History Literature / OfMiceAndMen

** Georgie is forced to kill Lennie after he unwittingly and accidentally kills Curley's Wife, as there were no positive outcomes for Lennie. George can either; run away with Lennie to another state, until they run out of places to go, allow Lennie to be lynched by Curley or have Lennie go to prison where he might get corrupted or assaulted by the other inmates.

* AmbiguousDisorder: The exact nature and name of Lennie's disability are unspecified. The important parts are that he's got the mental state of a child, likes to hold soft things, and he has strength beyond a regular man. Due to his child-like state, Lennie is unaware of what he's actually capable of and what damage he can do. Lennie has to rely on a carer to protect him from the outside world, as well as, reign him in when Lennie gets agitated or scared.

* BodyMotifs: Curley has a hand motif: His glove full of Vaseline, his status as a prized fighter, and how his hand gets broken by Lennie.

* MortonsFork: Slim blackmails Curley with this dilemma. Either live with a crushed hand and emasculated ego or they'll tell everyone how he provoked a kind-hearted, mentally disabled, herculean simpleton into a brawl and lost. Then got him and his carer fired, in order to salvage the remains of his dignity and masculinity.

* AssholeVictim: Curley gets his hand broken by Lennie after he tries to assert dominance over him and the bunkhouse. Everyone was clearly on Lennie's side since Lennie had no interest or desire in fighting Curley. Slim quickly blackmails Curley to lie about the source of his injury by threatening to tell everyone about how he broke his hand in fight he started against a herculean, towering simpleton. Curley's wife had no sympathy for him either.

* BilingualBonus: Soledad, the name of the nearby town, means ''solitary''.

* BetterToDieThanBeKilled: It's George who [[ShootTheDog decides what's best for Lennie]]: a quick, painless death he doesn't see coming, instead of a much uglier end at the hands of a lynch mob.

* PetTheDog: Curley's wife has a talk with Lennie, getting to bond with another human for the first time. It goes horribly after that, however.

* YourCheatingHeart: Curley suspects the reason his wife's seldom around and difficult to find is because she's going around having sex with other men.

** The crushing dreams of people that lived through the GreatDepression.

* MortonsFork: Slim blackmails Curly with this dilemma. Either live with a crushed hand and emasculated ego or they'll tell everyone how he provoked a kind-hearted, mentally disabled, herculean simpleton into a brawl and lost. Then got him and his carer fired, in order to salvage the remains of his dignity and masculinity.

** Inverted with Curley when he does this to a literal puppy, he [[spoiler: [[ShootTheDog ended up killing it]] due to his unchecked strength and even gets mad at the puppy for dying so easily]].

* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism: Despite George and Lennie's genuine and endearing friendship as well as a number of sympathetic characters, this book is set during the great depression so its pretty obvious its pretty bleak, depressing, and cynical.

* AmbiguousDisorder: The exact disorder Lennie has is unspecified. The important parts are that he's got the mental state of a child and he has strength beyond a regular man. Due to his child-like state, Lennie is unaware of what he's actually capable of and what damage he can cause. Lennie relies on a carer, like George and his grandmother, to protect him from the outside world. As well as, reign him in when Lennie gets agitated or careless.

* DoesNotKnowHisOwnStrength: Lennie, possibly the TropeCodifier. He kills mice just by petting them, kills a puppy by trying to play-hit it, and tries to calm Curly's Wife down by shaking her, but instead breaks her neck.

* {{Jerkass}}: Curly, who's accusatory, belligerent, and arrogant personality gets on everyone's nerves.

* PetTheDog: Curly's wife has a talk with Lennie, getting to bond with another human for the first time. It goes horribly after that, however.
** Inverted with Curly when he does this to a literal puppy, he [[spoiler: [[ShootTheDog ended up killing it]] due to his unchecked strength and even gets mad at the puppy for dying so easily]].

