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Emotional Intelligence In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

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Intelligence, according to Webster’s Dictionary is the ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills. Throughout the story, Of Mice and Men, Lennie is faced with many decisions which shows his two types of intelligence levels. In Of Mice and Men, we are presented with different scenes which showing the reader, logical intelligence and emotional intelligence. Lennie is a character with both logical and emotional intelligence because he knows both types of emotions well and he possesses more emotional than logical intelligence. Firstly, Lennie is able to use his logical intelligence for a given situation. All through the novella we see times where Lennie is forced to use his logical intelligence. Around the beginning of the story …show more content…

We see this in many different occasions in Of Mice and Men, such as when Lennie is with Curley’s Wife before accidentally killing her. “She screamed then, and Lennie's other hand closed over her mouth and nose. "Please don't," he begged. "Oh! Please don't do that. George'll be mad." (Steinbeck ______). Lennie’s conscience, or emotional intelligence to do this to Curley’s wife just to get her to stop screaming so George doesn’t get mad at him. If Lennie had more logical intelligence his entire personality and the entire story line would've changed for both George and Lennie. George needs someone like Lennie who has more of an emotional side to keep him sane throughout the day. Also, in Of Mice and Men Lennie is predestined to be more emotional while George is the logical and street smart rather than imagination based. In conclusion, Lennie is an extremely intelligent character. In today’s society we do not think about the emotional intelligence and focus on logical and knowledge based intelligence. Despite the fact that emotional intelligence has a greater value compared to logical intelligence it is looked down upon and is not given any attention. Both forms of the intelligence is greatly used on a daily basis, but for some occasions we should use emotional than logical or vice versa. Lennie displays both forms of intelligence in Of Mice and Men and has more emotional than logical

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309 Words | 2 Pages

Personally i believe that Lennie was loony and didn 't know how to control himself. In addition, I know in the book Lennie butchered bijou animals uncontrollably. Also Lennie was a kind person, but when he got pissed he hurt Curley However, people might say that he didn 't know what he was doing when doing such things.

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561 Words | 3 Pages

Of Mice and Mental Impairment Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck is a fiction novella set in the time of the Great Depression. It follows George Milton and Lennie Small, two itinerant workers with the same dream; they hope to someday get a farm of their own. However, Lennie has a severe mental disability, so George constantly has to tend to Lennie and help him get out of messes. In the novel, George and Lennie travel to their new job on a ranch in Salinas Valley, California.

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998 Words | 4 Pages

“But Curley’s gonna want to shoot ‘im” (Steinbeck 97), said George to Candy. That there? Just an argument between Curley shooting Lennie. Ill explain later, but this is where George is thinking about what he's going to have to do to Lennie, you see Curley is going to want to slowly kill Lennie for killing his wife. But George kills Lennie quick and easy.

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959 Words | 4 Pages

‘Lennie begged, “Le 's do it now. Le 's get that place now.”’ George concurs, places the Luger on the back of Lennie’s head, and shoots him. One of the most controversial aspects of George Steinbeck 's novel Of Mice and Men, was the death of Lennie by his friend’s hands. Many believe that George murdered him in Lennie’s best interest, yet many others believe that George was being selfish and with his act, removed the burden of Lennie.

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711 Words | 3 Pages

“She jerked her head sideways, and Lennie’s fingers closed on her hair and hung on. ´Let go, ´ she cried. ´You let go! ´… She struggled violently under his hands.

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424 Words | 2 Pages

Have you ever thought of killing your best friend? No, no one does, that person is supposed to be your everything. In Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, a main character gets killed by his best friend. George had no reason to kill Lennie. Lennie did not mean to kill them on purpose.

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406 Words | 2 Pages

George defends Lennie by saying, “He ain’t no cuckoo… He’s dumb as hell, but he ain’t crazy,” (Steinbeck 39). With George admitting he knows Lennie is not the most intelligent, but is completely sane, proves that he’s passionately speaking from his heart. Additionally, George has endangered his own life to keep Lennie safe many times in the past. Before arriving to the ranch in Soledad, Lennie and George was staying in a town named Weed.

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774 Words | 4 Pages

“‘So he reaches out to feel this red dress an’ the girl lets out a squawk, and that gets Lennie’s all mixed up, and he holds on ‘cause that’s the only thing he can think to do.’” When Lennie feels the girls red dress that once again creates a problem that results them in running away and trying to finding new work (Steinbeck 41). When they finally find a new job on the ranch, George tells Lennie to stay away from Curley’s wife because he knows she is trouble. ‘“Lennie said, “Well, I ain’t supposed to talk to you or nothing.”’ , “‘How’d you like not to talk to anybody?” Lennie said, “Well, I ain’t supposed to.

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654 Words | 3 Pages

What do you think it means to be intelligent? Being intelligent means having self-awareness and understanding, using logic and critical thinking, and having the ability to learn. This is shown in the novel by Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing, John Stienbecks novella, Of Mice and Men, and Richard Connell’s fictional short story, “The Most Dangerous Game”. In the book Where the Crawdads Sing, Kya uses her intelligence all throughout her life to survive on her own in the marsh.

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1358 Words | 6 Pages

He ain't gonna let me tend no rabbits.’ He moved his hand a little and her hoarse cry came out. Then Lennie grew angry. ‘Now don't,’ he said. ‘I don't want you to yell.

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1096 Words | 5 Pages

(Page 91). Lennie is unable to comprehend that he needs to let go of her hair; instead, he grabs it tighter and muffles Curley's wife's cry so he does not get in trouble. Lennie is unable to come up with solutions since all he focuses on is what shouldn't happen, which causes Curley's wife to die. Many, however, could argue that because of his mental impairment and lack of knowledge, it is not his fault. This is partially correct as George explicitly instructed Lennie to not interact with Curley's wife, yet Lennie disobeyed him, demonstrating his inability to grow and learn.

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402 Words | 2 Pages

In Of Mice and Men, written by John Steinbeck, some people think that George killing Lennie was the right thing to do. Others think that George should’ve tried to save him and run away. George made the correct decision to shoot Lennie because Lennie was a danger to society. Lennie had killed many animals, and then accidentally killed Curley’s wife. All the animals got killed because Lennie didn’t know his own strength.

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1469 Words | 6 Pages

George tries to defend Lennie after the rest of the ranch workers find out what he has done to Curley’s wife. He explains that Lennie cannot help getting himself into dreadful situations, but he has never done them on purpose. This quote ultimately proves that

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573 Words | 3 Pages

“But little Mouse, you are not alone,” is a quote from the poem by Robert Burns, To A Mouse. This quote directly relates to how some of men treat Lennie, Slim and George want to feel like Lennie’s companion. However, Curley feels very intimidated by Lennie because he is big and gets special treatment from the men. In chapter 3, Curley picks a fight with Lennie and instead of stopping Lennie from hurting Curley the men egg Lennie on, Lennie ends up breaking Curley’s hand. Crooks and Curley’s wife have another point of view on Lennie, both of them at different times try to show Lennie that George might not always be as faithful as he has been.

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605 Words | 3 Pages

Although described as a rather large man, Lennie’s role between the two men is very childlike. Lennie is treated like a child by George because Lennie does not have the maturity or mental capability to make decisions for himself. For example, George must continuously remind Lennie of the spot he must come to if in trouble because Lennie cannot focus long enough to process this information. Lennie is also fairly unintelligent and blindly loyal to George. This loyalty is seen when George tells Lennie to jump into a river, and Lennie obeys even though he is unable to swim.

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