Loneliness Never Shows Have you ever felt lonely inside and you were the only one to know it? Well you’re not the only one. In the book Of Mice and Men, I believe that John Steinbeck is trying to show that everyone has a loneliness inside them that they don’t always show. Some things that might actually make you lonely is losing someone or something you love, kind of like Candy’s situations. Candy is known in the book Of Mice and Men to be a tall, stoop shouldered old man. Walking around with his old dog that he considered his best friend. On page 45 it said, Candy looked unhappily. “No,” he said softly. “No I couldn’ do that. I had ‘im too long.”In this part of the book, Carlson was asking Candy if he can shoot his dog since to Carlson, …show more content…
Living alone in a barn with several horses. In the book of Mice and Men it showed a lot of items Crooks owned, each item having its own meaning. On page 67 it said, Crooks possessed several pairs of shoes, a pair or rubber boots, a big alarm and a single barreled shotgun. And he had books, too; a tattered dictionary and mauled copy of the california civil code for 1905. There were battered magazines and a few dirty books on a special shelf over his bunk. Crooks had a lot of possessions that showed how lonely he was, like for example, Crooks owned an alarm clock so he could wake up on time for work every day. Unlike Crooks being alone, the other men have their bunkmates to wake them up when it was work time. Also Crooks owning dirty books for entertainment since he doesn’t go to the lady’s house with the other men. Crooks acts like he is tough in front of the other men to earn their respect, but he actually just wants a friend, just like Curley’s …show more content…
But nobody knew the true side of Curley’s wife. On page 88 Curley’s wife says to Lennie, “What kinda harm am I doin’ to you? Seems like they ain’t none of them cares how I gotta live. I tell you I ain’t used to livin’ like this. I coulda made somethin’ of myself. Curley’s wife would go around the ranch trying to talk to the other men, but is usually shut down since she is Curley’s wife. All Curley’s wife wanted was a friend that she could talk to. She also couldn’t talk to Curley during the day since he was working all day. Curley’s wife just wanted to be in shows and in movies, but she just ended up being married to someone she didn’t even want to be with. While Curley’s wife was known on the ranch to sneak around with other men, people didn’t know that she was only lonely and was only looking for someone to talk
“You seen what they did to my dog tonight? They say he wasn’t good to himself, nor anyone else. When they can me here I wish somebody’d shoot me - Candy”. This quote shows how Candy was so lonely that he would rather want someone to kill himself instead of his dog because without his dog, he is now even more lonely. He is more lonelier than when he was before because before he was just old and he had his dog with him....
Curley’s Wife was probably one of the loneliest characters of all. She never talked to anyone and she never really liked Curley all too much. “Why can’t I talk to you? I never get to talk to nobody. I get awful lonely.” (p.86) Curley’s Wife seems to get a lot of the other guys in trouble. Curley always suspects that she’s fooling around with the other men, “Any you guys seen my wife?” (p.53) Curley’s Wife always gives an excuse to confront the guys saying, “Any you guys seen Curley?” Then she tries to hang around and make conversation. The guy’s see her as a tramp and a troublemaker but all she wants is someone to talk too.
Mother Theresa once said, "Loneliness is a man's worst poverty." Without friends and companions, people begin to suffer from loneliness and solitude (Dusenbury 38). Loneliness is an inevitable fact of life and cannot be avoided, as shown prevalent through each of the characters in John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men. Each and every character in this novel exhibits loneliness. Lennie was isolated for being mentally handicapped, Candy was isolated for being old and disabled, Crooks was for being black, Curley's wife for being a woman, and George for having to care for Lennie and being unable to socialize with others because of Lennie's consistency of getting into trouble from town to town.
Loneliness is the central theme in the novel Of Mice and Men. Many of the characters show signs of being lonely, some more than others. Loneliness haunts Crooks deep inside. Crooks accepts things the way they are though. Crooks does not talk to the other men and they do not talk to him. This causes the greatest amount of loneliness in Crooks out of all the characters. Rejection can cause most people to become crazy, as it
The theme of loneliness is important to the meaning of Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck, and the side characters of the novella feel loneliness just as much as the main characters. Crooks has been lonely for a long time, and his secluded nature starts to show. Curley’s Wife is lonely as well because of her feminine nature and marriage with Curley. Loneliness is also evident in Candy, and just as he thinks he has found a home, all his hope of companionship is ripped away. Crooks, Curley’s Wife, and Candy are not like the other characters of this book. All three of them have some feature that sets them apart from the others. Crooks is African American, Curley’s Wife is a woman, and Candy lost his hand. These traits have separated these characters
“‘A guy goes nuts if he ain’t got nobody. Don’t make no difference who the guy is… I tell ya a guy gets too lonely an’ he gets sick,” (Steinbeck 73). In this statement, Crooks, a character in John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, divulges what effect loneliness can have on a human being. In the novel, the two main characters escape to a ranch where they must face the conflict that seems to follow them. Set in the 1930s during the Great Depression, Steinbeck brilliantly portrays the loneliness and suspicion that was common during the time. Much like in everyday life, we can see the way in which loneliness drives people to become isolated, crave companionship, and refuse to express emotion.
