Theme Of Disability In Of Mice And Men

Helen Keller once said that “Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.” In the novel Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, 2 men named George and Lennie travel together looking for work during the Great Depression. They both had the hope of buying a ranch together but struggled to get the money to buy it. Steinbeck wrote about many conflicts in Of Mice and Men including racism, loneliness, and Lennie’s disability. Steinbeck explored racism in Of Mice and Men. Cruelty towards the weak was a major recurrence in the novel. The stable buck, or Crooks, was treated badly at the ranch where George and Lennie started to work at. At a past Christmas party, the boss brought a gallon of whisky for all the workers. Later, the men only brought Crooks …show more content…
Lennie’s disability caused him to not understand anyone. He barely remembered anything which caused him to be lonely. Everyone would talk to him, but he would not understand anything being said to him. There’s a saying when someone says something mean to you that you are just supposed to let it go in one ear and out of the other. It is basically saying to not let mean things people say to you stay with you and get in your head which make you do dumb things. This saying is what happened to Lennie, but it was not just mean things people said, it was everything people said. George told Lennie where they were going multiple times, but every single time Lennie forgot. Lennie’s disability caused loud noises and yelling to make him freak out. In order to calm down, Lennie liked to pet soft fabrics and things. This was in some cases good but in most cases bad. In Weed, where George and Lennie worked before working at the ranch, Lennie say a lady with a very pretty, red dress. Lennie likes to touch everything he likes so he went up and touched her dress. The lady thought Lennie was trying to rape her so she started screaming which scared Lennie and made him grab her dress. The girl went to the law and said she had gotten raped which caused “The men in Weed [to] start a party out to lynch Lennie”(42). Lennie’s disability caused him to not know his own strength. This recurred many times in the novel, getting bigger and worse every time. It first started with mice. Lennie would recieve mice from his Aunt Clara and Lennie would squeeze their heads so they would not bite him. This killed the mice, but Lennie would keep them after they died just to pet them. Then the situation got bigger when Lennie killed his puppy. He thought the puppy would be better than a mouse because it was bigger, even though the puppy was only a week old. It got the worst when Lennie killed Curley’s wife. Just like what happened in