, a huge man, shapeless of face, with large, pale eyes, with wide sloped shoulders” (2). Lennie is one of the best workers on the ranch “But he’s sure a hell of a good worker. Strong as a bull” (22). Though Lennie may not be the brightest person he is the strongest person on the ranch by far and knows how to do just about anything manual labor wise on the ranch. If you compare Lennie to George you would see a monster of a man towering over a smaller man but the smaller man would be smarter.…
In Of Mice and Men, Lennie is portrayed as an innocent figure. He is described in a simplistic way and with nature and animal terms. As Lennie is being described in the beginning of the novel, his walking is described as “the way a bear drags his paws” (Steinbeck 2). Although the bear is known to be scary and dangerous, it can also be a lovable, stuffed teddy bear that a young child would want to play with. On that notation, Lennie is classified as a harmless, lovable man who is dumbstruck and has no intention on harming anybody. However, Lennie’s friend, George, is described with the opposite of what Lennie was. He is classified as a man that was “small and quick, dark of face” (Steinbeck 2). Dark symbolizes evil or bad. So as Lennie is enjoying life, George will indeed know how to mess things up. Steinbeck makes the readers feel affection towards Lennie as he stumbles on throughout the novel. He is also recognized as being child-like. George describes Lennie as either a domesticated dog or a young male child when he says,…