1. Notes on language and techniques

2.  It does refer to the crushing of Curley’s hand, explain that Curley’s wife is lonely, and continue Candy’s role in the dream farm – but otherwise has few links with the rest of the novel.  So why did Steinbeck include it?

3.  The in-crowd have gone into town.  Those left behind are the misfits  They are victims of prejudice, lonely and dreamers

4.  Lennie comes in uninvited  Candy is very wary about entering the room. He has never been there before.  Curley’s wife just appears looking for Curley

5.  He is central to the chapter, but only mentioned briefly at other points in the novel

6.  The chapter begins and ends with Crooks alone rubbing ointment into his back  Crooks was cynical about the dream, then wanted to be a part of it, then changed his mind  The novel as a whole also ends at the place where it began

7.  Like the other ‘chapters’ it begins with prose description of the scene with lots of significant details  Most of the chapter is dialogue with lots of slang and dialect

9.  Notice particularly how many times he mentions ‘rights’  He explains his points in detail

10.  He is in his own world  He doesn’t interact with others, and rarely responds to their words with understanding.  Notice how many times he mentions the rabbits

11.  ‘A nigger, a dum-dum and a lousy ol’ sheep’  Curley’s wife is very racist and the word nigger is used freely, even by Crooks himself. Steinbeck was highlighting how it was for black people, not being racist himself

12.  ‘ You know what I could do.’  Curley’s wife tries to intimidate the men  Notice how different Crooks is at this point, especially in contrast to when he had the upper hand over Lennie

13.  A guy gets too lonely an’ he gets sick  This and other lines cause the reader to pity the lonely plight of the characters

14.  The farm continues to be described in an idealistic way  Note the parallels in detail between the place where Crooks was brought up and the dream farm e.g. Alfalfa  Curley’s wife has her own dream with its own language

15.  Curley’s crushed hand  Crooks’ pink palms  Candy scratching his wrist stump  Curley’s wife rubbing her nails  Hands feature all through the novel

16.  If you answer the essay questions and bring in some of the above points, with examples and explanations of why Steinbeck has used various techniques/words and how a reader may respond, and you can more or less guarantee a B.