Important Passages
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These are what I consider to be important lines from the first chapter of Of Mice and Men. In later chapters, I will expect you to pick out the important lines to discuss in your blogs. In this case, after you discuss the setting, I'd like you to pick out at least one of these lines and discuss it in your first Of Mice and Men blog article.
 

From Chapter 1 (pp. 1-17)

  • “In front of the low horizontal limb of a giant sycamore there is an ash pile made by many fires; the limb is worn smooth by men who have sat on it” (2).
     

  • “The first man was small and quick, dark of face, with restless eyes and sharp, strong features. Every part of him was defined: small, strong hands, slender arms, a thin and bony nose. Behind him walked his opposite, a huge man, shapeless of face, with large, pale eyes, with wide, sloping shoulders; and he walked heavily, dragging his feet a little, the way a bear drags his paws. His arms did not swing at his sides, but hung loosely” (2).
     

  • “You remember about us goin’ into Murray and Ready’s, and they give us work cards and bus tickets?” (5)
     

  • “Awright. You got that. But we’re gonna sleep here because I got a reason” (7).
     

  • “I’d pet ‘em, and pretty soon they bit my fingers and I pinched their heads a little and then they was dead – because they was so little” (10).
     

  • “When I think of the swell time I could have without you, I go nuts. I never get no peace” (12).
     

  • “Guys like us, that work on ranches, are the loneliest guys in the world. . . . With us it ain’t like that. We got a future. We got somebody to talk to that gives a damn about us.  . . . because I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that’s why” (14).
     

  • “Well, look. Lennie – if you jus’ happen to get in trouble like you always done before, I want you to come right here an’ hide in the brush” (15).