In the book Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, Steinbeck portrays Lennie as an innocent man with childish tendencies. However, Lennie shows some streaks of violence at certain points in the novel. Despite Lennie’s innocence, he can also be violent. Many of his violent behaviour stems from his ignorance of his own strength, leading to many mice, a puppy, and even a human being dead. Lennie’s mental disability makes him very childish and quite innocent. His mental disability shields hims from the harsh reality of life for the migrant worker. Lennie’s innocence protects Lennie from the actions of what he has done. Instead George has to do the cleaning up. But Lennie’s innocence is no help in protecting people and animals around him. Some things that Lennie does is innocent. His love for soft things such as fur, hair, and clothing is like what kids love. When George throws Lennie’s dead mouse away, Lennie goes looking for it and ends up crying. Lennie imitates what George does like a kid imitates his or her parents. Lennie isn’t able to do simple tasks like carry his own workcard. Lennie’s awe for pretty women is quite childlike, drooling over Curley’s Wife. These things make Lennie seem very innocent. Even how Lennie deals with his own actions seem very meaningless and innocent. The way Lennie sits idly as George cleans Lennie’s wounds and how Lennie expresses “he didn’t mean no harm” after the fight is innocent. Lennie asks the puppy after killing it, why it had to die as if the puppy were to magically come back to life. However despite this innocence Lennie shows violent streaks. One of many ways Lennie is violent is when his dream of tending the rabbits is jeopardized. The dream of tending rabbits in itself is innocent, but th... ... middle of paper ... ...ie not knowing what to do is innocent and his intentions were good, but his actions and unknowingness leads to others getting hurt. Lennie is portrayed as an innocent man with violent tendencies. His childish character makes him innocent. With his ignorance and understanding of only basic things make him innocent. But with such ignorance comes a bad side. His ignorance of his brute strength, his inability to know to be gentle, his inability to stop once he starts, when those he loves are in harm’s way, and when his desires are in jeopardy, lead Lennie to do violent deeds. Lennie’s mental capacity is not fit for the lifestyles that he is living, even though his strength is. He could do good work with his strength but his ignorance leads to the misuse of his strength for violence and murder. In the end, Lennie’s ‘violence’ ends with his death. Word Count: 1000
Although Lennie was unattractive and has the tendency of accidental violence, compassion was still something readers had for him. Steinbeck constantly reminded us that he has a mental disability which automatically makes someone feel pity for him. Additionally he was ignored and made fun of by other characters, “Blubberin’ like a baby! Jesus Christ! A big guy like you”(Steinbeck 10). Him getting in trouble was beyond his control because of his mental disability which is something else that makes a reader feel sympathetic for him. Also, the readers are solicitous towards Lennie because of how much he looks up to George. This is portrayed when Crooks asks Lennie what he would do if George never came back, “Well, s’pose, jus’ s’pose he don’t come back. What’ll you do then?”(Steinbeck 70). Because of his inability to comprehend information, he got extremely defensive and said, “George is careful. He won’t get hurt” (Steinbeck 70). This scene is crafted in such a way that it automatically
Lennie has always been told what to do by George. George really helps him through problems that keep happening during the book. Lennie is incapable to live because he does not know his strength and George has to play the role as a living assistant for Lennie. Lennie does not mean to harm but because of his condition he essentially harms people. In the book it explains the
Lennie had a soft spot for petting animals and soft things. He is totally oblivious to the fact that he hurts almost every thing he touches. He had pet mice and ended up killing them and when he played with the 'pup' he ended up killing it too. His uncontrolled strength also caused him to kill Curley's wife. "Lennie's fingers fell to stroking her hair... he stroked harder... "Let go!" she cried... She struggled violently... and then she was still; for Lennie had broken her neck." (Page 91). With the death of Curley's wife, Lennie's innocence was taken. He had unwillingly killed. He had to pay the price, by losing his life.
Lennie is depicted in a very childlike manner throughout Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck. Accordingly, he acts in a manner that is persistent with a child in that his motivations precisely lead to his actions. He does not act in a pure sense of dishonesty, reflective of the purity that is peculiar to someone who is like a kid at heart.
Due to child like qualities, Lennie is a person which would be easy prey and a vulnerable person. Lennie is a vulnerable person who is quite dumb. His has an obsession for touching soft thing and this will often lead him in to trouble. But poor Lennie is an innocent person who means no harm to anybody. When he and Curley get into a fight Lennie is too shocked to do any thing. He tries to be innocent but, when told to by George grabs Curley’s fist and crushes it. George is Lennie’s best friend and Lennie does every thing he tells him to do as demonstrated in the fight with “But you tol...
If someone’s actions are truly innocent, why must someone kill him? Lennie has never done something to inflict pain everything has been unintentional. Lennie was a strong young man, but with a mental illness. Lennie made multiple mistakes, he was murdered and it affected a lot of people including the killer.
