How Unhappy Are The Characters In Of Mice And Men

Essay by EssaySwap ContributorHigh School, 11th grade February 2008

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Do You Think That Every Character in 'Of Mice and Men' is Unhappy, are some Unhappier than others? John Steinbeck wrote 'Of Mice And Men' in 1937. It is based on two men, George and Lennie, who travelled from ranch to ranch. George is a small and fairly intelligent man while Lennie is a large man of very little intelligence. They had travelled together for a long time. The story 'Of Mice And Men' is set in 1930's America. During this period of time there was a depression in America. Unemployment was high, so men moved from ranch to ranch looking for work, never staying in one place long enough to firm any real relationships, so this was a very lonely and unhappy existence. John Steinbeck uses a fairly descriptive style of writing for the ranch, and this adds a touch of realism to the story.

The characters and places he creates seem real, and he uses real places to mark the general area that the story is set in, the Salinas River, for example.

There are two characters that seem to be reasonably happy throughout the story they are whit and Carlson. This may be because we don't hear about them often, Steinbeck puts across that they are happy, as they do not have any idea of what is actually going on around them, as shown after George shoots Lennie and Carlson remarks 'now what the hell ya suppose is eatin' them two guys?' Whit and Carlson also seem to enjoy their job and don't complain about it. These two characters don't seem to understand what a friend is, shown on pages 74 to 75 when Carlson shoots Candy's only friend in his life, his dog. Carlson doesn't appear to see what causes candy so...