Title: Steinbeck’s Secret Societal Judgement Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck reveals what society thought about several groupings of people at the time the novel was written. Of Mice and Men was only one of the books written by the author John Steinbeck, who used real people as inspirations for his stories. Steinbeck’s novel was written in the 1930’s when African Americans were segregated, women had less respect, and workers were the majority of the society. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck provides an insight into what the people in society thought of different stereotyped groups in the 1930’s, and how much power these groupings obtained because of the society’s view of them. Slim represents the leader of the workers, and gains more power than the others workers because of the respect the others give him. On the ranch, “Slim’s opinions were law” because he is such a respected worker (45). This shows the power that Slim has over the other workers on the ranch. In the small community the workers make up,…show more content… When the reader first hears about Curley’s wife, it is that she has been “married two weeks” and she is giving some of the other men “the eye” on the ranch (28). They also call her “a tart” because of these observations. These views show that the workers view her as nothing more than a cheater and a flirt(28). The workers seem to expect that she stay inside the house and be loyal to only her husband. Candy is insistent that Curley’s wife “‘go home’” when the workers come back so they don’t “‘tell Curley you [she was] here’”(81). This implies that Curley expects his wife to be in the house and that she is not allowed to talk to anyone else, even though he has just been out at the cat house. This also shows the little power she has over Candy and also her husband, proving that she has little power in this
