The Crucible and Of Mice and Men
John Steinbeck’s novel, Of Mice and Men, and Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, both have similarities and differences that appear through the history of the United States, prejudice, and also through the themes.
Of Mice and Men and The Crucible, share the similarity of teaching the history of the United States throughout the pieces. In the novel, Of Mice and Men, the reader will be able to learn the history of the United States through the writing style of the author, John Steinbeck. The setting of this novella takes place in Salinas Valley in California during the 1930s, the time of the Great Depression. The Great Depression began when the stock market in the United States dropped rapidly.
However, she “don’ like Curley. He ain’t a nice fella" (89). Curley’s wife has become lonely because all of the workers ignore her.
Social prejudice is also seen during this novel. Candy, the ranch handyman, is prejudiced against because of his age and his disability, the hand he lost due to an accident, and therefore becomes an outsider because he can’t do some of the same work as the other men. Lennie is a victim of social prejudice because of his size. Curley, the boss’s son, is very short, and “hates big guys. He’s alla time picking scraps with big guys” (26). Therefore, he tries to pick fights with Lennie due to his big size in order to feel significant for fighting with someone big with his small size. Like in Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, Miller’s The Crucible also experiences prejudice throughout the play.
Prejudice based on age, ageism, is shown in The Crucible when the young girls were first being accused of dealing with witchcraft. Due to their young age, their first alibi of just innocently dancing was believed. This example however, is an example of ageism that has helped the people involved, but for Rebecca Nurse, it wasn’t as good. When Ann Putnam and the other girls testified against her, Rebecca Nurse was innocent, but she was probably not believed due to her old age which caused he to be less believable.
Another prejudice that was shown in this play was the religious prejudice. Puritans were very strict against