Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s review of Of Mice and Men (original) (raw)

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Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s Reviews > Of Mice and Men

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Of Mice and Men
by

8734459

I think I've been avoiding John Steinbeck, consciously or subconsciously, ever since I was a horse-loving teenager and thought that The Red Pony would be a nice, pleasant book to read.

description

I didn't read any Steinbeck books for years.

But I was in the local library, puttering around in the general fiction shelves, and happened to pull this one out and noticed how short it was--only 107 pages. I had just finished reading Jonathan Livingston Seagull, which was a 127-page overdose of cheesy 70's inspiration, and it occurred to me that by reading this book to offset JLS I could restore the cosmic balance in my life, or something like that.

Lennie and George are a unique pair of friends: George is restless, intelligent and often short-tempered; Lennie is huge and incredibly strong, although mentally damaged. He has a childlike sweetness but is easily confused and frightened, and that combined with his strength makes him threatening to others. Somehow, despite their differences, the two have formed a friendship. George tries to protect Lennie from the world . . . and the world from Lennie. It's a difficult task. But they have their dreams and plans of a place of their own, where they can tend a garden and raise animals. And Lennie can take care of the rabbits. It's the most heavenly thing he can imagine.

George and Lennie are hired as field hands at a ranch in California, and the foreshadowings of disaster start to come thick and fast. An old sheepdog whose usefulness has passed is unceremoniously shot. The owner's son Curley comes around to their bunkhouse, spoiling for a fight. Curley's young, bored wife comes around even more often, looking for a different kind of trouble. The hands are sure that they only need a month or two of wages to achieve their plans of a place of their own, but the best-laid schemes of mice and men gang oft agley.

I was expecting to read about shattered dreams, but I was surprised and touched by the strength of the theme of true friendship--not just the friendship between George and Lennie, but also the friendship and understanding offered by Slim, the ranch foreman. With all of the loneliness and cruelty and loss and disappointment that life can bring, it's this one message of hope that I choose to take away from this short but powerful book.

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Reading Progress

June 20, 2014 – Shelved as:to-read

January 30, 2015 –Started Reading

January 30, 2015 –14.02% "After reading Jonathan Livingston Seagull this past week (127 pages) I'm feeling the need to balance that with an equal number of pages of greater substance. Steinbeck seems like a good way to go. :D"

January 31, 2015 –30.84% "Lennie cried out suddenly--"I don' like this place, George. This ain't no good place. I wanna get outta here.""

January 31, 2015 –66.36% "Candy cried, "Sure they all want it. Everybody wants a little bit of land, not much. Jus' somethin' that was his. Somethin' he could live on and there couldn't nobody throw him off it.""

January 31, 2015 –Finished Reading

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