?In the novel Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck created Curley as the main antagonist of the novel. For the purpose of this essay I will analyse and evaluate why Curley is an important character to novel and the effect has to final outcome of the novel.
Curley is special to the novel as he has already accomplished the American dream and is a figure of Authority “He wore high heeled boots”. The high heeled boots support the idea that he is a figure of authority.
On our first encounter with Curley he is seen holding an “aggressive stance similar to a boxer” and we are informed that Curley is “like small guys, they all hate big guys”. This is important as Lennie one of the main protagonists is a big guy, hinting to the reader that Curley is going to play a big part in the demise of their American Dream.
Despite all his power he has inherited by being the son of the boss, he has little control over others.
He is constantly intimidating other characters and asking “you seen my wife”. This supports the fact that he has little control over his wife and is always consciously trying to find her to “tame” her.
Curley suffers from Napoleon Complex, “he wore high heeled boots” this suggests that he is trying to make his figure appear bigger, by wearing different cosmetics. This is important to the novel as it shows us accomplishing the American dream does not always lead to happiness despite the other characters assuming so.
Curley’s jealousy of Lennie resulted in a physical encounter between the two, where Lennie demolished him by “crushing his hand” leaving him to “flop like a fish”. We would be under the assumption that Curley would snitch on Lennie to the boss and get him removed from the ranch but Slim blackmails him “you gonna tell em’ that you got your hand stuck in the machine, or we gonna get you again”. This is important to novel as we see that there are characters in the novel that lack the oppo…
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