** Loneliness but also ThePowerOfFriendship.

** ThePowerOfFriendship.

''Of Mice and Men'' is a 1937 novel, one of Creator/JohnSteinbeck's most famous, set during TheGreatDepression. It involves Lennie Small (a mentally-impaired GentleGiant) and George Milton, migrant workers who arrive on a California farm to work and hope to earn enough money to open a rabbit farm of their own, but … things go pretty wrong.

One of the most challenged books of the 20th and 21st centuries and a frequent target of censors, who criticized it for bad language,[[note]]The far-right Reform Party of Canada attempted to have it banned in public schools in the city of Winnipeg in 2000; nothing came of the effort.[[/note]] "promoting euthanasia" and being "anti-business". However, it remains very popular and is a widely used SchoolStudyMedia. It has also had several film adaptations, including theatrical releases in 1939 and 1992 and made-for-TV versions in 1968 and 1981. The most famous adaptation is probably the 1939 film, which was directed by Lewis Milestone and starred Burgess Meredith as George and Creator/LonChaneyJr. as Lennie, with a musical score by none other than Music/AaronCopland.

** While George's frustration with Lennie is at times understandable, there are other times when he outright verbally abuses him. Despite this, he has always looked out for him and cares about him deeply. Their friendship is still deep and remain loyal to each other considering they all they have in the world.

* PetTheDog: Curly's wife has a talk with Lennie, getting to bond with another human for the first time. It goes horribly after that however.

* NoNameGiven: Curley's wife; The Boss.

* YankTheDogsChain: The entire novel is built on this trope. From Candy being bullied into letting Carlson put his dog down, the tragic ending, the whole thing is just designed to yank your chain.

* ShootTheDog: Literally! Roughly midway through the story, Carlson bullies Candy into letting him shoot the old man's worn-out old dog, simply because he thinks the dog is too old and too smelly. Somewhat subverted as Candy later agrees that it was necessary and says that he should have been the one pulling the trigger. Also, invoked in spirit when George shoots Lennie at the story's end.

''Of Mice and Men'' is a 1937 novel, one of Creator/JohnSteinbeck's most famous, set during TheGreatDepression. It involves Lennie Small (a mentally-impaired GentleGiant) and George Milton, migrant workers who arrive on a California farm and hope to save up enough money to open a rabbit farm, but … things go pretty wrong.

* {{Jerkass}}:
** There's a reason no one on the farm likes Curley.

* GentleGiant: Lennie is huge and loves cuddly animals and soft things. The problem is that because of his inability to control his strength, he frequently kills pets when cuddling them.

** Carlson to a lesser extent - he's gruff and prickly, but not unlikeable.
** Crooks takes a great deal of joy in picking on Lennie. And then he's put on the receiving end of it by Curley's Wife who threatens to have him lynched.
** While George's frustration with Lennie is at times understandable, there are other times when he outright verbally abuses him.

* WhosLaughingNow: Curley tries to fight Lennie when he mistakenly believes that Lennie was laughing at him but in reality Lennie was smiling about his, George and Candy's dream home, especially the rabbits. The end result was Lennie breaking his hand while under George's command and had to be restrained by both him and Slim.

* AssholeVictim: Curley gets his hand broken by Lennie after he tries to assert dominance over him and the bunkhouse. Everyone was clearly on Lennie's side since Lennie had no interest or desire in fighting Curley. Slim quickly blackmails Curley to lie about the source of his injury by threatening to tell everyone about how he broke his hand in fight he started against a towering, mentally disabled manchild. Curley's wife had no sympathy for him either.

* AssholeVictim: Curley gets his hand broken by Lennie after he tries to assert dominance over him and the bunkhouse. Everyone was clearly on Lennie's side since Lennie had no interest or desire in fighting Curley. Slim quickly blackmails Curley to lie about the source of his injury by threatening to tell everyone about how he broke his hand in fight he started against a towering, mentally disabled manchild. Curley's wife has no sympathy for him either.