Crooks’ isolation in ‘Of Mice and Men’ Essay

1. The person who influenced Crooks to be isolated is his dad. When Crooks was a kid, he did play with some white kids. However, although those white kids were pretty nice, Crooks’ dad didn’t allow him to do, as Crooks said, â€Å"My ol’ man didn’t like that†. Thus, when Crooks was growing up, he was increasingly aware of that there exist a boundary between black people and white people that is hard to go across. As he found that â€Å"there wasn’t another colored family for miles around and now there ain’t a colored man on this ranch†, Crooks felt himself isolated because there were no black people whom he could communicate with, as he stated in the story, â€Å"If I say something, why it’s just a nigger sayin’ it.† Furthermore, the white workers on the ranch also played a major role of influencing Crooks to be isolated. They discriminated him, thought Crooks † stink† and didn’t allow Crooks to play cards together with them. This would enhance Crooks’ feeling of isolation. Therefore, both of Crooks’ dad and the white people on the ranch influenced Crooks to feel isolated and lived alone in a shed. 2. If I were Crooks, I would feel the same way as Crooks did: lonely, frustrated and helpless, just like a single man walking on the boundless desert. Whenever I am unhappy or sad, nobody talks to me and give me comforts. Crooks said, † A guy needs somebody-to be near him†¦ A guy goes nuts if he ain’t got nobody.† That’s true. This unhealthy mental state will make me feel more and more miserable; and also think that life is hopeless. That’s true. If human beings avoid communications with each other, then the life becomes boring and meaningless. Being lonely or isolated is not the nature of a person. Why does George feel bad after killing Lennie? That’s because George lost a friend whom he was used to for a long time and a sudden feeling of lonely came to his heart. So, being lonely and isolated will affect not only my emotions but also my life in a negative way. 3. When I was in elementary school, there was one student in our class who lost three fingers in a car accident at six. However, such an unlucky boy didn’t get any support from us. Instead, nobody wanted to do homework with him because he couldn’t write words quickly; nobody liked to play sports with him because he couldn’t even hold a ball in his hands; nobody would like to make friends with him because they felt embarrassed of staying with a handicapped person. Even one day he fell onto the group, nobody came to give him a hand. He never told us his name. I could notice that he felt isolated and rejected from the entire class. He usually just sat silently at one corner of the classroom in the back. After one year, he quit school and no one cared about that. While reading this chapter, Crooks’ life on the ranch reminds me of the real-life situation happened on that boy who felt lonely and isolated.