OF MICE AND MEN By John Steinbeck An introduction for Year 9 English. This is John Steinbeck . He is considered one of the most important of American authors. He is such a revered and loved author that he has his own museum : “The Steinbeck Centre” in California.
OF MICE AND MEN
By John Steinbeck
An introduction for
Year 9 English
This is John Steinbeck
He is considered one of the most important of American authors
He is such a revered and loved author that he has his own museum : “The Steinbeck Centre” in California.
The reception area is actually his childhood home!
Steinbeck is from German and Irish descent.
His mum was a school teacher and she encouraged his love of literature.
Salinas Valley, California where Steinbeck grew up
(Looks a lot like Australia!)
In his summer holidays Steinbeck worked here as a ranch hand
It is the Salinas Valley and life on the land that he captures in his novels and inspires the world.
This famous author went to Stanford University in 1919
He is a really slack student. He wagged class and NEVER GOT A DEGREE. In 1925 he left Uni for good and ran off to....
New York !
His dream is to be a writer but he fails and goes back to California.
His first novels were not received well critically
His first novella- a short novel – was published in 1937.
He gained world wide recognition. He goes on to write other famous novels, for instance The Grapes of Wrath.
In 1962 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
This is the original cover for the book in 1937.
Looking at the cover what do you think it might be about?
I hate reading my English books. So why should I read this book?
There are several reasons why you should read this book. Let me try & persuade you.
Reason 1:This book is cool!
Megadeth have a song called “Of Mice and Men” on their “The system has failed” album.
Reason 2:THIS BOOK IS OFTEN CENSORED
Even though Of Mice and Men is considered an American classic.
It is one of the most banned books
in American schools.
Constantly this book is complained about by parent groups in America. So what makes the book so controversial?
It is banned because of its language:
Son of a bitch
The “n” word
Here are some examples of other banned literature in American schools.
Of Mice and Men is controversial because of the way it depicts
The book is also censored because the characters are rough & tough ranch hands. They spend most of their free time drinking alcohol and visiting prostitutes in what is known as a
Of Mice and Men is only around 100 pages long.
An easy read!
Of Mice and Men has a great story.
It is suspenseful with a shock ending.
It’s about dreams, friendship, loneliness & violence
Reading some books makes you a better
person and this is one of them!
Before you read here is a little background information about farm life in America in the mid 30s.
Farm life today!
Before the 30s farm life was booming in America. Farmers were trying to cash in on the biggest crop of the day: wheat!
With the invention of better tractors, farmers could go crazy ploughing the land.
And they did.
In those days they didn’t know a lot about soil conservation. When the crops failed year after year because of drought there was nothing holding the soil in place.
What happens to loose dry dirt in a big wind?
Dust storm Sydney
23 September 2009
Strong winds had blown the dust from
The view in suburban Sydney at 5:45 am this morning (23 September 2009). Sydneysiders awoke to a strange red glow in the sky.
Okay that was bad in Sydney but check out the dirty 30s in
The Prairie winds made many dust storms
Black Sunday April 14, 1935. The dust storm that turned day into night. Many believed the world was coming to an end.
Imagine trying to live in these conditions.
The dust storms lasted from 1931-1939
Farmers and their families had to leave
They had to sell everything
They took to the road. Where would they go?
California had great farmland and no dust.
They would migrate to California
Description : OklahomaMigrant family looking for work in the pea fields. California. 1935
Farming in the Panhandle
Wheat was a real good thing. The world needed it and was paying a good price for it. Wheat farmers with tractors, one way plows and combines purchased by most farmers after the phenomenal crop of 1926, began plowing and planting wheat as never before. The lands were planted to wheat year after year without a thought as to the damage that was being done. Grasslands that should have never been plowed were plowed up. Millions of acres of farm land in the great plains were broken.
1930 was dry but most of the farmers made a wheat crop. In 1931 the wheat crop was considered a bumper crop with over twelve million bushels of wheat. Wheat was everywhere, in the elevators, on the ground and in the road. The wheat supply forced the price down from sixty-eight cents/bushel in July 1930 to twenty-five cents/bushel in July 1931. Many farmers went broke and others abandoned their fields.
With continuing hard times and dry years, the farmers, who still had a lot of pioneering spirit and faith in the land, made ready to weather the storms. The old survival methods of pioneering were brought out of storage, dusted off and put into practice. Many farmers increased their milk cow herd. The cream from the cows was sold and the skim milk was fed to chickens and pigs.
When normal feed crops failed, thistles were harvested, and when thistles failed, hardy souls dug up soap weed which was chopped in a feed mill or by hand and fed to the stock. This was a back breaking, disheartening chore which would have broken weaker people. But to the credit of the residents of the Dust Bowl, they shouldered their task and carried on.
Women tried to look after their families while the men looked for work
Dorothea Lange, Resettlement Administration photographer, in California atop car with her giant camera February 1936.
Many farm labourers and ranch hands travelled the roads in search of work in California.
These are the types of characters
Steinbeck writes about
During the time Steinbeck was writing “Of Mice and Men” it was a difficult time for America. It was the time of The Great Depression.
The Salinas River area in California.
Where Steinbeck grew up & worked on ranches.
Into this area came many jobless men
in the 30s.
What we have learnt in this powerpoint
There was a farming crisis due to dust storms and drought
during the 1930s in the middle of America
Many farmers and their families moved to California to find work.
John Steinbeck’s experiences on the land as a ranch hand
In the 30s helped him to create interesting characters.
John Steinbeck wrote Of Mice and Men in the mid 30s
during The Great Depression
John Steinbeck is a very important writer in American literature
Of Mice and Men is banned a lot in American schools because of its language and sexism.
3 points you thought
3 things you didn’t know before