• George Milton
• Lennie Small
• Curley's Wife
• Curley
• Slim
• Candy
• Other Characters
• Crooks
• Carlson
• The Boss
• Whit

George is Lennie's companion, and was asked to look after Lennie by Lennie's Aunt Clara before she died. Since then, he has travelled around, looking for work with Lennie.

George is a kind man. He travels with Lennie and helps him to survive although Lennie is more of a burden than a help, and creates many problems for him. He is also friendly, and almost immediately makes friends with Candy, Carlson, Slim, and the other ranch hands.

He has matured a lot since the incident he relates to Slim where he made Lennie jump into a river just for fun. He realises that Lennie depends on him, and needs him to survive.

George often insults Lennie and 'gives him hell', but he doesn't really mean it. Although he often talks about how well off he could be without Lennie he secretly doesn't want Lennie to leave, and when Lennie offers to do so in the first chapter, George virtually pleads with him to stay. This is because George also depends on Lennie to a certain extent for his unconditional friendship.

George is intelligent, as Slim points out in chapter three, but also modest in denying being smart. He expresses his desire to be different from other ranch hands who merely work for a month and then spend all of their money, but also realistically realises that his dream of owning a house with Lennie (or anyone else) is unlikely to ever come true.

Overall, George is an intelligent and kind character. He is thoughtful enough to realise that the best thing for Lennie is to shoot him, for the alternatives are even worse, and compassionate enough to kill Lennie himself.

Lennie is a massive, extremely strong man, who has no living relatives. He travels about the country searching for work with his companion, George. Lennie's Aunt Clara had asked George to take care of Lennie if she ever died.

The most obvious feature of Lennieð's character is that he seems to be retarded somehow. He is a man who has the mind of a child. Slim is one of the first characters to notice this, remarking that Lennie is

'Jes' like a kid'

and Curley's wife also comments on how he is

'Jus' like a big baby'.

Lennie doesn't know his own strength, and this is one of the things which lead to his eventual downfall. He realises that he is strong as a bull, but he can't judge how much force to use for certain actions. That is why he kills his pets, when he only intends to pet them and play with them.

It is this inability to judge his strength, combined with his desire to pet things and Curley's wife's desire to be petted and admired which leads to Lennie's inevitable death. The ability to judge one's own strength is one of the first signs of maturity, and it is important that Lennie doesn't have this ability.

Despite the major flaws in his character he is amiable and friendly, and doesn't do any of the bad things he does on purpose.

He has a poor memory, and has to repeat things to himself many times to remember them. Even then, he still forgets them.

He has a sort of blind faith in George, trusting in George to protect him and look after his welfare. For example, remember the incident George describes to Slim when he told Lennie to jump in a river and Lennie obeyed, without a thought to his own well being. This illustrates Lennie's trust in George, and also his immaturity.

However, it must be noted that Lennie can still be quite crafty, as when he cunningly persuades George to tell him the story about the rabbits by threatening to leave him.

Most of the ranch hands except for Slim brand Curley's wife as a 'tart'. In fact, she is portrayed as such whenever she appears, obviously playing up to and teasing the men.

She is cruel to Crooks, Candy and Lennie in Crooks' room, and later on she tempts Lennie, letting him stroke her hair in the barn, and kneeling beside him in the hay in a provocative way?

We can definitely say that she is lonely. She says so several times, and that is to be expected since she is stuck on a ranch with men who dislike her and rarely talk to her.

However, she attempts to overcome her loneliness in the wrong way. George immediately realises that she means trouble when she first turns up in the bunkhouse, and it is hardly surprising that her actions lead her new husband to be fiercely jealous.

She walks around the ranch, dressed inappropriately and seductively. and remember that she has only been married a couple of weeks. She admits to Lennie that she doesn't like her husband and regrets marrying him. She seems to be of limited intelligence, as she was taken in by other men's promises of film parts.

It is partly her desire to be petted and admired which leads her to allow Lennie to stroke her hair, which in turn leads to her death at Lennie's hands.

Note that throughout the book, she is only ever known as 'Curley's wife' which seems to indicate that the author viewed her as a possession of Curley's rather than a human being.

Notice that she is frequently associated with the colour red, a colour symbolising an impure woman, as well as one calculated to enrage a 'bull' such as Lennie.

Curley is the nastiest character in the book, and it is easy to point the finger at him and say he is 'the bad guy'.

He is resentful and angry towards everyone. Candy speculates that he dislikes big men because of his own diminutive size, and indeed it does seem that he has quite an inferiority complex, although he dislikes George almost as much as Lennie.

He is always looking for ways to assert what he sees as his masculinity, which explains his aggressive behaviour.

