Essay: Attitudes towards mentally ill offenders – the killing of Lennie Small in John Steinbeck’s ‘Of Mice and Men’

Abstract: John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men puts forth various notions of mental health during the Great Depression era in the United States of America. This paper focuses mainly on the treatment of Lennie Small, an individual with mental illness, by the other characters, especially George Milton. It explores how mental illness was dealt with in the 1930s; focusing on George’s conundrum at the end of the novella, attempts to provide a reason for why he did what he did. The paper also touches upon aspects of conviction of a mentally unstable person and the killing of such a person in Of Mice and Men.
Keywords: Lennie Small, Of Mice and Men, mental illness, John Steinbeck, crime, insanity defence, sympathy entrapment
Attitudes towards mentally ill offenders: The killing of Lennie Small in John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men
Lennie Small and George Milton are the two protagonists in John Steinbeck’s novella- Of Mice and Men. The story revolves around Lennie who has an intellectual disability and shows symptoms of schizophrenia, and his relationship with George –his on-road companion and saviour. The unemployment situation post the Great Depression saw many Americans losing their jobs, and continuously changing their places of work. Lennie and George are ranch workers and the story begins with them looking for a job on one of the ranches near Soledad. They are motivated to work to fulfil their eventual dream of owning a ranch and never having to work for anybody else. Through their initial interactions, we come to know that Lennie has done something unacceptable (which we later learn is touching a girl’s dress to feel it). This brings them into trouble and forces them to run away. Lennie seems to be obsessed with all things furry and soft like the girl’s dress, so mice. The problem arises when he pets them too hard, and when they start struggling, he then kills them without meaning to. Lennie and George land up a job on Curley’s father’s ranch, a few miles away from Soledad and befriend many of the ranch workers. George is aware of Lennie’s obsession and prevents him from harming mice. A similar situation recurs when George refuses to allow Lennie to take care of the pup given by Slim, another ranch worker. George, although burdened by Lennie’s existence, takes care of him like a child and defends his actions for most of the novella. A confrontation between Lennie and Curley at the beginning of their stay at the ranch marks the tone of their relationship. Lennie is strong, well-built, muscular; and, his physique arouses Curley’s insecurity. Curley eventually starts a fight with Lennie, in which Curley is badly injured. Meanwhile, Curley’s wife (a supposed “looloo”) becomes a cause of worry for George. He calls her “a jail bait” and warns Lennie to not get involved with her. Lennie, however, does get involved-becoming obsessed with her soft hair. He starts caressing it but takes his caresses too far. Unable to comprehend Curley’s wife’s struggles, as he does the mice, he snaps her neck and kills her. Frightened, Lennie runs away to a safe place that George had earlier showed him, in case he ever got into trouble and remains hidden. The ranch workers discover Curley’s wife’s body in the barn, and Curley, raging for revenge starts a search for the killer. Curley is convinced that Lennie is the killer, as he is the only one who isn’t present. George, unable to defend Lennie anymore, is forced to join the search party. Before anyone finds Lennie, he gets to him and kills him. At this point, keeping in mind George and Lennie’s tender relation, and George’s awareness of Lennie’s inability, the question arises – Why did George kill Lennie?
Lennie’s fate is foreshadowed in the killing of Candy’s dog. As the dog is killed to relieve it from the suffering of old age, so Lennie is killed, but for a slightly different reason. Lennie is killed because of George’s anticipation of Lennie’s suffering; a suffering Lennie would be put through if found guilty of committing Curley’s wife’s murder.
Lennie isn’t a normal human being and it is difficult for the ranch workers to accept this. Through the course of the novella, Lennie’s behaviour is naive and child-like. He continuously distances himself from the outside world, which results in his forgetfulness. George has to make him repeat things, almost like a teacher who wants his students to remember a poem or tables. George constantly endeavours to get Lennie to remember information important to his existence so that he keeps out of trouble. Lennie is continuously dependent on George, just like a toddler is dependent on his father and takes his orders very seriously. It is only George who can see this and treats him as sensitively as possible. George cares deeply for him and his decision to kill Lennie is probably a result of his awareness of his own inability to protect Lennie any longer.
