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Essay On George And Lennie Friendship

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“The remedy [for the Great Depression] is to give workers the access to the means of production, and let them produce for themselves, not for others,..the American way.”
-Upton Sinclair Jr., author of The Jungle and other works.
America in the 1930s is a haunting reminder of one of the most desperate times Americans faced in our country’s history. Both Sinclair and John Steinbeck, author of Of Mice and Men, give their consumers a reality check about the Depression as well as showing what lengths people would go to to survive. Steinbeck reveals many truths about the Great Depression as well as emphasizes on the rarity of true friendship by using the basic needs of man and the duality between characters in Of Mice and Men and amongst these …show more content…

George, at one point, dwells upon an account in which he abused, horribly so, his authority over Lennie and decided, in his retrospect, to never do so again due to him realizing just how much authority he has. Steinbeck emphasizes on George and Lennie’s relationship with each other being more complex than just George being the brains and Lennie being the brawn, “I was feelin’ pretty smart. I turns to Lennie and says, ‘Jump in.’... He damn near drowned before we could get him, An’ he was so nice to me for pullin’ him out. Clean forgot I told him to jump in. Well I ain’t done nothing like that no more(Steinbeck 40).” The duality between George and Lennie is a very distinct part of their personalities as well as giving their relationship a sense of irony. George, a small lithe man who is as smart as a whip, and Lennie, a tall stocky giant with a terrible memory. Some might have thought that the gentle giant would have been the caretaker but it s really George, who has been doing it almost their entire lives. Their friendship is also rare do to it being uncommon within the 30s of

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