The most obvious feature of Curley's personality is that he is a coward, which Carlson quite rightly points out. He is willing to attack people he sees as weak, like meek-mannered Lennie, but when he meets resistance from somebody he thinks is dangerous like Slim, he backs down immediately and looks for someone else to vent his anger on.

Slim works as a jerkline skinner on the ranch where the story is set, driving a team of mules. This is a position which carries a lot of authority and power.

The men like and respect Slim, deferring to him in all matters. Only Slim is able to persuade Candy to allow his old dog and long-time companion to be killed.

Candy considers Slim to be a match for Curley in a fight, although Curley was once a boxer, and Slim has never been in a fight before. This illustrates the depth of respect the men feel for him.

Unlike many powerful men, Slim is also kind and compassionate. He explains to Candy that it was cruel to keep his dog alive, suffering, and tries to console him by offering him a newborn puppy. He also kindly gives a puppy to Lennie, although he modestly makes light of it, saying he would have had to kill it otherwise.

More evidence of his caring, thoughtful nature comes at the end of the book. When he and the other men find Lennie dead, killed by George, Slim is perceptive enough to realise that it must have been George who took Carlson's gun, and he comforts George.

Not only is Slim kind and friendly to his fellow labourers, we also see him exchange friendly words with Curley's wife. He seems to be the only one who realises that Curley's wife may not simply be a 'tart', she may merely be lonely. If he does think she is a prostitute, he doesn't hold it against her as the other men do. He doesn't attempt to judge her, when he doesn't know her well enough. So, to conclude, Slim's character is very kind and friendly. He is also very intelligent and perceptive, and he has a good sense of justice and fairness.

Candy is an old man with only one hand. He lost his right hand in an accident while working on the ranch. He works as a swamper, which means he sweeps and mops the floor.

He is quite friendly, although we see evidence that he is quite a gossip, from how he eagerly tells George and Lennie how Curley keeps Vaseline in his glove, and by how he eavesdrops on the two.

Candy is lonely, and feels isolated from the other men because of the large age difference between them. His best friend was his dog, and once that had been killed, he took up with George and Lennie so that he would have a sense of security and not be alone in his old age.

However, it is not only his fears that he will be fired soon which prompt him to join George and Lennie. It is also because he shares their dream of settling down and living independently.

He is usually quite realistic. He recognises that if he is fired his chances will not be very good if he is alone, and he knows that Lennie has little or no chance of survival after killing Curley's wife. Because he is so old, he has probably learnt to be realistic from past experience.

There are very few other characters in the book. These notes will deal with the following four characters:

1. Crooks

2. Carlson

3. The Boss

4. Whit

Crooks is an even lonelier character than Candy, because not only is he old and a cripple, like Candy, but he is also black. Most of the men have a lot of prejudice against Crooks, referring to him with derogatory terms such as 'nigger'. And because he is a different colour, he has to stay in a room on his own.

Crooks is a victim. We are told by Candy that the Boss takes his anger out on Crooks, though Crooks does nothing wrong. And Candy also relates an incident in the past when one of the ranch hands picked a fight with Crooks. It is to Crooks' credit that he won the fight, although the other man did have his feet tied.

As a result of the discrimination against him, Crooks has become quite bitter and cynical. This is why when Lennie and Candy tell him about their plan to buy a house he reacts with scorn and disbelief.

Note that Crooks is quite intelligent; he knows how to read. Also, during his discussion with Lennie and Candy, we see more evidence that he is an intelligent, but tortured individual.

Carlson appears to be friendly at first, but in fact the author uses him to portray the brutality and barbarity which was common on ranches such as the one where the story was set.

Carlson is strong and physically powerful. He has no qualms about killing, and even volunteers to kill Candy's dog. He seems excited and animated when the manhunt for Lennie is announced, eager to shed blood.

He takes pride in his gun, cleaning it and taking care of it. Perhaps he sees it as a symbol of his masculinity, much as Curley thinks his aggressive behaviour makes him look tough.

His callous comment at the very end of the book shows that he is not very intelligent, and can never understand the world of sensitive people like Slim and George.

The Boss only appears once in the whole book, when he meets George and Lennie at the beginning.

The only sure thing that we can say about the Boss is that he, like his son Curley, has a very aggressive and intolerant attitude.

He is angry when George and Lennie are late, and Candy says he cruelly took his anger out on Crooks. However, the Boss is probably a little more mature than Curley, and can be generous at times, like when he gave the men whiskey at Christmas.

Whit's character is never developed in the book and little is known about him.

He plays cards with George, but unlike George he is not interested in what he is doing, and really prefers to gossip than to play.

He is also anxious to join in the hunt for Lennie, which tells us that he is not very caring or nice. He is really only a device Steinbeck uses to provide descriptive passages, and to show what the average ranch hand was like.