Judged because of his age and physical stability e.g by Curley's wife, she makes him feel useless
Had a long true friendship with his dog
but now the dog is dead, he feels
alone
The old, frail dog was a mirror image of him,
now he feels he may get "canned" too
Excited by the dream, but when Lennie/ Curley's
wife dash their hopes he is sad again and even
yells at her dead body
Foreshadows Lennie's death
His dog's death foreshadows
Lennie's death, they are both
shot in the same way and with
the same gun (Carlson's gun)
Confides to George about his regret, wishes he
killed the dog himself. His words influence
George's decision to shoot Lennie out of love
Annotations:
"I ought to have shot that dog myself, George. I didn't ought to have let no stranger shoot my dog."
Deaths progress in a hierarchy, from a mouse (at the
start, in Lennie's pocket) to a dog, to humans. 2 animal
deaths mirror 2 human deaths.
Both deaths are mercy killings and are both
sanctioned by Slim, who seems to have the highest
authority on the ranch.
Candy was powerless to stop his dog's death
like George is powerless to stop Lennie's
Lennie is often
described as an
animal, so the dog
dying foreshadows
another 'animal'
death
A gossip
Talks about Slim, Crooks,
Curley and his wife and
the boss. Gives his
opinions on them, mostly
negative except for Slim
He gossips, but because
he is lonely he is pleased
to have people to talk to
Philosophical
Knows human nature, gives an insight
into why Curley is so aggressive
Annotations:
"Curley's like a lot of little guys. He hates big guys. He's alla time picking scraps with big guys. Kind of like he's mad at 'em because he ain't a big guy."
Is appreciative of the boss,
respectful of him and Slim