Trying times always push society to its limits and with that, show society’s true nature. This is displayed best in Ayn Rand’s Anthem and John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men; one set in a post-apocalyptic age where man struggles to rebuild and the other set during the Great-Depression. By comparing Ayn Rand’s message concerning the individual in society in Anthem to John Steinbeck’s in Of Mice and Men it is clear that one has a main message that society is a burden to the individual, while the other’s message is that society helps out the individual. As we progress further down the road to prosperity there is always a time before or after that knocks us down and shows either the best or the worst of society. With that said society to an …show more content…
Having a society be such a burden on individuals it is hard to see whether society can actually instead of hindering the individual, help those individuals. Society as we’ve seen can be and will be a burden to individuals in order for it to progress farther down the line to prosperity; in times of dire need society instead of being a burden to the individual society actually helps them out as seen in Of Mice and Men. During the Great Depression men, women, and children had to struggle to survive and being helped by society wasn’t an option nor did they want it to be. In Of Mice and Men the main characters struggle to find jobs on farms due to the fact that our struggling individual needs help from society. Society during this time wasn’t always kind to individuals that didn’t benefit society, because they couldn’t help themselves during that time. Society had to stick together during this time or else they would starve and die. Lennie wasn't the only individual that needed help from society, individuals that couldn’t get a job or help themselves were most likely left out of the meat of society. Having people like George in society, helping out the individuals like Lennie helps further advance society out of the Great Depression it was in. George wasn’t the kind of person to leave someone like Lennie to fend for himself, so he traveled with him and helped him get a job. With this society being made up of people like George help the Lennie’s of society
The Great Depression affected millions of people in America, two of those people affected were George and Lennie. George and Lennie are migrant workers that struck a job in California. George can be described as the brains of the partnership, while Lennie is more of the muscle. In the story Lennie has a fascination with feeling soft objects. This later gets them in trouble in the town of Weed. Once they get to the job, they go months will no big problems. Until, Lennie accidentally killed The owner’s son’s wife. After this happened Lennie ran off, and all the workers went to go find him and kill him. George does find Lennie before any of the other workers, and even with the chance to escape, he shoots Lennie. In John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, the murder of Lennie was not Justified.
Today, it is more evident than ever that there are deep divisions within modern society along the lines of race, class and gender. These divides are highlighted by recent protests, riots and movements. These issues are relevant in modern society as well as in two famous stories. Both F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby and John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men use character development to make commentary toward these points. Fitzgerald’s novel covers the tumultuous journey of Nick Carraway through the swanky social elite of the 1920’s. Steinbeck’s text covers the opposite end of the spectrum, detailing the experiences of George and Lennie, ranchers during the great depression. While also providing a riveting and captivating plot, these seemingly antithetical tales both develop their respective characters to be normal, everyday people who face difficult problems because of their class.
Imagine a world where you didn’t have electricity and you didn’t have the right to be your own person. In Anthem by Ayn Rand that is how people lived. Everyone in Anthem didn't know anything but the life that they are living. These people don't have anything to miss from the way the world used to be. But some people knew that they wanted more. Equality knew that. The lesson that was taken from this book is that a person is in this type of situation and something tells them that something isn't right and it feels wrong. That person needs to find a way to fix it or get out of the situation that is making them feel uncomfortable.
You can judge a society by its treatment of the old, the weak, the helpless and the needy. Through the narrative conventions of foreshadowing and characterisation, John Steinbeck, in his novel Of Mice And Men, published in 1937, is able to effectively reveal the imperfections of America’s capitalist
Anthem is one of the best books you’ll ever read, if you like a good struggling books. It is about this man called Equality 7-2521 that lives in a society that does not believe in individualism. It is all men are one, that there is no “me” or “I” only “we” and “us”. Growing up Equality 7-2521 was a very bright individual, he was always faster and more intelligent child but this was not good. For this he would always get scolded and even whipped, because is not to be more than his others. He was also ridiculed for being tall, which was a sin to be different than the rest.
