Use Of Foreshadowing In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

If someone likes to kill things, don’t let them touch your hair.

Books often use foreshadowing to hint at a large event that happens later in the book. In the novel, Lennie accidentally kills several small animals. Lennie is too strong for his mind and accidentally uses his strength to kill the animals. All that Lennie wanted was to feel the animals soft fur, but ends up doing terrible things. At the end of the book the same thing happens with Curley’s wife, and ultimately Lennie. In the book Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, Lennie kills a series of animals, foreshadowing the death of Curley’s wife. The first grim sign occurred early in the novel. The two friends are just arriving at their camp by the river, and George notices something strange in

Although Lennie has been instructed by George not to talk to her, he strikes up a conversation with Curley’s wife while the other men are playing horseshoes. As the conversation progresses, Curley’s wife offers for Lennie to feel how soft her hair is. At first Lennie is hesitant but in the end he can not resist. He enjoys feeling her soft hair, just as he did the mice and his puppy. When he does not let go when she asks, she begins to yell for help. At the possibility of not being able to tend the rabbits, Lennie becomes upset. Steinbeck writes “He shook her then, and he was angry with her.” (91). This detail is important because that same anger is present that he showed to his puppy for dying. In both cases instead of feeling sorry for scaring or killing them, he is angry at them because of it. Finally, Lennie’s strength is too great for him. Steinbeck writes “And then she was still, for Lennie had broken her neck.”(91). Just like the mice that he squeezed too hard, and the puppy he shook too harshly, Lennie’s strength had gotten the best of him. Although he never intended to kill anything, he could not contain his own