Migratory Workers In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

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In the novel Of Mice and Men, the lives of migratory workers during The Great Depression were affected negatively and highly unfortunate. The constant traveling and temporary jobs caused workers to not be able to develop proper relationships with each other. Even though the characters can’t develop these normal relationships in society, all the characters yearn for connection or friendship as shown by the allurement of a “family” living on a farm like normal people. The characters crave companionship but surprisingly they isolate themselves from society because of fear of others hurting them which results in the theme of loneliness throughout the novel. This generalization is supported by many of the characters behaviors in the book and even in what they say. For example, early on in the chapter on Pages 13 through 14, George tells Lennie, “Guys like us that work…show more content…
They got no family, they don’t belong no place. They come to a ranch and work up a stake and they go inta town and blow their stake, and the first thing, you know they’re poundin’ their tail on some other ranch. They ain’t got nothing to look ahead too.” What George means by this statement is that these migratory workers who are ranch hands, are constantly going to ranch from ranch, working for some money, and then since they are so lonely and have nothing to save up for or look ahead to, they go and spend all their money in town with the other men at bars and “cat houses” to be some-what happy for a night or so. This is their way of coping with this loneliness and depression. The reason behind all of these actions these men were taking in their lives was the economy and time period they were living in. For example, an
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