Have you ever wondered what two different novels written at the same time are saying about society? Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck tells the story of George Milton and Lennie Small, two displaced migrant ranch workers, who move from place to place in California in search of new job opportunities during the Great Depression in the United States. Anthem by Ayn Rand It takes place at some unspecified future date when mankind has entered another dark age. Technological advancement is now carefully planned and the concept of individuality has been eliminated. By comparing Ayn Rand’s message concerning the individual in society in Anthem to John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men it is clear that they have very different views on how society should be, even though they were
Some characters in this novel are alienated by mainstream society because they do not fit society’s ideal image of a person. And they are all not accepted as human beings. Throughout John Steinbeck’s novel, Of Mice and Men, the social injustice of how people were treated during the Great Depression is explored through the characters Crooks, Curley’s wife, and Lennie, to show that society actually needs to become stronger than it really is.
The society depicted in Anthem, written by Ayn Rand, has the people working for other people, and that their own lives are useless, a system known as collectivism. The rules are quite restrictive in Anthem’s society for the purpose of keeping people in line so they would not rebel against the government. Rules also serve to keep people equal to one another; however, at the end of the novel, Equality 7-2521 creates his own society with hopes to give people full freedom and individualism. The government’s society in Anthem created laws to keep the collectivist ideals alive.
Ceaseless collectivism is not something that can be forced upon a community. Ayn Rand’s novel Anthem conveys this through the writings of Equality 7-2125, a man willing to stand up to the collectivism of the society he is confined to. Anthem not only shows how dull and lifeless a society can be with a lack of individuality in its people, but also reveals how one person can significantly impact a community. This novel displays the importance of individualism through Equality’s thoughts and actions. This includes when he reinvents electricity in the tunnel, falls in love with Liberty, and when he completely separates himself from society.
Traditionally, social hierarchies are how individuals are arranged based on how they act and look. These social hierarchies are found in many species, but are the most complex in humans. Social hierarchies are especially present in John Steinbeck’s book, Of Mice and Men, which is about two farmers trying to find work in the great depression. Throughout the book, Steinbeck challenges these traditional social hierarchies. While some people can be higher up in the social hierarchy because of how they were born, this does not mean that they are better people, and challenges conventional social hierarchies by showing that they can shift.
Have you been put into a society group? If so what society group do you think you will best fit in? All the characters in of mice and men are put into their own little society group.the characters who is interesting are Crooks, Lennie, and Curley's wife.
lead him to a life of worry and lack of security, as he is old and a
I knew he wouldn’t make it into the society ,but he didn’t see it. People had always looked down on him and excluded him from the society because he wasn’t ordinary like us. I agree, he wasn’t ordinary. He was extraordinary. You will never come across a man like Lennie in your life. Even when people thought of Lennie less than what he is, it never made it to him. He didn’t know what people thought of him because he viewed everyone the same. Whenever I thought Lennie was struggling, he showed me that he wasn’t. He showed me that he is able be a part of this society without looking down on others and not letting others to look down on him. When Crooks was neglected by others from ranch members like us, Lennie still talked to Crooks as if he was just a guy from next door. When Crooks told Lennie to go away, he didn’t. He stayed because he wanted to be friends with him. Lennie saw more than us. Lennie was like a kid who saw importance in everything. What Lennie didn’t see is the segregation between us humans. He didn’t see it. Lennie loved everything and Crooks, he loved you too. Well me on the other hand, I learned to love everything. That’s one thing I learned from
“Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty,” said Mother Teresa. Humanity has struggled against being left alone and being lonely for a long time. As a result, humans formed a society where they could be together. On the other hand, there are still people who are left out of the society. In other words, there are still people out there who are marginalized, not accepted fairly to the society. John Steinbeck shows the marginalized people’s lives in his novel, Of Mice and Men. In his novel, characters such as Lennie, George, Candy, Curley’s wife, Crooks, and even the ranch workers, are marginalized from the society. Ranch workers like George, Candy, and Lennie have nowhere to go, and they do not have anybody to care for them. Especially for Lennie, he is mentally challenged, too. Crooks, being the colored man, suffers from discrimination. Curley’s wife is constantly surrounded with loneliness. In Of Mice and Men, marginalized people who are neglected from the society, create a society of their own; they share their dreams and help each other out although they are all different from each other.
John Steinbeck, an American novelist, is well-known for his familiar themes of depression and loneliness. He uses these themes throughout a majority of his novels. These themes come from his childhood and growing up during the stock market crash. A reader can see his depiction of his childhood era. In Of Mice and Men, Steinbeck shows the prominent themes of loneliness, the need for relationships, and the loss of dreams in the 1930s through the novels’ character.