"Of Mice and Men" Blog

In the book, Of Mice and Men, written by John Steinbeck there is various atmospheres included. The atmosphere of the ranch seems to be very negative and deals with a lot of bad moods from the people. Many people at the Ranch seem to have a problem with Lennie and George, mostly the boss and his son, Curley. For example, in the book it says, "We jus' come in,' said Lennie softly. Curley stared levelly at him. 'Well, nex' you answer when you're spoke to..." As you can see, Curley seems to have a very negative attitude towards Lennie even though he does not know much about him. The overall atmosphere is negative for the ranch.

The atmosphere for the bunkhouse is not very welcoming. It was very neutral, but a lot of negative energies were in this chapter. When Lennie and George first get to the bunkhouse, they were not very happy because George found a can that kills lice and bugs next to his bed, which made the place seemed very dirty. The atmosphere was positive because Lennie and George made a friend sort of, named Swamper or Candy, which seemed to be a nice guy. Also, they met Slim, who was also a very nice fella.  The bunkhouse sort of had a negative atmosphere though because of the negative energy that was given off by Curley, who was very happy to see Lennie and George and was starting trouble with them both. 

I believe that Curley's wife not having a name in the book is due to many reasons. I believe that the reason is because of her gender. I think it is because of her gender because during that time women weren't really important, I guess I can say, so they sort of just saw the women that were married as sort of the man's arm candy and nothing else, so there was no real importance to know their names because they were like property. The message that John Steinbeck could be trying to send by not giving her name is probably the message of how most women acted in that time and maybe how no one really bothered to known what their names were. He could also be trying to send the message that all women were seen as her husband's property since they were married and nothing else because in this chapter Slim and Curley's wife were flirting and once she heard that Curley was looking for her, she ran. Also, in the chapter, Curley comes looking for her since she was not in the house where she was suppose to be, so he was really mad, which shows that he is very protective over her like you would be of your property.