What Are The Similarities Between Of Mice And Men

Setting is an important piece of every well written literary work weather it be a play like The Importance of Being Earnest or a novel such as Of Mice and Men for example; In both plays, The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde and the novel Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, the author presents an rural setting and untruthful characters in order to show the significance of how a setting can affect the characters and the overall theme of a literary work; ultimately illustrating that the physical place you are in life plays a big role in how you develop as a human being. The rural setting plays a major significance in both works, the farm in Soledad California found in Of Mice and Men shows how much different life

Through his use of a rural setting in his play the reader can see that to be considered high class you would have to have a house in the country. This is different from Of Mice and Men as Steinbeck used the rural setting to show how people can make a living and Wilde uses it as a symbol to be accepted in the Victorian age. But both text rely on the significance of the rural country setting to get their point across. Jack one of the main characters in The Importance of Being Earnest says “I have a country house with some land, of course, attached to it, about fifteen hundred acres, I believe; but I don’t depend on that for my real income” he is using his rural country land to prove to Lady Bracknell (another character in the play) that he is worthy enough to be able to marry her daughter. This use of his land to marry her daughter shows how significant it was to have land in the country you needed it for approval in that time period, much like George and Lennies use of the land to have a life and a home. Both authors show this because of how important the rural land of the world can affect everyone’s life no matter what social standard or class you may be

In Of Mice and Men, George has to lie in order to keep Lennie out of trouble for instance in the beginning when they are just headed out to the farm George is not letting Lennie talk in order to hide his disability and lies about why he isn’t talking by saying "Oh! I ain’t saying he’s bright. He ain’t, But I say he’s a God damn good worker”. Steinbeck is have George lie to help them be able to get the job on the farm so they can make a living. Having George lie in the story shows what type of situations they faced in the country. The farm owners needed workers who a reliable and able to follow directions, Lennie was a good worker but struggled with listening because of his disability. Therefore George lied for their benefit in order to secure the job so they could live, similarly in The Importance of Being Earnest Wilde wrote Jack as a character who lies about his name in the country for his own benefit so he could be accepted by women he desired in the play. Steinbecks use of the untruthful characters makes for a great story on what you may have to do or encounter in your life to be able to be accepted in a certain