There is a bit of a controlling side of George when it comes to looking after Lennie because Lennie has a fetish for petting mice, and keeping them in his pocket. Lennie is such a big and strong guy that every time he pets a mouse, he does it too hard and accidentally breaks their necks, and kills them. He gets so upset, he still keeps them in his pocket, trying to keep George from seeing. Once George finds out, he makes Lennie put the mouse on the ground and let it go since it’s dead.
During chapter two, the novel tells us how much the women were disrespected back then. The only woman mentioned in this novel was Curley's wife. You can notice women are not important in these times because she is known as "Curley's wife," not by her actual name. Every time she was mentioned in the book, they would explain her walking into a room full of guys, looking for her husband, and apparently giving them "the eye." I guess everybody thought she was trying to flirt with them, just because she was the only girl around. Also, Curley's wife did not even like Curley, because he had little man syndrome, and was not a nice man to anyone. Really, Curley's wife was not trying to flirt with the migrant workers, she just wanted people to talk to because she was always lonely, and searching for her husband, Curley. In my opinion, Curley's wife was just a lonely woman, stuck in a world full of men, just looking for a purpose.
In the middle of this novel, in the third chapter, Lennie had gotten into a scuffle with Curley. Since Curley thought he was a tough guy, he decided to pick a fight with someone way bigger than him. Curley thought Lennie was laughing at him when he was talking, although Lennie was just smiling/grinning because he was day dreaming about the dream ranch. When Curley started to fight him, George yelled at Lennie, "Get him, Lennie, Get him!" Lennie gets confused easily, and he did not know what to do until he heard George's voice. Out of nowhere, Lennie grabbed Curley's little fist with his enormous bear-like hands, and crushed his hand completely. That taught Curley not to mess with Lennie, becuase he's uncontrollably strong, and a bit crazy.
Also during this chapter, the swamper (Candy) is joining along with their dream ranch idea, because he proved he will have enough money to pitch in on the house, and support himself, for the rest of his retiring life.
In chapter four, the novel really shows us that Crooks is not treated fairly at all by the other migrant workers. The reason for this is, he is black. Back in those times, the blacks were looked down on, and treated with disrespect. Basically if you were a black man, you weren't treated like a human. Black people were rarely allowed to socialise with others, go out to whore houses, play cards, or gamble. They were not allowed to have any real fun whatsoever.. My opinion of that was actions of being totally unfair, ignorant and judgemental.
During the fifth chapter of the novel, Lennie kills Curley's wife. It shocked me, because I expected something violent to come out of Lennie eventually later in the novel, but not killing an actual human. The way how Lennie killed Curley's wife is, she told him to stroke her hair, because they were talking about touching soft things. Lennie got so interested in her hair, he started to get rougher and rougher, she told him to let go, and her voice got louder. She started to scream, which led Lennie to confusion, and he grabbed her hair with his large hands, and did not let go until he snapped her neck, and she laid on the ground dead.
Lennie ended up being way stronger than I visualised. Evidence to support this is, when we read about how many mice Lennie accidentally killed, and when he killed the puppy by petting it so hard. That shows Lennie is a very strong, dangerous person, but obviously doesn't know better.
In the very last chapter in the novel, all of the migrant workers go out hunting for Lennie. After Lennie accidentally killed Curley's wife, he ran away to a spot George told him to run to if he ever got into real trouble. The migrant workers(including George) found Curley's wife's corpse, and knew it was Lennie, so they had no choice but to go after him, and kill him. Curley wanted him gone. George knew in his mind he either had to run out of town, and keep hiding for the rest of his life because Lennie always gets himself into serious trouble.. Or he could just kill his best friend himself, Lennie would have no choice anyway if the other migrant workers got him. So George's decision was to kill Lennie himself. George met him at the spot he told him to be waiting at. They talked a bit, and George got him thinking about the dream ranch, and the cows, chickens, and rabbits that Lennie would tend.. So Lennie's mind was set in a happy state, his head was turned away from George, and then Lennie got shot in the back of the head. From my point of view, George did the right thing. He was probably sick of leaving the area all the time because of Lennie's mistakes. I think George felt exactly how Candy felt when all of the migrant workers wanted to kill his old, smelly dog. George probably felt like if anyone were to kill his friend, it would be him. George knew it was the right thing to do, and knew it had to be done. At least he did it so Lennie wouldn't feel a single thing, and his last thoughts were about the dream ranch.. The only thing Lennie could remember. It was a good decision, even though George is scarred for life, he probably wouldn't have wanted to watch Lennie struggle away from the migrant workers and die a painful death. In my eyes, it was the right decision.
