Of Mice and Men is a novella by Nobel Prize winning author John Steinbeck, published in 1937, which tells the tragic story of George Milton and Lennie Small, two displaced Anglo migrant ranch workers in California during the Great Depression.
Based on Steinbeck's own experience as a bindle stiff in the 1920s before the arrival of the Okies he would vividly describe in The Grapes of Wrath, the title is taken from Robert Burns's poem, To a Mouse, which is often quoted as: "The best-laid plans of mice and men aft gang agly." Required reading in many American, Australian, British, New Zealand and Canadian high schools, Of Mice and Men has been a frequent target of censors for what some consider "offensive" and "vulgar" language, and appears on the American Library Association's list of the Most Challenged Books of 21st Century.
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