Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

605 Words2 Pages

In Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck portrays a somewhat ordinary life of land workers on a ranch. The novel mainly chronicles the lives of its two protagonists, Lennie and George, over the course of a couple of months. In this passage, located in the last pages of the book, Steinbeck focuses on Lennie’s befriending and then killing Curley's wife, the spouse of the boss's son. The passage also focuses on the conditions before and after the murder and how it dramatizes the events. In this passage Steinbeck controls the atmosphere in the barn before and after the killing of Curley’s wife using silence and contrast between the action in the barn and the action outside. Steinbeck illustrates the dark and quiet barn where Curley’s wife is killed and puts it into contrast with the bright and loud outdoors using conflicting imagery. Curley’s wife first alludes to what the men are doing outside when she walks into the barn: “All the guys got a horseshoe tenement outside.” (page 120) The presence of the outside world is echoed throughout the passage to prevail a sense of doom. Periodically, Ste...

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