ABSTRACT
This paper attempts to amplify the theme of loss of American Dream in John Steinbeck’s novella Of Mice and Men (1937) and further investigate to trace out an ever lurking blue print of social realism in Of Mice and Men of John Steinbeck; the Nobel laureate of literature (1962) well known "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social perception" . He has well proven his expertise in literary art through his great works like Of Mice and Men (1937), The Grapes of Wrath (1939), East of Eden) and so on. In Of Mice and Men one can truly experience the preciseness with which Steinbeck has depicted the low class livelihood of the ranch dwellers. He has utilized the every bit of his experience of spending summers working in the nearby ranches and later with the migrant workers of Speckles of Sugar beet farms. Steinbeck has a great perception of reality of life thus has expressed so well in this novel through slow and calm start just as a line of graph starts in the upward direction reaching to the highest peak with near surety of fulfilment of the dream ever dreamt and finally as expected harsh lethal blow of life, shattering dreams to ground akin to the graph line falling at the same angle with which it had raised earlier to the highest peak portraying a parabolic image of life in reality. In which the whole area covered with the graph is the area of American Dream representing the futile hollowness and uncertainty of its fulfilment.
Keywords: American dream, Blue print, Social realism, Distorted aims.