How does Steinbeck make it clear from the beginning that the novella will end in

tragedy?

Steinbeck uses writers’ techniques such as motif and alliteration to imply that it will
end in tragedy, such in the title, and throughout the book, like when Candy’s dog had
to be shot and when Lennie repeatedly killed small animals by accident.

Firstly, Steinbeck makes it clear from the title of ‘Of Mice and Men’ that the novella
will end in tragedy. ‘Mice’ and ‘Men’ is an example of juxtaposition. Mice are seen as
small, useless creatures, whereas men (humans) are the dominant species. By
putting the two contrasting living creatures together, Steinbeck is likening them, two
things that are not usually likened. ‘Mice’ and ‘Men’ is also an example of
alliteration, which adds to the same effect – likening the two contrasting living
things. This forces the reader to find some similarity between the two.
This use of juxtaposition and alliteration to liken the two suggests that the novella
will end in tragedy, because, in reality, mice are not as strong as humans, and
humans will end up hurting small creatures.
If the reader is familiar with the famous Scottish poem by Robert Burns, ‘To a Mouse,
on Turning Her Up in Her Nest with the Plough’, they can make links between the
title of this novella and the poem. Steinbeck was inspired by this poem for the title of
his novella ‘Of Mice and Men’. The poem by Burns is about him accidentally
destroying a field mouse’s nest. An extract from the poem – ‘The best laid schemes
of mice and men go oft astray, and leave us nought but grief and pain.’ The ‘best laid
schemes’ could refer to the dreams of the characters in Of Mice and Men, and ‘go oft
astray’ refers to their dreams never coming true. ‘Nought but grief and pain’ implies
that the novella will end in tragedy, and the abstract noun ‘grief’ has connotations of
death. This suggests that there will be death and tragedy in the novella.

Another moment, near the middle of the book, that foreshadows that the novella
will end in tragedy is when Candy’s dog had to be shot. In the novella, it starts with a
conversation between Candy, Carlson and Slim, and Carlson says that Candy’s dog is
too old and should be shot. He says to Candy, ‘ “Look, Candy. This ol’ dog jus’ suffers
hisself all the time. If you was to take him out and shoot him right in the back of the
head -” he leaned over and pointed – “right there, why he’d never know what hit
him.” ’ The way Carlson specifies the area where the dog could be shot – ‘…pointed –
“right there” ’ makes the reader feel uncomfortable, and make them predict that the
novella will end in tragedy. Steinbeck uses sound imagery when Candy’s dog was
being shot to further create a sense of uncertainty in the reader. ‘A shot sounded in
the distance,’ is sound imagery as it creates a sound in the reader’s head. The
suddenness of the shot, and the tragicness makes the reader feel as if the dog
actually shouldn’t have been shot, a sense of regret, and makes the reader think that
there will be more occasions like this one.
The whole topic of Candy’s dog having to be shot foreshadows Lennie’s death at the
end of the book. Lennie died in a similar way to Candy’s dog – Carlson felt it was
better of being dead because it was suffering, and also it was shot in the back of its
head. This is close to identical to why and how Lennie was killed – George felt that
Lennie would be better off dead because of all the trouble he accidentally creates,
and Lennie also was shot in the back of his head. This is how Candy’s dog’s death
foreshadows and suggests tragedy at the end of the novella.

A final example is how Steinbeck describes Lennie repeatedly killing small animals by
accident. Steinbeck uses motif to suggest tragedy at the end of the novel, and also
gradually increases the severity of Lennie’s mistakes. First, Lennie accidentally kills
little mice. George says to him, “Trouble is with mice, you always kill ‘em.” At first,
the reader wouldn’t think too much of this, since mice are small animals, and of not
much importance. But throughout the novella, Lennie keeps accidentally killing
bigger things. He then kills puppies – ‘…and Lennie said softly to the puppy, “Why do
you got to get killed?” ’ The adverb ‘softly’ suggests that Lennie actually cares, and
didn’t mean to kill it. It also conveys his innocence. Then he moves on to humans –
first with Curley’s hand. He accidentally breaks it. Finally, he kills a human. He kills
Curley’s wife by accident. To prepare the reader for this, Steinbeck uses motif to
suggest tragedy. Just like how Lennie stroked the little animals, he ‘stroked harder’
on Curley’s wife’s hair. This alerts the reader, and makes them realise that Lennie is
about to kill Curley’s wife. Also, after every accident, Lennie says to George, ‘I never
meant no harm.’ However, he says this for small accidents – like with the mice – as
well as big accidents like with Curley’s wife. This shows just how innocent Lennie is to
how much harm he actually made, because he treats the loss of human life just like
the loss of small animal life of an animal that he just found on the road. The motif
used by Steinbeck really makes the reader know that the novella will end in tragedy.
Lennie’s accidents then in turn link back to the title of the book – ‘Of Mice and Men’
and it finally makes sense as to why Steinbeck used alliteration and juxtaposition to
liken the two. The reason is because the least important thing Lennie killed was a
mouse, and the most important thing he killed was a human. Linking back,
Steinbeck’s use of alliteration to liken the two conveys Lennie’s understanding – that
he doesn’t understand the difference between the two, so the likening of both
contrasting creatures shows Lennie’s obliviousness to how different the two actually
are. This shows that the novella will end in tragedy.

Overall, Steinbeck is saying that life in America in the 1930s was very hard. Dreams,
even small ones, were often unrealistic and ended up being tragic, and that good
intentions lead to tragedy. Also, the story focuses on Lennie’s innocence, and
through the title and key moments in the story, Steinbeck successfully conveys that
the novella will end in tragedy.