The narrative is set during the post-Great Depression period, a time in which massive societal changes were taking place in American society. It was a period of turmoil, where people weren’t receptive to “crazy bastard[s]” like Lennie nor did they know exactly how to handle them. Mental illness since time immemorial has been associated with demonic possession. The father of American Psychiatry, Benjamin Rush who practiced during the 1700s did not believe in this association, however, “he purged, blistered, vomited and bled his patients; administered herbal concoctions and drugs; and twirled them in a purpose-built gyrator, until their noses bled.” It was only around 200 years after, by the 1940s, that less severe treatments became frequent, such as lobotomies, which claimed good results for many of the patients. Lobotomies, however, weren’t failure-proof. Tennessee Williams’sister Rose (a schizophrenic), for example, suffered more after the lobotomy than before it— “In Rose’s case the operation was something of a disaster: her personality was crushed and she was thereafter unable to live an independent life.”And this is only in the medical circles, the social treatment of mentally ill people is best known to us through literature. In fact, even in literature there are very few characters that have been able to do justice to mentally unstable characters. In this novella, only George Milton is truly sympathetic to Lennie’s predicament. George is ahead of his times– “He can do anything…I ain’t saying he’s bright…But I say he’s a God damn good worker. He can put up a four hundred pound bale.”
Let’s try to understand why George killed Lennie through how others have treated Lennie. Curley’s treatment of Lennie is probably the worst because he doesn’t even acknowledge that Lennie is different and hence must be treated with much more care. Additionally, his treatment appropriates the view that if a mentally challenged person committed a crime, the only treatment available to him or her was death or lifetime confinement. George, on the contrary, does not view Lennie’s act as a crime and understands that others would not be accepting of the ‘insanity defence’, then known as the M’Naghten rule that George unwittingly believes in. According to the Legal Information Institute,
The insanity defence refers to a defence that a defendant can plead in a criminal trial. In an insanity defence, the defendant admits the action, but asserts a lack of culpability based on a mental illness…An important procedural corollary to the insanity defence involves the establishment of legal competency, otherwise known as competence to stand trial. In accordance with due process requirements, a criminal defendant cannot stand trial if he or she is deemed legally incompetent… A defendant is incompetent if he or she is incapable of rationally communicating with his or her attorney or rationally comprehending the nature of the proceedings against him or her. A defendant may move at any time for a hearing to determine competency, which involves the submission of supporting evidence and some form of a psychological evaluation. The threshold for establishing competency is often identified as notoriously low. So long as a defendant is deemed incompetent, the insanity defence becomes moot as the defendant cannot stand trial.
In other words, it is an excuse for the crime that has been committed. And, if take a closer look at the procedural corollary, Lennie most definitely cannot stand trial; he just won’t be able to comprehend it.
George defends Lennie’s action using the following words, “Couln’ we maybe bring him an’ they’ll lock him up? He’s nuts, Slim. He never done this to be mean”. This brings us to the realisation that standard rules of crime and punishment don’t apply to mentally ill individuals simply because they do not fit into the general normative of individuals. However, George already knows that Lennie doesn’t stand a chance for a free trial and that he would be killed violently the minute Curley sets his eyes on him. Curley is consistent in his aggression throughout the novella and his general dislike of people with strong physiques will not work in Lennie’s favour. Despite that, even if we wish to believe that Lennie does stand a chance, the chances of him surviving inside a prison are almost none. While prison is a challenging environment for all prisoners, it is even harder for those with serious mental illnesses. Mentally ill prisoners are likely to be victims of other prisoners — mentally sound as well as mentally ill. They are vulnerable to assault, sexual abuse, exploitation, and extortion. As late as the 21st century, prisons are inadequate to sensitively handle mentally ill individuals which often force such prisoners to commit suicide.
Capital punishment alias death penalty was common during the Great Depression era in the USA. According to FindLaw,
From the 1920s to the 1940s, there was a revival in the use of the death penalty, due, in part, to the writings of criminologists, who argued that the death penalty was a necessary social measure. In the United States, people were suffering through Prohibition and the Great Depression. There were more executions in the 1930s than in any other decade in U. S. history, an average of 167 per year.
Hence, what George did for Lennie, does in one sense liberate him from the consequences that he would have had to face had he lived; for he would not have died a painless death. This instance of “mercy killing”, however, shouldn’t be mistaken as a deed of the past, such instances occur in different countries and different forms, for as recent as 2016— “Mother Pleads For Mercy Killing Of Mentally Ill Son In Coimbatore”, was the headline of a related article in The Hindu, which saw the mother of her mentally ill son in a different, yet similar position. George’s position, thus, is born out of love, and touches upon something known as ‘sympathy entrapment’ – “Entrapment merely completes the picture of human motivation by including financial and emotional issues within the set of motivations that can lead to exculpation.”As George shares a deep bond with Lennie, he is unable to envision his terrible fate, which is probably why George “hadda” do it.
The judicial system is seemingly incompetent to deal with such cases, giving very little choice to the friends and relatives of mentally ill individuals to save them. Hence, George’s action can be viewed as a kind of euthanasia to, maybe, not free him from his current situation but from that which would have caused him suffering in the future.
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