Of mice and men, page 10-24

Throughout the conversation of George and Lennie on these pages, it turns out that George gets only disadvantages out of staying with Lennie. He only gets him into trouble and he could do so much more without Lennie. But he's still staying with Lennie and I really want to know why. What is Georges reason for not leaving Lennie? Also, the way they are talking to eachother makes me think they might be related in some way. Maybe, they are uncle and nephew?
I'm wondering as well how old both of them are. When I did the first part of the reading, I thought they are probably about the same age but I'm not so sure anymore. They are definitely not brothers.

On page 16, George suddenly gets really angry at Lennie. That's when we hear the story on how they got in trouble the last time; Lennie likes to pet nice things like mice. They met a woman in a nice dress and Lennie wanted to feel the dress. His action was mistaken as a try of rape and they barely got away.
Shortly after he explodes, on page 18 line 5, he feels guilty about shouting at Lennie like that. He's afraid Lennie might leave him. On line 16 though, Lennie tries to apologize by saying he was "only foolin' about the ketchup. I don't want no ketchup". It's a very childish way but to me, it's clearly a try to apologize to George for all the trouble he gets him into.
Another example that shows that Lennie likes George is the effort he puts into remembering what he's supposed to do next day because he realizes it's very important to George.
At one point, George is telling Lennie a story that he has told him before, and Lennie, though he can't remember anything else, knows this story by heart.

Of mice and men, page 3-10

On the first two pages, John Steinbeck only describes the landscape. Then, on page 5, it talks about two men which I immediately associate with the two men in the title.

The men's names are George and Lennie. George is described as "small and quick" and Lennie is described as Georges opposite. He is huge, with large, pale eyes and wide, sloping shoulders. The way George tells Lennie not to drink from the river, it seems like he takes care of Lennie. I'm wondering if they are maybe related?

The introducing part ends on page 7 line 12. That's when we first hear about the circumstances. 

We find out that they are on the way to a farm a couple miles down the road. During this conversation, it becomes clear that George is the small but smart guy and Lennie is the big, dumb guy who can't remember anything. They remind me of Asterix and Obelix somehow. We also hear that they got into trouble before.

At the end, we figure out Lennie has a dead mouse in his pocket, supposedly just because he likes to pet it.

Of mice and men by John Steinbeck

ISBN 978-3-15-009253-8

About two weeks ago, we started reading "Of mice and men" by John Steinbeck in English class. We are using the Reclam Fremdsprachentexte version of the book. It has German translations of hard words at the bottom of every page to make the reading easier.


I'm excited to read the book since I have no idea what it's about just yet.