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Of Mice and Men Bunkhouse

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Submitted By Hancxck
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'What ever I do, I'll still end up at Aunty Jean's'
What do you think is Aunty Jean's importance in the novel and how does Brooks present her ? (30 marks)
Kevin Brook composes Aunty Jean as mother like figure to Martyn. Although Martyn and his Father, Billy, do not like her, she still attempts to look after Martyn like a mother. The control she has other Billy and Martyn given by Brooks has lead to Aunty Jean obtaining bad first opinions from the reader. The use of control makes conversations between Martyn and his aunty more effective.
The first impressions of Aunty Jean are giving to the reader from Billy whn he refers to Aunty Jean as 'her' and also calls her 'that bloody woman'. The description that Martyn give of her does not make her person you would want to be friends with as he uses words such as 'cold and hard', 'furious', 'mad' and 'ugly'. Aunty Jean is also seen to be a person who has to have everything perfect as she 'moans about everything in Martyn's house' and ' checks and frowns at the house'. This would upset Martyn because would be bossed around something Martyn hasn't done for many years. The importance of Billy and Martyn telling the descriptions tell us the amount of hate they have towards Aunty Jean.
Martyn lives his own life when Aunty Jean is not there due to his Dad's drinking problem and Martyn feels that he has control and can live a life with no interference. Martyn feels threatened by Aunty Jean. He fears that she will take over his life and restrict Martyn from the uncontrollable life he once had when his Dad was his carer. Martyn feels that living with Aunty Jean would make his life worse than what it already is and he tries ever so hard to prevent living with his Aunty who would have the upper hand over him. The importance of Aunty Jean scaring Martyn into the fact that he may one day lose the control he has and end up falling into the hand of his evil Aunty.
The fact that Martyn covers up his father's death shows how desperate he is to avoid living with his Aunty. This also shows the influence of the regular visits his Aunty pays to him and his father as she is behaving a noisy way trying to find out what Martyn's father is really doing and is he looking after Martyn or not. Also the visits give Martyn an idea of what it would be like to live under the same roof as his Aunty and if the visits are anything to go by Martyn would definitely not want to live there due the pressure she puts on with all the questions about how is is doing at school and if he is doing ok himself. The importance of Aunty Jean's visits show Martyn's desperation of how he does not want to leave what he has to live with his Aunty.
The use of person views towards Aunty Jean also tend to make the reader have the same biased view of Aunty Jean which affects the way the reader looks at Aunty Jean. So by the reader taking Martyn's view they will always think bad of Aunty Jean and won't see she tries to help Martyn. The use of irony when Martyn ends up living with his Aunt and finds out that she is a drinker too also shows that she was a competing with her brother and thought of the custody of Martyn as a game which shows she has little care over him either. The importance of Aunty Jean also being a drinker can give Martyn some relief that he won't live the live that he thought he was gunna live when he would eventually be taken care of by his Aunt

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