John Steinbeck was born in 1902 in Salinas, California. His first writing success came in 1935 with Tortilla Flat, a collection of humorous stories. But Steinbeck’s writing is less about humour and more about social issues. John Steinbeck’s timeless novella Of Mice and Men was published in 1937 to considerable acclaim, and the reading public’s appreciation of the text has hardly diminished since. Steinbeck based the novella on his own experiences working alongside migrant farm workers as a teenager in the 1910s. He spent his summers working on nearby ranches and later with migrant workers on Spreckels sugar beet farms. There he learned of the harsher aspects of the migrant life and the darker side of human nature. He explored his surroundings, walking across local forests, fields, and farms. While working at Spreckels Sugar Company, he sometimes worked in their laboratory, which gave him time to write. In Of Mice and Men two migrant field workers in California on their plantation during the Great Depression, George Milton, an intelligent but uneducated man, and Lennie Small, a bulky, strong man but mentally disabled, are in Soledad on their way to another part of California. They hope to one day attain the dream of settling down on their own piece of land. Lennie's part of the dream is merely to tend and pet rabbits on the farm, as he loves touching soft animals, although he always kills them. This dream is one of Lennie's favourite stories, which George constantly retells… You can listen online to free English audiobook “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck on our website.
