Dreams and willpower are necessary to keep hope alive in people. What was once the land of opportunity was now the land of desperation. What was once the land of hope and optimism had become the land of despair. Sometimes these dreams become nightmares because of the hardships that are endured through the trials of life and society. Many immigrants from Europe coming to America in hope of prosperity and easy living found themselves in conditions that were paralleled by the conditions in the E

uropean slums of the inner city. Howard Levant made the statement after a critical reading of the novel that “the good life is impossible because humanity is flawed” (Owens 146). The horrors of the American Civil War and the growth of towns with slums as bad as those in Europe, and the corruption of the American political system led to many shattered dreams. For society as a whole the American dream ended with the stock market crash on Wall Street in 1929.This was the start of the Great Depression that would affect the whole world during the 1930’s. However the dream kept some hopes alive and could not be suppressed by the heartbreaking circumstances endured by all Americans. Many moved to the west in California to escape from their land in the mid west. Californians who lived through the 1920s and 1930s must have felt as though they were on a roller coaster. In a dizzying cycle of boom and bust, a decade of spectacular prosperity was followed by the worst economic collapse in the state's history. Ramshackle encampments, such as Pipe City in Oakland, filled with forlorn unemployed workers and their families. The crash of the Macon, a helium-filled dirigible, mirrored the collapsing fortunes of Californians everywhere. The hard times of the thirties contributed to a disturbing resurgence of nationalism. The farmers in the Dust Bowl area of the country were hurt by a severe drought and were forced to move to California to make any money at all, usually working as a hired hand on a large plantation with many other farmers. The resistance of the unemployed became a major factor in the political and social life of the decade. Beyond this, the movements of the jobless fuelled the organizing of workers in industrial trade unions in the late 30s and 40s and created the political impetus for the welfare state of later decades. The Great Depression struck California hard, just as it did countless other states and nations. It also helped remake California, writes Kevin Starr in the fourth instalment of his multi-volume history of

Some topics in this essay:
George Lennie, Dust Bowl, Joesph Fontenrose, Wall Street, Steinbeck Lennie, Woody Guthrie, George Lennie's, Salinas River, , Donald Pizer, george lennie, dream farm, george lennie characters, shattered dreams, sons cain, promised land, little farm, lennie characters, lennie represents, mutual commitment, lennie constantly,