One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest is a novel that features Randle McMurphy as an unscrupulous anti-hero in a mental hospital ward. Harrison Bergeron is a short story that highlights the main character, Harrison Bergeron, as an anti-hero in a fully dystopian society. McMurphy can be classified as charismatic and charming at times, but is very rebellious and wants to suppress his arch nemesis, Nurse Ratched. Harrison Bergeron has an unmatched obsession for overthrowing the government which attempts to suppress individual talents and people’s unique abilities. Both Randle McMurphy and Harrison Bergeron are what are known as unscrupulous anti-heroes.
Imagine a life where people ignore us and treat us as if we were not even there, simply because they believe we do not have the same mental age as our peers and cannot hear. All on a day to day basis. When entering One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey, one can tell that Chief Bromden, our Indian narrator, is fully aware of his surroundings and does not live up to the statement above; even though the nurses and aids in the ward think otherwise. In this novel, we see how Chief Bromden comes to understand that he is not the one who started to present himself as deaf and dumb, but it was the people around him that thought he was too dumb to hear what they were saying. Through Kesey’s writing, we come to see how McMurphy, a rough-n-tough fighting man, helps Chief regain his ability of speech and build his emotional and “physical” strength back to its fullest potential.
Title: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest The title One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is directly referring to a character. The character who went over the Cuckoo’s Nest was McMurphy. This makes the connection that the asylum is truly a Cuckoo’s Nest full of insane men.
One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey reveals the insensitive treatment and dehumanization of the mentally ill. The origin of the book is a story of an individual in a mental hospital. Ken Kesey’s character observes the daily life in a psych ward and reveals
In Ken Kesey’s 1962 novel ‘One flew over the cuckoo’s nest’ the main character and narrator, Chief Bromden, is noticeably stuck inside his own head as he acts deaf and dumb to escape the pressures of being a part of something. As the novel moves on, for someone who’s perception of living is to stay transparent and withdrawn totally inside himself the Chief takes a transformation from his delusional mind and gains strength physically and mentally, creating a journey towards freedom and finally, breaking free from the ward and from himself. Kesey uses the transformation to unravel a number of ideas about the importance of freedom and explores how the pressures of society can lead individuals to conform within themselves. The theories Chief believes
Kesey has used characterisation to get the idea that in this novel there are aspects of venerability and strength. In Nurse Ratched’s case, Kesey has made it so that she is shown with strength and power over the whole ward, including the black men in white, other nurses, and mainly the patients. An example of Nurse Ratched’s power over the patients is when she says to Billy Bibbit, “What worries me, Billy, ' she said- I could hear the change in her voice- 'is how your mother is going to take this.” This shows how one sentence was able to debilitate Billy into begging Nurse for forgiveness and restraint of telling his mother.
The movie “One flew over the cuckoo’s nest” gives an inside look into the life of a patient living in a mental institution; helping to give a new definition of mental illnesses. From a medical standpoint, determinants of mental illness are considered to be internal; physically and in the mind, while they are seen as external; in the environment or the person’s social situation, from a sociological perspective (Stockton, 2014). Additionally, the movie also explores the idea of power relations that exist between an authorized person (Nurse Ratched) and a patient and further looks into the punishment a deviant actor receives (ie. McMurphy contesting Nurse Ratched). One of the sociological themes that I have observed is conformity.
Ken Kesey’s comic novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, takes place in an all-male psychiatric ward. The head of the ward, Big Nurse Ratched, is female. Kesey explores the power-struggle that takes place when the characters challenge gender dynamics in this environment. One newly-arrived patient, McMurphy, leads the men against the Big Nurse. The story is told through the eyes of Chief Bromden, a patient who learns from McMurphy and fights for his freedom.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest written, by Ken Kesey, is a novel that takes place in a psychiatric hospital during the 1950s and is told through the perspective of Chief Bromden, a schizophrenic patient within the ward. Patients in this ward are divided into two categories. There are Chronics. These are patients that have no hope of being treated or cured. Secondly, there are acute patients who are still treatable and capable of some independent functioning.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey, considers the qualities in which society determines sanity. The label of insanity is given when someone is different from the perceived norm. Conversely, a person is perceived as sane when their behavior is consistent with the beliefs of the majority. Although the characters of this novel are patients of a mental institution, they all show qualities of sanity. The book is narrated by Chief Brodmen, an observant chronic psychiatric patient, who many believe to be deaf and dumb.
Ken Kesey’s figurative language in his novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, illustrates that a broken individual can be made whole again. Throughout his life, Bromden has always been assumed to be deaf and dumb. When he speaks to people, their “machinery disposes of the words like they were not even spoken” (181). Here, Kesey’s metaphor represents the effect that Bromden’s words have on a mind plagued with societal expectations. Bromden is a large, Native American man that does not conform to the mold set by the Combine.
Weather in literature is often used to symbolize the mood or mental state in which a character experiences. For example, rain is commonly associated with sadness. As it is commonly identified, fog is a cloudy element of weather that affects one’s ability to see clearly, however, it is also used in literature to represent a character’s lack of clarity. Throughout One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey, the motif of fog is used to represent the mental instability and confusion Bromden experiences under Nurse Ratched’s ward. As the story progresses and Bromden gains confidence, the fog diminishes and he is able to overcome the Big Nurse.
Ken Kesey uses his novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, to describe the lives of patients in a mental institution, and their struggle to overcome the oppressive authority under which they are living. Told from the point of view of a supposedly mute schizophrenic, the novel also shines a light on the many disorders present in the patients, as well as how their illnesses affect their lives during a time when little known about these disorders, and when patients living with these illnesses were seen as an extreme threat. Chief Bromden, the narrator of the novel, has many mental illnesses, but he learns to accept himself and embrace his differences. Through the heroism introduced through Randle McMurphy, Chief becomes confident in himself, and is ultimately able to escape from the toxic environment Nurse Ratched has created on the ward. Chief has many disorders including schizophrenia, paranoia, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder, and, in addition to these illnesses, he pretends to be deaf and dumb.
Moral Lense Literary Analysis of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest The 1950s, the context of which One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, a novel by Ken Kesey, was written, was called the Era of Conformity. During this time, the American social atmosphere was quiet conformed, in that everyone was expected to follow the same, fixed format of behavior in society, and the ones who stand out of being not the same would likely be “beaten down” by the social norms. In the novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Kesey argues that it is immoral for society to simply push its beliefs onto the people who are deemed different, as it is unfair and could lead to destructive results. First of all, it is unjust for people who are deemed unalike from others in society to be forced into the preset way of conduct because human tend to have dissimilar nature.
His rebellious and free mind makes the patients open their eyes and see how the have been suppressed. His appearance is a breath of fresh air and a look into the outside world for the patients. This clearly weakens Nurse Ratched’s powers, and she sees him as a large threat. One way or another, McMurphy tends to instigate changes of scenery. He manages to move everyone away from her music and watchful eye into the old tube room.
