Of Mice and Men Essay:

     Of Mice and Men, written by John Steinbeck, shows the struggles and hardships that two migrant farm workers experienced during the Great Depression. The dream of owning their own farm keeps them going and lightens the load of their work while it also strengthens their friendship. The dream that Lennie and George had, although unlikely to be achieved, causes a friendship to grow and thus gives a meaning to life.
     Lennie and George have a mutual dependency on each other, but Lennie needs George more because he has a mental handicap and George needs to watch over him. For Example, when Lennie and George met their new boss, George told Lennie not to talk so the boss wouldn’t know how that Lennie is mentally disabled. Without George telling Lennie not to talk to their new boss Lennie might have showed how unintelligent he was and he might not have gotten the job. George is like a parent to Lennie and he shows his love not through the words he speaks to Lennie but through the way he cares for him. In addition, Lennie causes trouble wherever he goes without knowing it. They had to leave their old job because Lennie grabbed a girls dress. George likes having George around even though he says he would have it easy without him, George finds Lennie funny in some situations and George probably appreciates having a little responsibility in his life. Lennie and George have a special bond between each other that most grown men don’t have, because of this bond they believe they will achieve their dream.     
     When Lennie has to kill George he becomes the loneliest character in the book, this is because he knows how it feels to have a friend but now that he doesn’t he is even more depressed because he knows how it feels to not be lonely. For example, the other ranch hands have never felt anything else but loneliness so they are used to the feeling. Since Lennie used to have George he knows what it feels like to not be lonely. Not only has he lost his best friend but also his dream of owning their own farm. In addition, the loneliness that George faces might not have been causes if he would have watched over Lennie and not let him roam around free. George didn’t want to kill Lennie but he did it for his own good so Lennie wouldn’t be brutally murdered by Curley and the other ranch hands. George shows how much he loves Lennie in the last scene by forgiving Lennie for all the things he did wrong throughout the novel.
     Many of the people in this novel are very independent and when they get involved in relationships they usually don’t last because the ranch hands are used to living alone. They did not achieve their dream because of the ignorance of the people that they interacted with throughout the story. Their friendship would have kept on growing except the ranch hands didn’t understand Lennie’s condition therefore they wanted to kill him causing George to make the biggest decision of his life.