Of Mice And Men Final Blog Post

The ending of "Of Mice and Men" saddened me a lot. Lennie was by far the character I liked to the most. He added humour and sadness into the book. I think George did the right thing in killing Lennie. Lennie would only cause himself and the others around him more pain. The thing that justified George's choice to kill Lennie was that he wanted Lennie to be happy when he died. If he had let Curley shoot him, Lennie's last few moments would have been terrible. Even if Lennie was simply put in jail, he still wouldn't have been happy. Curley would have made sure Lennie was miserable in jail. People would have laughed at him and hurt him. George killed Lennie out of love.

I think the ending was perfect for the way Steinbeck set it up. The foreshadowing from the death of Candy's dog, the death of Lennie's pup, and the other various hints in the book. It made the ending of the book a surprise, but not a huge shock. I didn't disike anything about the ending. If Lennie and George ran off together or if Lennie ran off on his own, the book wouldn't have sent such a powerful message. The way Steinbeck ended it was the best way to end it.

The main message Steinbeck was sending was of the impossibility of the american dream. This ties in directly with the time the book was written. In the 30s, people had these fantasies similar to George and Lennie's. The book shows the desperation of migrant farmers at the time. When Candy hears about the plan, he immediately jumps on board it shows the desperation of the farmers. Even Crooks is enticed by the plan to work on a farm with no boss. Steinback writes a book based on reality, not fiction. The story may be fictional but the messages he sends are powerful in real life.

Steinbeck was also sending a message about the similarities between animals and humans. The comparisons of Lennie to a bear, the squawking of Curley's wife, and the other various examples sent the point that humans aren't much different from animals. It showed that "Even the best laid schemes of mice and men often go awry."

In the poem "To a Mouse" a mouse's plans to live in a home for the winter is ruined by a plow. This shows that even though the mouse thought he was safe for the winter, life throws curve balls and the next moment he was out in the cold. The book is called Of Mice And Men because Steinback wanted to tie in the poem To a Mouse to his book. He wanted to tie it in to prove his point that humans aren't so different from mice.