Lennies Character Complexity in Of Mice and Men文献综述

 2022-08-11 15:25:36

Abstract

Of Mice and Men is a famous novel written by John Steinbeck, which becomes a success and attracts peoplersquo;s attention. There are a lot of comments proposed by scholars, which are quite meaningful. The literature review will have a brief summary of their agreed ideas as well as discussions. In addition, a conclusion of E.M. Fosterrsquo;s theory is also be included. It is beneficial in the interpretation of character Lennie, which is a hot topic. The literature will be divided into three parts, theory of E.M. Foster, comments on John Steinbeck and Of Mice and Men and the themes inside the book.

Key words: character; John Steinbeck; Lennie;

一、 Literature Review

John Steinbeck is a famous American writer, who wrote a series of novels on American society. In 1962, he was shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature for his outstanding contribution in American Literature. Steinbeck wrote a lot about things on ranches, stories on workers there in particular. Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, In Dubious Battle, The Moon is Down, East of Eden are a few parts of his creative works. Among all the listed books, the first three are known as workerrsquo;s trilogy, which reveal tough lives of workers on the ranches as well as their struggling moments towards disappointing society. As for his writing preferences, a special focus on disabled body is shown obviously, which he believes could make his writing more impressive and ideographic. Just as two scholars reckon, disabled body is a kind of image which is closely related to readerrsquo;s mental state as well as readersrsquo; social background. In their opinion, though people with physical disability should not be seen as a person of discrimination but a group of people who need bravery, communication, understanding and encouragement. From where I stand, their explanations on images of disabled body clearly shows Steinbeckrsquo;s purpose of using such kinds of images frequently in his novel creations. The reason is that Steinbeck is a writer who has a special focus on the important social elements as well as the small groups of the society, which is an idea mentioned by Freeman Champney (1947) in his article.

When it comes to Steinbeckrsquo;s creation of disabled body, one of the most well-known one is Steinbeckrsquo;s Of Mice and Men. Being one of the workerrsquo;s trilogy, it tells stories of workers, especially Lennie and George, who always move around to find jobs, hoping to realize their American dream of being landowners under the great Depression of the 1930s. In this book, Lennie is a man who is disabled in mind, attracting many readersrsquo; eyes. Because of this, Lennie also aroused a heated discussion between scholars, which appeared in many research articles. George is a prudent and talkative worker who always takes future into consideration. He bares the responsibility of Lenniersquo;s crime and teaches Lennie how to make situations better when he is not together with him. These two characters push plots of the story till the end. It is obvious that the contrast between Lennie and George is quite big and magic, which makes the analysis of these two characters interesting. In addition to the content of the novel, the state of the novel should also be mentioned. Of Mice and Men wins a high and stable position in American Literature. Together with The Grapes of Wrath, it has been heralded as exemplary works that shed light on the sorrowful realities of migrant workers. Also, the book is widely recognized as a modern allegory and is now a required bibliography for American students. So far, many researchers have shown their ideas of the book through different aspects, which are mainly about the aspect of modern allegory, the aspect of Lennie and Georgersquo;s fate, the aspect of metaphor or the aspect of themes. In addition, there are also few articles doing research on the language style and dialect of John Steinbeck, the comparative analysis between Of Mice and Men and other books and even the Christianity analysis of this book. Besides, many scholars have shown their ideas on the theory of character classification, which gives a fundamental basis on character analysis. After reading all the ideas of these articles, a series of ideas will be concluded. Totally, the literature review will pay attention to scholarsrsquo; comments and ideas on writer Steinbeck, the novel Of Mice and Men as well as the theories on characters.

For the first part of this literature review, a theory of character analysis should be mentioned. A theory that is well spread among scholars is proposed by E.M. Foster (1927), who is a novelist from Britain. In his words, characters in a novel can be roughly divided into two types. One is flat character and another one is called round character. E.M. Foster (1927) also shows his clear definition on each of them in his famous book that is published as Aspects of the Novel. Flat character, just as its name, represents people with only one characteristic that can never be changed by time, society and so on. E.M. Foster (1927) describes flat character vividly by saying that a real flat character can be certainly introduced by a simple sentence. Mostly, a flat character is driven by a strong will, for which they are easy to be find in a certain novel. For example, itrsquo;s easy to find that Nancy is a flat character in the book Oliver Twist. This conclusion is drawn because Nancy has her unchanging living principle, which never betrays her conscience. On the contrary, round character is a kind of character that is changeable, which means their characteristics are not always the same till the end. They do what they think appropriate when they meet different people as well as different situations. In other words, this kind of character always creates surprise for readers, which is convincing. In Fosterrsquo;s (1927) words, maybe we need to use more than one sentence to introduce a round character and to make this character a round one. This concept proposed by Foster (1927) has gradually became an authority since many scholars began to apply this concept to their research. However, nowadays, a number of scholars questioned this definition because of the preciseness. Just as Pickrel (1988) points out, Fosterrsquo;s theory seems easy to understand but carries own faults, which is obvious. Due to this, many scholars added their ideas on the theory. Some people express their unsatisfaction towards the theory, saying itrsquo;s not good to classify character that is complex. Others even propose their own theory, saying itrsquo;s more appropriate to use “essentialist and existential” to distinguish characters. As far as I am concerned, character classification is a good way to have a deeper analysis of them. As Alexander, S (2012) reckons, to categorize character is not to ignore differences but to have a deeper recognition of them. As a result, some supplementary information is added to Fosterrsquo;s theory.

