Of Mice and Men
Prompt #23 · Of Mice and Men
Prompt Type: Symbol/Motif
The Salinas River appears at the beginning and end of the novel as a place of temporary refuge and final reckoning. Analyze how Steinbeck uses this natural setting symbolically to frame the novel's exploration of freedom and fate. Explain how it contributes to the meaning of the work as a whole.
Quote 1
“A few miles south of Soledad, the Salinas River drops in close to the hillside bank and runs deep and green.”
Chapter 1
Argument
This opening description of the Salinas River establishes it as a natural sanctuary offering temporary escape from the harsh world of itinerant labor, setting the symbolic foundation for the river as a space where freedom seems possible before fate intervenes.
Quote 2
“The deep green pool of the Salinas River was still in the late afternoon. Already the sun had left the valley to go climbing up the slopes of the Gabilan mountains, and the hilltops were rosy in the sun.”
Chapter 6
Argument
The river's return in the final pages mirrors the opening imagery but now functions as the site of final reckoning rather than refuge, where the 'deep green pool' becomes the location where George must destroy the dream to save Lennie from a crueler fate.
Quote 3
Chapter 6
Argument
George's command for Lennie to look across the river during the mercy killing transforms the natural setting into a symbolic threshold between the illusion of freedom (the dream) and the inevitability of fate, as the river witnesses the death of both Lennie and their shared dream.
Quote 4
“—I think I knowed from the very first. I think I knowed we’d never do her. He usta like to hear about it so much I got to thinking maybe we would.”
Chapter 5
Argument
George's realization that the dream was always impossible reframes the river setting as a space where illusions must be confronted—the natural refuge becomes the site where freedom is revealed as fantasy and fate as inevitable, completing the symbolic arc from hopeful beginning to tragic end.
Quote 5
"Because I got you an’—" "An’ I got you. We got each other, that’s what, that gives a hoot in hell about us," Lennie cried in triumph.
Chapter 6
Argument
This final affirmation of companionship at the river's edge transforms the natural setting into a space where human connection briefly defies fate, even as the physical location witnesses the destruction of that very bond—the river frames both the dream of freedom through friendship and its ultimate impossibility.