Three key traits of Curley (with supporting quotes)
-
Aggressive / Pugnacious
Curley often picks fights and looks for reasons to assert himself physically — he provokes others to prove he is tough.
Curley stepped over to Lennie like a terrier. "What the hell you laughin' at?"
— Chapter 3 -
Insecure / Jealous
Curley’s aggression is partly driven by insecurity about his small stature and by jealousy (especially regarding his wife and larger men).
"He's alla time pickin' scraps with big guys. Kind of like he's mad because he's not a big guy."
— Chapter 2 (Slim's observation) -
Authoritarian / Status-conscious
As the boss's son, Curley emphasizes his status and distance from the ranch hands and tries to control situations to enforce that status.
"He wore a work glove on his left hand, and a small, brown glove on the other, to be fancy. He wore high-heeled boots and spurs to prove he was not a laboring man."
— Chapter 2
Note: Page numbers vary between publishers and printings. I have given chapter references because those are consistent. If you tell me the edition (publisher and year, or the classroom copy you have), I can provide exact page numbers for that edition.