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How can you explain the hallucinations that Lennie has while he waits for George?

Of Mice and Men is a novel-as-play as was Steinbeck's later effort, Burning Bright. The constraints of the stage may ultimately be the most effective explanation for Lennie's vision of a giant rabbit and his deceased aunt.


Even so, the highly practical and persuasive explanation provided in the other post here can perhaps be supplemented by a more diegetic (inside the story) explanation of Lennie's hallucinations and by an additional reading of Lennie as a figure intended to be preyed upon in a system that roots out psychological weakness. 


There is a temptation to see Lennie's hallucinations at the end of the story as emanations of the Freudian psyche. Specifically, Lennie's visions of his Aunt Clara and the giant rabbit seem to align well with the idea of the Super-Ego, the portion of Freud's tripartite psyche associated with morality and socialization. 


The figures of Lennie's hallucinations chastise him and express the negative views that society will have on Lennie's behavior. Aunt Clara tells Lennie that he "don't never take no care" and that he does bad things, never appreciating his sole caretaker and friend, George. The rabbit proclaims that Lennie is crazy and that George is going to punish then abandon him. 



"He gonna leave you, ya crazy bastard. He gonna leave ya all alone. He gonna leave ya, crazy bastard."



In these exchanges, we might see Lennie's social conscience working through the hallucinations and connect them to the notion of his Super-Ego. Taking this interpretation, we might note that Lennie seems divorced from the point of view being expressed by his aunt and by the rabbit. Although he is aware of society's views and mores, he is incapable of integrating them into his own behavior. He is wild, like the rabbit, and he is destined to disappoint those who care for him, like Aunt Clara. 


The phrase "crazy" may have powerful implications here as well. If Steinbeck intends for Lennie to be seen as a victim of an unforgiving system, this term becomes more than a colloquial exaggeration. Rather, "crazy" becomes a mark of doom for Lennie because it is a weakness that will make him a target. 


Steinbeck's biographer, Jackson Benson, suggests that Lennie fits a pattern that appears through much of Steinbeck's work and that is informed by a pervasive philosophical attitude. 



"People who act by their dreams are defeated; people who try to change things are usually unsuccessful. The best that man can hope for is to be able to adapt to what is and to survive. There is even a natural selection in his work. The weak, the deformed, the deficient [...] do not survive."



Lennie's hallucinations then might be seen as proof of an inability to adapt that, coupled with a tendency to act by his dreams, set Lennie on a path to certain destruction in the Steinbeck cosmos. Not only is Lennie incapable of integrating socially and thereby adapting, he is incapable of integrating his own psyche. He is a broken man. 


Alternatively, we might see the hallucinations as a simple indication that Lennie was not in control of his own mind and therefore not in control of his own behavior. This helps us to see Lennie as a victim - - a victim of his own weaknesses - - to be pitied and to be understood as a symbol of the difficulties we all face in attempting to live socialized lives in a competitive system. 

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