Like the other characters Candy's dream was stolen from him. Candy's character was lonely because he needed human contact but his only companion was his dog which was killed. Loneliness affected many characters in John Steinbecks novel, Of Mice and Men. Crooks, Curley's wife and Candy were affected the most by this loneliness because none of them had a real companion and all of them had dreams which were shattered.
Mother Teresa has once said, “Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.” Loneliness is sadness because one has no friends or company or the quality of being unfrequented and remote. This quote relates to the theme of loneliness as portrayed by the characters in Steinbeck’s novel, Of Mice and Men. Although some view George and Lennie as victims of loneliness, Steinbeck suggests that they are Crooks and Curley’s wife because they both suffer from isolation.
Candy is a one-handed swamper that also gets ignored and discriminated like Crooks. Candy used to be a strong young man that was productive, but now Candy is left aging on the ranch with only one hand due to a machinery accident on the ranch. The other ranch hands disrespect Candy due to his physical handicaps and age. The only thing that really cheers up Candy is Candy’s dog. Candy’s dog is like a parallel version of Candy because of their many similarities like physical disabilities and age. The only thing that has a special place in Candy’s heart is Candy’s dog, and eventually, Carlson gets so annoyed by the dog Carlson shoots Candy’s dog in the back of the head, killing it. The quick and horrid death to Candy’s dog made Candy realize that he is going to share the same fate as his dog. Looking back on Candy’s life one can conclude that Candy is in a dissatisfied state about his life, given that Candy’s days of working are over and the only thing he loved is
Of Mice and Men, written by John Steinbeck, is a book that can be analyzed and broken down into a vast majority of themes. One of the predominant themes found in this book is loneliness. Many characters in this book are affected by loneliness and they all demonstrate it in one way or another throughout the book. Examples of these characters are Curley’s Wife, Crooks, and Candy.
In his novel Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck depicts the essential loneliness of California ranch life in the 1930s. He illustrates how people are driven to find companionship. There were so many moments of loneliness and sadness throughout the novel, including many deaths. Following the deaths, they were very unexpected making the novel more intense and latch onto it more.
Every human needs a friendship in their lives. Friendships help to prevent loneliness, and without them, people don’t live their best lives. Having no friendships forces people to keep their feelings inside. Many characters in Of Mice and Men, such as Candy, Crooks, and Curley’s wife, don’t have friendships in this novel. In John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, characters such as Crooks, Candy, and Curley's wife show that lack of friendship can make a lonely person because they can't share their feelings.
Loneliness is the sadness resulting from being forsaken or abandoned. John Steinbeck brought up the theme of loneliness in many characters in Of Mice and Men. Crooks, Curley?s wife, and Candy expressed the theme of loneliness in many different forms throughout the story. Early in the novella George said, life working as ranch hands is about the loneliness of living, for these people finding friendship seems to be impossible. Crooks expressed feelings of loneliness throughout Of Mice and Men.
... love and affection that she desires. This makes her seek it from other people. By not talking to anyone and constantly worrying about what Curley will do, she has attained a sneakiness that does not please anyone on the ranch. Acting in flirtatious ways is the only way Curley's Wife thinks she can deal with her loneliness.
Everyone’s felt like an outsider at some point in their lives. Because they are different in one way or another. That is why John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men is an easy story to empathize with. It tells the story of two men, George Milton and Lennie Small. Having found work on a ranch, they form friendships with other men there, try to keep out of trouble until they receive their pay at the end of the month and work towards bringing their dream of owning and working their own piece of land into reality. Several characters including Candy, Lennie, Crooks and Curley’s wife are the outcasts of this story. Which in turn also makes them the most relatable. Steinbeck,through the story of Crooks and Curley’s wife,explains the relationship between the causes of loneliness, how it affects characters who suffer from it and how they strive for acceptance from or with other characters.