As we all know, in 17th century, flat character frequently appears in western classical novels or plays and gives readers some sense of fresh. Also, Chen Daolin (1984) adds the function of flat character by saying that flat character can show its educational significance, especially in fairy tales. For example, Snow White is a beautiful girl with kindness only, who teaches people the living principle of kindness. Another function is also mentioned by Liu Zhihui and Wang Wenliang (2011), they reckon that flat character can, to some extent, play an important role in pushing the plots to a climax. The name “eye of emotion” is also used to shape flat character, for they are easy to remember. In addition, flat character is believed to be characters except main character in a novel, which is also mentioned by Li Yanying (2013). She points out that scholars pretend to feel the significance of round character and ignore the significance of flat character, for they hold the claim that cosmetic sense in flat character leads to this. From where I stand, both of these characters could be shaped as main character since not all stories in a novel should be created full of conflicts and sorrowful sense. As for their added discussions on round character, scholars reach a consensus that round character appears closer to people in reality, which confirms with my belief on round character. For the reason that duality is definitely hidden in these bodies. Scholars also add more details that round character could not be simply defined as a kind one or a bad one. Moreover, they usually appear to be a good person with some bad points or a bad person with humanity inside. In other words, round character has contradictory factors inside themselves. In addition, they are believed to be more suitable as a protagonist because itrsquo;s easier for them to show tragic elements in a novel, which will certainly give readers educational significance. From where they stand, Fosterrsquo;s definition is lack of preciseness, for which they add something new to it. A good case in point is that some of them think a round character need to be clearly divided into two kinds, that is “good people with some shortcomings” as well as “bad people with humanity”. Both of their ideas express the contradictoriness as well as the conflicts inside a round character. Adding these explanations into Fosterrsquo;s theory may make it more convincing.

As for the second part of the literature review, scholarsrsquo; comments on Steinbeckrsquo;s novel Of Mice and Men, especially their ideas on Lennie are to be summarized as follow. Firstly, the implication of the title Of Mice and Men deserves to be mentioned. It is widely acknowledged that the title of the novel is from a famous poem called “To a Mouse”, which reveals its unique functions for implicating the fate of Lennie and also the important themes of the book. As Huang Lihua (2002) has mentioned in her article, Accidental Event, previous name of this book, is far more meaningless than the name now. This changed name together with its implied meaning in the poem makes Of Mice and Men more attractive and meaningful. The poem “To a Mouse” vividly portrays the sad fate of a mouse who appears to be homeless in winter when its field is used to grow crops. From then on, a mouse has to put up with cold winds and snows, which seems sorrowful. For the purpose of the poem, it is to metaphor lives of humankind, doubting the value of humanrsquo;s intelligence and efforts. The poet pretends to show the sad reality of society at that moment. When the poem is related to this book, the poem is also sensible. Mice, being the metaphor of workers like Lennie and George, is of great importance in describing helpless and hopeless lives of farmers, whose lives are easily destroyed by the Great Depression. Their lives are just like those of mice that are forced to immigrant by unexpected nature forces. Just as Zhang Jing (2013) mentioned in her article, they belong to the lowest class and they are too powerless to adjust big changes in society, leading passive lives. As a saying puts it “survival of the fittest and elimination of the unfit test”, they are too weak to adjust the changing society, facing cruel elimination. Their American dream of being landlords is doomed to be a daydream, that is quite sorrowful. Moreover, Wen Shan claimed that the title also implies a strange relationship between men and mice, which is the same as that of people in the book. Itrsquo;s a symbol of loneliness and isolation, similar to the strange relationship between men and mice. All these well-recognized functions on the title have already set a sad tone for the novel.

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