Blog 5 - last one [sad violin music] the American Dream

I think that the American Dream was an extremely prevalent theme in the book Of Mice and Men because many of the scenes have the American Dream in it. A big scene was when Candy, Lenny, and George talk about how they are going to own their own property and grow their own food and have rabbits. Lenny said that "[He] gonna take[his] pups." What they were dreaming about was the American Dream. It is the 2,660 square foot house, the 2.1 cats and the neatly mowed lawn that with enough work and effort, everyone could achieve. The American Dream was a big part of the story from when George and Lennie talked about it with Candy, and when they talked about it with Crooks. The American Dream is the idea that hard work can bring happiness in life. Basically the idea of Capitalism, the idea that property is privately owned and people can start businesses to achieve their American Dream. George, Candy, and Lenny were trying to work for money to buy their private plot of land and achieve their American Dream especially in hard times such as the Great Depression. During this time, people lost hope and didn't dream to do anything. This is portrayed in the story as George, a realistic person who had little hope for the future. Lennie is the character who is always looking towards the future as is seen when he always would think about rabbits. Today, the American Dream still exists, prompting immigrants to work hard to achieve their goals like the many immigrants who left their home countries to go to college in America. People such as Hillary Clinton back in 2008 proposed an American Dream plan for the country when she was running for primaries and Barack Obama further helped people achieve their american dream by creating the Affordable Care Act which provides poor people with healthcare (Obamacare). Also, our current president, Donald Trump is another symbol of how the American Dream is still prevalent today; anything can happen if you work hard enough and are determined enough. Donald Trump worked incredibly hard to build up his real-estate empire he now owns today and he had worked hard enough to even become president (not supporting sides or anything). The author of the book portrayed the American Dream extremely well because many people were working towards a goal of prosperity through hard work such as George and Lennie, despite their odds, kept working towards their goal until, unfortunately, George had to kill Lennie.