Curley's Wife Feminist Analysis

The suppression against women is an extremely important issue to this day. Women have been treated as the inferior gender for almost as long as recorded history. Sexism was typical in the 1920’s, the time period in which this novel, Of Mice and Men, takes place. Though its frequency is familiar to Curley’s wife, it is quite damaging. She shows recurrent outbursts of distress and tells of decisions she has made in her life that tell the reader that she is strongly affected by this sexist phenomena. These factors show that she has changed her lifestyle and her attitude, due to society’s view of women. It is clear that Curley’s wife is a victim of sexism as evidenced by her shifting attitude and loss of identity. A man keeping his wife away in his house alone all day is definitely not the ideal marriage. Nevertheless, this is exactly what Curley does to his wife. Being alone, speaking to no
Likewise, it does not shock Curley’s wife, but it drags her emotional stability down tremendously. Being kept in isolation made her desperate for conversation, which made her hated by the ranchers, because she should not talk to anyone but her husband. They create lies that she is some kind of whore. All this becomes too much for her and she starts to become frustrated. She also turned her entire life around to marry a man she hardly knew. That was her only choice, as she could not work. Being a woman makes her life almost intolerable. In addition, though it is not directly stated, readers can imply that she is abused. She is called names and is treated much like an animal. Curley’s wife states numerous times that she does not understand why she is not allowed to talk to anyone and gets very upset. All of these factors prove that sexism has impacted Curley’s wife very negatively as a whole. Though this situation is fictional, it is the harsh reality for many