Comparing Cat And Rat: The Legend Of The Chinese Zodiac

“Of Mice and Men,” a novel written by John Steinbeck, and “To a Mouse,” a poem written by Robert Burns, are similar not just by coincidence. Though 152 years apart in age, evidence of the poem’s influence is easily seen in Steinbeck’s work. The most notable influence is the title, of course, which is directly taken from a quote in the poem. Though this instance is quite apparent, the influence doesn’t stop there. “Of Mice and Men” and “To a Mouse” have several similar thematic structures, including characters, plot similarities, and setting.

There is a lot of symbolism in this story, for instance, mice represented a false hope of a safe place for Lennie. Also, the first mouse you encounter in the story is dead. Which

The 1785 poem To a Mouse by Robert Burns inspired the title of John Steinbeck’s 1937 novella Of Mice and Men. These two texts carry common theme, allowing clear similarities to be drawn between them.

One of these is the connection between the inevitable violence in the story and the inevitability of the oncoming winter in the poem ("Explanation: To a Mouse”). There is also a connection between Lennie and the mouse, and George to the speaker. The speaker says, “Still thou art blessed,/ compared with me!/ The present only touches thee,/ But, oh, I backward cast my eye/ On prospects drear,/ And forward, though I cannot see,/ I guess and fear” (Burns). The mouse is not able to look back and mourn past failures as the man does, and instead moves right on to the next dream. The mouse in the embodiment of childlike innocence. Lennie, being both mentally deficient and by the end of the story, dead, is not able to look back or critically analyze future events, just like the mouse.. But George, just like the man, will always be haunted the events of the story. It is implied that his, and the others who shared the dream’s ability to dream big again will never be the

John Steinbeck, the author of the novel Of Mice and Men, wrote this Nobel Prize winning novel to ‘challenge his readers sense of values and morals and also to increase their awareness of the horrible things that people are capable of doing’ (John Pinder, Wiki Answers [online, accessed 14th March 2010], http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Why_did_steinbeck_write_ 'Of_mice_and_men '). Steinbeck has enhanced the plot and characters in the novel through clever use of animal imagery foreshadowing certain events and giving further insight into many of the characters.

Have you ever been to a Chinese restaurant that handed you a paper with a bunch of random animals and years on it? Most people will just throw it away and not pay that much attention to it. That little piece of paper contains a basic information about the Chinese Zodiac just enough to get you hooked. There are many people all over the world that very much believe in the ancient Chinese Zodiac. The Chinese Zodiac can be helpful for finding the current Chinese year, what animal people are, and can help make decisions.

There are different types of conflict, the conflict such as Man .vs. Nature, Man.vs. Man, and Person .vs. Self these types of conflicts show the struggle people have to go succeed a goal, dream or just to survive. In the poem “Ode to a Mouse” by Robert Burns and the novel Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, both authors use the literary element, Conflict to show the struggles of the characters.

Anna writes through poem that this act is unjust and should not happen to such a creature. Through the use of the poem she tries to tell the scientist “Beware, lest in the worm you crush, a brother's soul you find.” (Barbauld, l.35-36) Barbauld relates that killing a mouse is not morally different from taking the life of a fellow man. The poems theme is effective and pushes the reader to feel sorrow for the poor mouse. In “To a Mouse” by Robert Burns, the ongoing themes are guilt and fear. Burns knows what mice are up to, stealing his food from his crops and ruining his walls within his home to make homes of their own. Burns however, does not care because he himself feels guilty for the little mice. Burns feels like even though they may be a nuisance to some humans, the mice have no choice but to do these things to live to see another day. “I doubt na, whiles, but thou may thieve; What then? Poor beastie, thou maun live!” (Burns l.13-14) Burns explains why he is not bothered that the mice steal his food. Burns also has the theme of fear in his poem. The mice fear men, and for good reason, Burns is aware of this and makes minimal effort to scare the mice while they are at work. “An’ justifies that ill opinion which makes thee startle,” (Burns, l.9-10) Burns discusses how the fear mice have for men is due to the brutes who have no patience to understand what the mice go through. While the two poems have different themes, one

