Lennie's Death In Of Mice And Men

The novel Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck, tells the story of two migrant workers during the great depression. Lennie and George are like many other workers during the 30's, except Lennie is mentally handicapped, which causes many problems for the duo. When things turn for the worst, George killing Lennie was the best thing he could do. Lennie wasn't able to react to the situations he was in, he had incredible strength that he couldn't control which made him dangerous and George pulling the trigger was the only way to give him a painless death with no regret.
Lennie's lack of self-control and reaction to his surroundings was one of the first things to get him in trouble. In Weed, he reached out and grabbed a woman's dress. "'So he reaches out to feel this red dress an' the girl lets out a squawk, and that gets Lennie all mixed up, and he holds on 'cause that's the only thing he can think to do'” (41). The incident in Weed was a prime example of Lennie not being able to react to situations and causing problems. The fact that it happened more than once makes it worse.

Now that there had been a serious casualty, Lennie's problems couldn't be ignored. Curly took the rest of the farm hands with him on the quest to kill Lennie. "'I'm gonna shoot the guts outta that big bastard myself, even if I only got one hand" (98). There was no way to escape from those men. With Curly's wife's blood on his hands, Lennie would die at the hands of Curly, but George killed him quickly and painlessly. Along with that, George wanted to be able to live with no regrets. In the parallel situation, when Candy's dog was killed, Candy wasn't the one to kill his companion and felt immense regret. With George killing Lennie, he was able to ensure that it was painless and didn't scare Lennie before he died. After the gun was shot, this was the best thing for