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Comparison Of John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

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The story of Of Mice and men takes place in John Steinbeck’s birth town Salinas, a town in California close to the Salinas River and Salinas Valley. Being born and raised in an agricultural society managed by Capitalism, Steinbeck witnessed the effects it had on the working class. Jay Parini, the writer of John Steinbeck – A Biography, tells us that John Steinbeck sifted through his whole life, all of his experiences, while writing this book. So of course when Steinbeck wrote Of Mice and Men it easily assumed that he was greatly influenced by his own experiences and personal interactions with migrant laborers. (Parini) Steinbeck wrote Of Mice and Men during a difficult time in American history: The Great Depression. The Great Depression had a major impact on American society. Roughly thirty three percent of the workforce became unemployed (Nash) and some, like George and Lennie, were forced to travel around the country in …show more content…

You were either a proletariat or a bourgeoisie, there was nothing in between. George and Lennie, as well as the other workers, work eleven hours a day in poor conditions, without ever questioning it. They knew exactly what they were going to get themselves into because of the Capitalist style way of life. Before Gorge and Lennie arrived at the ranch, they knew what the conditions would be like, how the boss would be and what type of job they would be doing. They had experienced it many times before that and they knew exactly how it would be at the ranch. “Tomorra we´re gonna go to work. I seen thrashin´ macines on the way down. That means we´ll be bucking grain bags, bustin´ gut.” (Steinbeck)Just by taking a quick glance at the machine, George knows that Lennie and him well be working hard and long. But with the communist way of life engraved into their soul, it just seemed like another day at

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