Like many ancient traditions, the origins of Chinese New Year are rooted in legend. The ancient legend of this holiday says that thousands of years ago, an evil monster named Nian, roughly translated as "year", would come and kill villagers, their children, and destroy the village (Chinese New Year). One year an old man came to the town and he set up red papers and firecrackers in an attempt to get revenge on the Nian, his actions scared the Nian away and spared the town from destruction. From this encounter, the Chinese learned that the Nian was afraid of the color red and loud noises (Chinese New Year). This ancient legend became the foundation of Chinese New Year as people began to hang red lanterns, wear red clothes, and light

The relationship itself helps Cleary drive the point home. Why exactly is it mouse? Is it because a mouse is small enough to ride a motorcycle? Then why not a hamster? A squirrel? Cleary uses a mouse due to its “fiend nature”. Man has given mice a tarnished reputation. This then should make it tough for a friendship to develop between the two. Cleary demonstrates that friendships can develop from the weirdest of pairs. Not many would consider a mouse as a

And in constructing the novella this way Steinbeck wants to draw the reader’s attention to what he sees as certain urgent and widespread social problems.” (Attell 3). Attell is trying to say that Steinbeck is using side characters in the book to describe other problems of the Great Depression. Crooks represents the racial problem in California showing that Steinbeck is saying that racism was a problem. Curley’s wife represents how people were affected by the social conventions and practices by how she was treated by her mother and her marriage to Curley. According the Attell Steinbeck not only disliked the way workers. But also racism and the effect social conventions and practices had on people. Attell is correct a third time on evaluating Steinbeck’s purpose on writing Of Mice and

“The Mouse” is a short story written by H.H Munro. The main characters are Theodoric, the mouse, and the blind lady. The author Munro writes the story in third person and uses an omniscient view. The setting of the story takes part in the vicarage, the stable, and the ends in train compartment. The tone used by the author to engage his readers is an exciting, thrilling fast paced tone that bring the characters to life. To strengthen the thrilling exciting tone, the author uses phrases such as: “he was not even alone in his own clothes. “A warm, creeping movement over his flesh betrayed the unwelcome and highly resented presence, unseen but poignant, of a strayed mouse.” After reading the quote above, I as the reader was drawn into the

In the beginning, the narrator gave a confession in retrospect; he was an honorable man born as a sane, kind, loving. Additionally, he had a great love for animals. He married a girl at a young age. Their house was like a mini zoo; birds, gold fish, a dog, rabbits, a small monkey, and a cat. The man singles out a huge, beautiful all-black cat as his favorite, named Pluto. Because of its unusual intelligence, the wife jokes around that the cat might be a witch in disguise. Over the course of time, the narrator and Pluto created a strong bond between them.

In the short story, both cats follow the narrator around the house; however, their motives seem to be different. The first cat, Pluto is loved by the narrator. According to the narrator, Pluto was “my favorite pet and playmate”, and it seems the cat reciprocated the love and would follow the narrator throughout the house (Poe). Pluto wanted to be with the narrator so much that the narrator had difficulty leaving the house and making sure the cat did not follow him outdoors. Their companionship lasted for several years, with the narrator being the one to solely feed Pluto and Pluto wanting to be by his side. Until one day, the narrator’s personality changed, and he killed Pluto and gets the second cat out of his feelings of remorse. The second cat was loathed by the narrator, but just as Pluto, the second cat wanted to be near the narrator. Likewise, the second cat would follow the narrator’s footsteps throughout the house, which would irritate the narrator profusely. The irritation seemed to encourage the cat to be around him even more and included the cat sitting under the chair, jumping onto the narrator’s lap and cuddling with him. The cat seemed to enjoy making the narrator angry and the narrator would wake at night and find the cat lying on his chest and as he states, “find the hot breath of the thing upon my face (Poe).” Since the second cat wanted to be near the narrator even though the narrator despised him, enhanced the belief that it was the second life of Pluto wanting the narrator to remember what he had once done, but that was not the only similarity.