Loneliness In Of Mice And Men

Loneliness affects many people in a deep psychological way that follows them through their lives. This is no different with many characters in George Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, which takes place in 1937, following two migrant workers, named George and Lennie, as they interact with people working on a ranch in Soledad, California. Loneliness is one of the most important themes in Of Mice and Men, as seen in the characters of Curley's’ wife, Candy, and Crooks.
Curley, the son of the ranch owner, has a wife that tends to anger the ranch workers by always popping into the bunkhouse and flirting with them. It isn’t until chapter five that Curley’s wife’s loneliness is actually expressed through her words to Lennie. “I get lonely...You can talk to people, but I can’t talk to nobody but Curley. Else he gets mad.” By saying this, she tells the readers a few things. The first is that she is, indeed, lonely and is looking for company. The second is about Curley’s controlling nature. It’s

In chapter four, when Lennie is coming in to visit with some of Slim’s puppies, one of which Slim gave to Lennie, Crooks vents to Lennie about how lonely he is. “ S'pose you didn't have nobody. S'pose you couldn't go into the bunkhouse and play rummy 'cause you was black. How'd you like that?” When Crooks says this to Lennie, it shows us several different things about his character. The first is that he is discriminated against because he’s black, and this creates a rift between him and the other ranch workers. The second is that he’s lonely because of this discrimination. Being discriminated against, and set aside in a barn to sleep instead of the rest, who sleep in a bunkhouse, causes him to have to spend nights and days alone for the most part. This causes him to get “sick,” as he puts it. This loneliness causes him to go a bit crazy, in other words. Still, his loneliness seems to affect him in much the same way as the other