George And Lennie In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

In the book Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, there are two characters, George and Lennie. George is smart and Lennie is mentally slow. They are working on a ranch and their dream is to own a farm of their own one day. Lennie has been known for liking to pet soft things, and in multiple incidents, it has him gotten into some trouble. In Weed, a town not far from the ranch, Lennie got in trouble because of a petting incident. George had to step in and stop him. There is a man who works on the farm with George and Lennie named Curley. He is the boss’s son, and has a past with fighting. In the book, Lennie and Curley get into a fight, so they don’t necessarily see eye to eye. Curley has a wife who seems to flirt with the other workers on the farm, but really

They were discussing the death of Curley’s wife and how Lennie could have killed her. George says “ Couldn’ we maybe bring him in an’ they’ll lock him up?” (95) This shows that he sincerely didn’t want to have hurt him, but in the end he had to kill him because if he didn’t Curley would have hurt him much worse. George shot Lennie in the back of the head, which was painless and fast. If Curley got his hands on Lennie, he might have been shot in a different part of his body, which would lead to a slow painful death. George knew shooting Lennie where he did, was the best thing for Lennie, and that’s what friends do. George knew that if he didn’t kill him then he would end up suffering and he didn’t want to put his best friend through that. Earlier in the book, Candy had an old dog and Carlson shot it because it was suffering and blind and deaf. After Carlson had shot the him, Candy wished he would have done it. He wanted to be there until the very end to show his loyalty and respect for this dog. George felt the same way as Candy, he didn’t want to feel guilty, for not doing something about it, if Lennie was killed by someone