Powerless In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

The effects of being powerless differ among many people. What this means is that one cannot do something about a situation, or has no say in something. They are powerless. This novella by John Steinbeck takes place in the 1930s in Salinas Valley California in a town named Soledad. Soledad in Spanish means “loneliness”. The whole theme around this book is the differing effects of being powerless. There are many characters in the book that are powerless at some points. This is because they are isolated for certain reasons. One of the scenes where someone was powerless was when on Christmas, Crooks was beaten. He was not being punished, this was just because he Lonely and left out. Another was when Lennie was left behind, and all the other ranch …show more content…
One of them happened to be crooks. One day, Crooks was looking for slim so when he found him, he didn’t even walk into the room that Slim and candy were in. Crooks peered his head through the door and said, “Mr. Slim,” (50). This shows that Slim (A ranch hand) had a higher “rank” than crooks. It also showed that Crooks respected Slim like a boss, therefore Crooks did not have any power over him. Another example would be when on one Christmas eve, Crooks was beaten just for the hell of it. There was no legitimate reason, but everyone started beating on him because he was African American; an outcast, “Yes sir. Jesus, we had fun. They let the nigger come in that night. Little skinner name of Smitty took after the nigger. Done pretty good, too. The guys wouldn't let him use his feet, so the nigger got him,” (20). This shows even more that Crooks is powerless. The said that they “…let the nigger in…”. This shows that he isn’t even allowed to go into parties or gatherings because he is isolated away from everyone else. It also shows that Crooks has no power because they were beating him. Smitty was beating Crooks because he was drunk, and Crooks couldn’t do anything about