Of Mice and Men Final Test: Whole-Novella Quiz

Of Mice and Men Whole Novella questions

The answers and an explanation for each question appear as you play, and on the answer-key page of the printout.

1. Where and when is the novella set?
   The Oklahoma dust bowl before the war · California during the gold rush years · A Kansas wheat farm in the 1870s · Depression-era California ranch country
2. What does the hands' way of working - hired by the season, paid off, moved on - explain about them?
   Why none of them keeps a friend or a home · Why the ranch keeps no women on the payroll · Why they are able to save for land of their own · Why the boss must pay them more than usual
3. Curley's wife is never given a name in the book. What is the effect of that?
   It hides which of the men she grew up with · She stays a possession rather than a person · It makes her death matter less to the reader · It keeps her husband at the centre of things
4. The book is built from six scenes, each set in one place and carried mostly by dialogue. Why?
   The six chapters were written years apart · It first appeared in parts in a magazine · Steinbeck wrote it to be staged as well as read · He was copying the shape of a radio play
5. Whose pistol is used for both killings in the book?
   The boss's · Curley's · Slim's · Carlson's
6. What links the shooting of Candy's dog to the way the book ends?
   Candy's regret foreshadows George's choice · Both deaths happen in the bunkhouse at night · Both are done to settle a score with Curley · Both killings are done by Carlson's hand
7. What sets Slim apart from the other hands?
   He is the only one who can read well · The men take his judgement as final · He alone is kind to Curley's wife · He owns a share of the ranch's stock
8. Candy, Crooks and Curley's wife all want a share of what George and Lennie already have. What is it?
   A way of getting even with Curley at last · A wage better than the ranch is paying · Someone to belong with and somewhere to go · Work that does not break a man's body
9. Why does George tell the men that Lennie had the pistol and that he took it away from him?
   So Carlson will not ask for his gun · So Curley will not be blamed for it · So Candy can still be given a share · So the men read it as self-defence
10. The ranch lies near a town called Soledad. What does the name contribute?
    It names the solitude the book is about · It places the story near the Mexican border · It marks the ranch as far from any home · It shows the ranch hands are mostly Spanish

More Of Mice and Men practice: all Of Mice and Men quizzes · characters quiz · themes quiz · language & structure quiz

Original questions written for Pagine. This book is in copyright, so questions paraphrase rather than quote it.