Lennie’s illness was seen as common and nothing to take concern over, which pertains to the vague yet soft sympathy from George whom “babysits” Lennie. George was an older brother to Lennie in a sense, helping him to get through life without any mishaps. However for George, Lennie’s illness determined their income and job status. In several incidences, Lennie overreacted in certain situations causing them to lose or leave their job spontaneously. At different points in the book, George became frustrated with Lennie: “You can't keep a job and you lose me ever' job I get. Jus' keep me shovin' all over the country all the time. An' that ain't the worst. You get in trouble. You do bad things and I got to get you out” (Steinbeck 12). This showed the overall frustration yet compassion towards Lennie, however extreme concern. According to Lennie, when he killed the puppy he said: “Why do you got to get killed, you ain’t as little as mice I didn’t bounce you hard” (Steinbeck 85). This really brought out the fact that Lennie’s illness was not to be tempered with, as he really couldn’t ever contemplate the harsh, unintentional things he’s done. When George and Lennie arrive at their new job, tension rises in the book and the author brings out that possible aspect of Lennie unintentionally doing something wrong which in turn would cause them to lose their job--or
... killing the only friend he had and was someone who he had promised to protect, but he still believed he had to do this. Lennie did not have a chance to stand up for what he had done, society in the 1930’s was different from us today. People did not receive the chance to stand up for what they did and receive the actions of punishment, they would just be shot on the spot or taken and hung. This was the major mercy killing in the book and was foreshadowed by each of the other killings Lennie committed.
Crooks, Curley’s wife, and most defiantly Lennie are the outcasts on the ranch. The novel presents Lennie as a mentally challenged, but an unusually strong worker who travels with his friend George. George takes care of Lennie as if he was his own child and Lennie cares for George the same way. “I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you” (14). Lennie describes how he cares for George although he honestly just messes everything up for George. Lennie has the mind of a child and does not understand how to act and be an adult. Lennie continues to pet dead mice, feel shiny and smooth objects, and not know how to interact with other people. From time to time, George continues to care and try to make improvements with Lennie, but it just does not happen. Lennie continues to have the mind of a child and can never distinguish the different between right and wrong. Throughout the novel; from being a mentally challenged; tall, muscular man; Lennie is most definitely an outcast in the story Of Mice and Men.
In the beginning he was forgetful and made many mistakes and by the end he was about the same. Throughout the entire book Lennie doesn’t learn from his mistakes as he keeps getting in trouble. At the beginning of the book, he was forgetful and he continues not to remember anything as the story goes on, this got him into trouble multiple times throughout the book. Sometimes he doesn’t even know what to do on his own. An example of this was when Curley was punching him, he needed instructions on what to do. Lennie never grows throughout the book, and this affects him because he needed to change for the better to begin with and he didn’t which lead him to many
Lennie accidentally killing all of his pets establishes that the theme of this novel is death and loss. These pets consist of mice, dogs, kittens, etc. Lennie loves to feel and pet animals, but he does not know his own strength. He kills them without really noticing what he has done, until George tells him that he did something wrong. After being scolded, Lennie is very remorseful about what he did. Once, after being yelled at Lennie says, “I pinched their heads a little and then they was dead- because they were so little (13).” Lennie’s remorse is probably more for upsetting George than it is for actually killing the animal.
With his disability, he needs something to feel connected to. He loves to pet furry and soft things. In chapter one in “Of Mice and Men”, Lennie and George are walking along a dirt road, on there way to a ranch. George discovers Lennie playing with something in his pocket. Lennie states to George before the dead mouse was taken away. ““ I could pet it with my thumb while we walked along”” (Steinbeck 6) . In order to prove that Lennie is not smart enough to fulfill the American Dream, Steinbeck creates Lennie to seem as not normal as possible. Steinbeck places Lennie in a state, where he does not understand right from wrong. He does not know nor understand, that playing with a deceased critter is not only gross but unacceptable as a
Since the beginning of the book, Steinbeck characterizes Lennie as a man who sees the world through the perspective of a child, as if it is a dream. Lennie is a big guy, but he acts like a baby. In the beginning of the story, after George threw the dead mouse Lennie was petting, Lennie was “…‘Blubberin’ like a baby!” (9). This juvenile action demonstrates Lennie’s immaturity and childish
In the Salinas River Valley, after the Great Depression, there were a large number of unemployed workers seeking jobs. In the fiction novel "Of Mice and Men," by John Steinbeck, Lennie Small is among one of those men. Lennie and his friend George both have just received jobs on a ranch as farm workers. What brings the two together is their dream to someday own their own land. Lennie has a lot of character and personality traits that define him. One trait that he has is he is very forgetful. Another trait he has is he is very curious. A final trait he has is that he is very reliant. Although he might not be the intelligent person in the book, he has a very well developed personality. Lennie demonstrates his personality and character traits throughout the novel.
Lennie apologized to George for killing the mice; he told him that the reason for killing the mice was because “they bit my[Lennie’s] fingers” but he only “pinched their heads a little”(Steinbeck 10). Lennie’s guilt drives him to apologize about the mice but he appears to underestimate his own strength because he claimed that he vaguely pinched their heads, but Lennie being a vast man, that couldn't have been the case. He didn't know the consequences of pinching the mice even after he had done it so many times. This shows the lack of perception he holds, meaning he can't become cognizant of the things happening around him on his own, causing the reader to initiate sympathy for Lennie. Lennie’s immaturity is so big it can be misunderstood for cleverness. George sharply asks Lennie to give him the object from his pocket but he claims “ I ain't got nothin’”but later on admits he has a dead mouse but [George] insists to “ have it”,but George insisted to have the mouse then he “slowly obeyed”(Steinbeck 5-6). It appears as if Lennie was being clever but by handing the mice to George, his childish behavior is revealed. His ingenuous acts portray identically to a child influencing the reader to gain sensitivity to the way Lennie is treated. The way Lennie understands the world and process thoughts makes him mentally stable, for a child. Not only is he innocent but he is also ironically characterized.