Of Mice and Men: Men`s Lives
How does the writer show the frustration and tension of the men’s lives in this section? (Page 57 – 63) In this section the men are constantly in frustration which creates a tense atmosphere because of the fear of becoming “sacked” by Curly’s old man, although the only place that enables the men on the ranch to repose whilst still working on the ranch is by going to “Susy’s place”. The brothel is strongly depended on by the men because it gives the men happiness; their attachment with the brothel is displayed by announcing what the brothel consists of.
George is dependant on the brothel because all he wants is a place where “A guy can go in an’ get drunk and get ever’thing outta his system all at once,” now narrowing this quote down to just, “and get ever’thing outta his system all at once”, we are shown that all George wants is to be away from is the ranch and going to the brothel allows him to simply forget all his problems for the duration of one night.
The fact that George is desperately willing to escape life on the ranch shows an idea of frustration because George is aware that he’s going to be on there for a long period of time, but in the same situation, he is in desperation to leave work to become his own boss. The determination becomes frustration due to the possibility that George’s dream is becoming further and further away from his grasp.
Although in this section, the tension is mostly created by Curley; when Curley enters the ranch the majority of the men change their behaviour to an awkward characteristic, because the main focus is on Curley and his wife, and the men know that Curley’s wife can cause trouble due to her flirtatious inner nature. Curley enters the ranch in search of his wife which gets the men get frustrated because when Curley is present he always insists on starting a fight with someone which leads to Curley trying to build up the tension between the men. Curley bust into the room” shows the anxiety that Curley has towards the men and his wife being around everywhere he also “looked threateningly about the room” in attempt to cause a fight with one of the men. The men also claim “Curley’s just spoiling it” by trying to threaten all the men he is causing hatred within the rest of the ranch workers to go against him.
