The Beat Generation of the 1950’s and early 1960’s encouraged a new lifestyle for young Americans striving for individualism and freedom, which included rock and roll music, long hair, relaxed style attire, vegetarianism, and experimenting with drugs (“Beat Movement”). Many young Americans of this era wanted to experiment with new social and cultural concepts, rebelling against “normal” American life. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, written by Ken Kesey, portrays the gruesomeness of conformity through the lives of patients in one of the asylum’s wards. The novel shows how the patients are confined to strict rules and limited freedom because of Nurse Ratched’s power. The Beat Generation wanted change because of this conformity, by rebelling against the rules and structure of society. In the text, Kesey implies that conformity is damaging because he believed that conformity and mental institutions negatively impact the patients by destroying their self-esteem, while many in the ‘50s and early ‘60s believed mental institutions helped someone become a normal member of society. In the novel, the aides constantly help the patients with simple tasks. In the beginning of the book, the Nurse orders that the aides help Chief shave, “And since it is …show more content…
Through the institutions, patients had less freedom, were forced to do activities, had no say in their treatments, and had to be helped with everyday tasks. The lifestyle in mental hospitals corresponded with American life in the 1950’s and early 1960’s because the mental hospitals encouraged conformity. Even though the Beat Generation’s ideals would have been seen as outrageous in the 1950’s and 1960’s, their beliefs rejected conformity and encouraged a new lifestyle for
Final Exam: Prompt 1 In the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s nest by Ken Kesey he discusses the harsh reality of living in a mental institution in the 1950’s. Kesey looks at the world from Bromdens view point a schizophrenic patient who the other patients view as deaf and dumb, despite his ability to hear and understand them just fine. The patients being use to their routines, or living “in the fog” as Bromden calls it. This lead to an uneasy change when McMurphy arrives from a work farm, pretending to be mentally ill, and disrupts their whole way of life.
They were using these things to control the patients so that the patients would become sociable, quiet, and would conform. These treatments or therapys really were ways of manipulating the patients into acting like everyone else in society because the nurses in the mental institution as well as the rest of society and government wanted there to be no individuals, everyone had to be the same. These treatments would
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a novel written by Ken Kesey in the early 1960’s. This book displays a variety of different ideas that were coming of age during this time period. Kesey develops characters that are unique and are on different quests to find their self-knowledge and a cure for their illnesses. Kesey’s character, Nurse Ratched, is on a quest to maintain her power and dominance over the ward, the staff, and all the patients. She does this in a variety of different ways, although some think she ultimately fails at her quest at the end of the novel, she is still trying to hold true to what she is trying to do.
In One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kessey uses many themes throughout the novel. Kessey shows the role of women as emasculators and shows a negative view of women in the asylum. “She sounds like a teacher bawling out on a student” (Kessey 1). The men in the insane asylum are all under the rule of women. Miss Ratched also known as the Big Nurse is in charge and is really strict.
He went on to explain that the people in those institutions are very limited to the things they are able to do and the choices that they can make. Simple choices such as what to eat, what to wear, and what to do in your freetime are made for the mentally ill by the workers. The patients are forced to take medication against their will and are also limited to everyday things such as being outside. There is so much dehumanization that occurs that the mental hospital doesn't feel like a place where the patients are receiving help. Instead, the patients themselves refer to being at the mental hospital as “doing time” as they would in
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.
Nurse Ratched’s desire for control, in Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, allows her to manipulate the entire hospital ward into believing her work is for the betterment of the patients. Significantly, Nurse Ratched appears doll-like: hair in a tight bun, a neatly pressed uniform, and “too-red” lipstick (48). Traditionally, dolls, like other toys, are made to occupy the unruly minds of young children. By comparing Nurse Ratched to a child’s toy, Kesey implies she is a mere distraction to the patients from their mental impairments.
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.
He is able to let her insistent fit roll right off of his back, and does not let the Nurse’s conformity affect him the way that his individuality cripples her. Overall, Kesey believes that individuality will ultimately
The rules were to remain unbroken and accepted, resulting in a vanish of varied personalities. Taking place in the 1960s, anyone who took an oppositional stance was considered traitorous and daring, in both the novel and in the real world. Randle McMurphy is the freedom fighter of the novel. Kesey incorporates him as a free thinker, in order to open the eyes of others in the ward. As the protagonist, McMurphy helps the men see that their lives are worth much more than what they have been convinced by the Big Nurse.
In Ken Kesey’s novel, One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the main theme that society embraces people who conform to oppressive standards is reiterated numerous times throughout the book. The book is narrated by a schizophrenic, Native American man named Chief Bromden. He is large in physical stature, but is often treated as if he were invisible. Kesey depicts conformity through Bromden’s lack of perception of how size is related to power, and how Bromden’s view evolves following McMurphy’s arrival on the psychiatric ward. Prior to Randle McMurphy’s arrival on the ward, Chief Bromden spent most of his time in a delusional fog, in which he was able to protect himself from the realization that he is a big person.
Throughout the years, the attitude towards the mentally ill has changed, but not by very much. As a result, changes have occurred within their support system. Those in counseling have tried to figure out what caused the negative stigma about the mentally ill, and how to change these perceived thoughts. The Snake Pit, a 1948 film, was one of the first movies to cast the mentally ill in a negative light, and consequently, movies like this continue to make those who are uneducated see the mentally ill as ‘evil’ or frightening. In 1975, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest tried to reverse the stigma by portraying the mental health doctors as the sadistic ones.
Mental illness has proven to be one of the most controversial topics, leading to a severe stigma surrounding it. In the time that Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest was written, people who were rejected and outcast from society for either being gay or too feminine were considered as mentally ill and were placed in mental asylums, similar to the one present in the narrative. These men were judged solely on their lack of masculinity, and were further stripped of this characteristic by the women in the novel. Ken Kesey illustrates that the imbalance of control between genders leads to a continuous power struggle through the symbolism of Nurse Ratched’s uniform, Bromden’s schizophrenic episodes and flashbacks, and the characterization
In his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Kesey takes readers “to the heart” of both Randle Patrick McMurphy and Nurse Ratched to a great degree of success. He does this primarily through the perceptive description of these characters by Chief Bromden, and particularly his impressions of both characters and their actions as a patient of the ward, as well as the contrast and power struggle between McMurphy and Nurse Ratched and their opposing ideas. This characterisation in turn helps to develop ideas about the nature of power, society, and masculinity. Randle Patrick McMurphy is a rowdy, “good looking” (p27) and “friendly” (p27) man who makes certain to disobey the rules as soon as he enters the ward.
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.