Relationships In Of Mice And Men

“Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck was a very worldwide known book back in the 1930s. The story revolves around two migrant workers George Milton and Lennie Small, who share a brotherly relationship. Even though their relationship was the main one in this book, the characters also share relationships both good and bad with the other characters in this book. The other common relationships were: George and Candy,George and Slim, Lennie and Curley,and Lennie and Crooks. One of the themes of the book is the predatory nature of human existence, and Steinbeck did an excellent job showcasing it in this novella. George had a few relationships throughout this novella with: of course Lennie, Slim, Candy, and Curley. George and Lennie’s relationship

He had a relationship with both Crooks and Curley. Crooks had befriended Lennie when Lennie had visited Crooks. They had a conversation and Crooks was asking him what he would do if George went and started a life for himself. Crooks saw that it had bothered Lennie so he reassured him George wasn’t going to leave “I didn’t mean to scare you. He’ll come back. I was talkin’ about myself,” (pg.73). Like George, Curley was also had a rocky relationship with Lennie as well. Lennie got the worst of it because Curley absolutely despised Lennie and ended up fighting him “Come on you big bastard. Get up on your feet. No big son-of-a-b###h is gonna laugh at me,” (pg 62). The relationships between the men in this book is an example of the predatory nature of human existence. Each of the men had a diverse problem that they were handling on their own and using diverse coping mechanisms. They also had admitted to have a profound sense of isolation and/or loneliness. An example of this is Lennie, he wasn’t like the others so he was the odd one out. His coping mechanism was petting or feeling soft things, like mice “what do you want of a dead mouse,”(George) “I could pet it while we walked along,” (Lennie) (pg