George Milton's Existence in John Steinbeck Of Mice and Men

This thesis entitled George Milton's Existence in John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men that examines existentialism in a literary work. It uses existentialism theory by Jean-Paul Sartre who argues that everyone has freedom of choices. This research also uses new criticism theory to answer the statement of the problems. The researcher uses qualitative descriptive method to explain more detail in the analysis. The statement of the problems in this study are: 1. How is George Milton characterized? 2. How does George Milton show his existence through his choices and responsibilities? 3. How does George Milton show his essence? The results of the analysis show that George Milton has some characteristic in the story: a kind person, a brave person, and a dodgy person. Then, the next result shows that George Milton is aware with his existence through the freedom of choice and the responsibilities in the journey. George Milton chooses some decisions: he escapes from the previous ranch to save Lennie—a weak person who has mental disability and often makes troubles, he keeps staying on a new ranch, he plans to buy a new house, and he keeps Lennie staying on the ranch safely. George is also responsible for the choices, his responsibilities are: looking for a new job after he leaves from the previous ranch, keeping Lennie to be safe from the cruel Curley, planning to get another job, and showing Lennie a safe place to hide when he gets into trouble. Then, the last analysis shows that he is a humanist one for helping weak people in the ranch.