...Ms. Latasha Keith HUMN401-1305B-01: Literature and Film Professor Bonnie Ronson January 19, 2014 Unit 2 Individual Project – Canonical Classics of Literature Section 1- Introduction Ken Kesey’s novel “One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest” is set at an Oregon asylum in the 1950s (NovelGuide.com). The book is a study in the institutional process of the human mind, a critique of Behaviorism and a celebration of humanistic principles while exploring themes of individuality and rebellion against socially imposed repression (NovelGuide.com; SparkNotes.com; CliffsNotes.com). These themes and ideas were the topic of discussion during the publication of this novel because the world was introduced to communism and totalitarian regimes. The novel was published in 1962 and received with immediate success (SparkNotes.com). Section 2 – Biographical Information La Junta, Colorado is the birthplace of novelist Ken Kesey. He was born in 1935 and grew up on a small farm in Oregon and Colorado with his family. He married his high school sweetheart in 1956 and they had three children together (Lone Star College). He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Oregon where he participated in wrestling and theater in 1957 (Lone Star College; SparkNotes.com). In 1959, Kesey enrolled in a creative writing program at Stanford University, the same year where he began volunteering with the Stanford Psychology Department (CliffsNotes.com; Lone Star College). The Stanford Psychology...
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...The Power of Rebellion Rebellion is the only power against tyranny in this world. Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest addresses the power of rebellion against a tyrannical force through the relationship between protagonist R.P. McMurphy and antagonist Nurse Ratched. Through the use of diction, figurative language and symbolism, Kesey illuminates rebellion kindled by McMurphy as a force that degrades the power of Nurse Ratched. The use of diction in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a key component to revealing the influence of McMurphy’s rebellion. The use of diction can be seen as Nurse Ratched’s “remote patience” begins to diminish following the destruction of the glass pane in front of her nurses’ station (Kesey 207). In this instance, Nurse Ratched’s forced patience with McMurphy is wearing down due to his repeated defiant acts. The word “remote” to describe Nurse Ratched’s patience, a patience she forces in order to maintain her calm, collected façade, reveals the influence of McMurphy’s rebellious actions. No longer is Nurse Ratched able to adequately mask her intolerance with the patients, which in turn demonstrates the breakdown of her control over said patients. Diction once again exposes Nurse Ratched’s loss of power as she “jerk[s] the adhesive as tight as she [can]” on McMurphy’s bandage (207). This rough physical movement indicates that Nurse Ratched is not pleased to be bandaging the hand of the man who shattered glass just to test her patience...
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...Kesey and Weir both explore the struggle for independence by enforcing similar settings and contrasting characterisation in their two individual texts, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Dead Poet’s Society. At first glance, many would argue that there could not be two settings more dissimilar than a men’s mental institution, and a boy’s private school. However, both texts are set in heavily instituonalised arenas, where the individuals within the communities have had their independence and freedom stolen by overpowering figures of authority. Although the setting of the two institutions is contradictory in various ways; the warm, bricked and neat academy against the blinding white hospital walls; the oppression and rigidity between the two is evident. Both pieces introduce an...
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...Jordan Begley 1-21-14 The Individual and The System One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest Many social issues and problems are explored in Ken Kesey's novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Perhaps the most obvious complaint against society is the treatment of the individual. This problem of the individual versus the system is a very controversial topic that has provoked great questioning of the government and the methods used to treat people who are unable to conform to the government's standards. McMurphy is an individual who is challenging and rebelling against the system's rules and practices. He eventually teaches this practice of rebellion to the other patients who begin to realize that their lives are being controlled unfairly by the mental institution. When McMurphy first arrives at the institution, all of the other patients are afraid to express their thoughts to the Big Nurse. They are afraid to exercise their thoughts freely, and they believe that the Big Nurse will punish them if they question her authority. One patient, Harding, says, "All of us in here are rabbits of varying ages and degrees...We need a good strong wolf like the nurse to teach us our place" (Kesey 62). This novel has a very strong theme of government rejecting those who are considered nonconformists in modern society. The government then places these nonconformists in mental...
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...Dyman Fisher Mr. Nardone AP English 24 November 2012 Critical Paper The Novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey is narrated by Chief Bromden, a patient in an Oregon psychiatric hospital. The lives of the men in this hospital are dictated by the "Big Nurse" also known as Nurse Ratched. Nurse Ratched is a tyrant who gains power by emasculating the men and carrying off a sexless persona. She has complete dominance of the men and there is no rebellion until a patient by the name of Randall McMurphy comes and disrupts the matriarchal system of the ward. McMurphy is the Christ figure, or tragic hero, of the novel. McMurphy is depicted as a Christ figure when he first arrives at the asylum. He is "baptized by a shower when he first enters...
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...Work Cited Kesey,Ken. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. New York: New American Library,1962.Print 2012 English Summer Reading Assignment COVER SHEET Complete this form and all assignment requirements. Attach this to the TWO-COLUMN JOURNAL as a cover sheet. All assignments are due to your English teacher on the first official day of school. Note that the Parent/Guardian verification section MUST be complete to receive credit. Parent/Guardian Verification I verify that____Arbaz Khan____completed his/her summer reading of (Student’s Name—Please Print) _________One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest________. (Title(s) of Work(s)—Please Print) Parent/Guardian signature: ___________________________________________ Date: ______________8/28/2012___________________ MLA Format Book Citation(s): Kesey,Ken. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. New York: New American Library,1962.Print ----------------------- 5. “A sound of cornered-animal fear and hate and surrender and defiance, that if you ever trailed coon or cougar lynx is like the last sound the treed and shot and falling animal makes as the dogs get him, when he finally doesn’t care any more about anything but himself and dying,”(Kesey,267) allows the patients to conform to the oppressive Combine. McMurphy’s arrival ,with his consistent laughter, showed how he was an obvious rival to the well reserved...
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...In One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, author Ken Kesey focuses on how modern society oppresses those who do not fit into the mold of what is considered normal. In the mental ward that the book takes place in, Randle McMurphy continually rebels against the tyrannical Nurse Ratched, who symbolizes modern society in Kesey’s book. McMurphy, although unaware in the beginning of the horrible experiences the patients go through at the hands of Nurse Ratched, starts an uprising against Nurse Ratched and ends up sacrificing himself so his fellow patients can gain their freedom. Initially entering the asylum, McMurphy was not insane. He chose to go to the hospital instead of serving a six month sentence at a work camp because he thought it would be easier. In the beginning, McMurphy is immediately labeled as different; unlike the other patients who have been forced to repress their emotions due to Nurse Ratched, McMurphy is described as a big, vulgar, sexual, funny man whose loud laugh shocks the patients. This shows two things; one, McMurphy does not truly understand the pain or suffering that comes from being oppressed by a society yet, which leads to the second point. Because McMurphy is both not oppressed and still has his...
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...Big Brother is never seen and does not really exist, but he is used as the method of control by the government to maintain the power they desire over the citizens of Oceania. Comparing this to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Nurse Ratched similarly uses manipulation and fear to control the ward. She does not hesitate to do what it takes to maintain control of the ward. Nurse Ratched uses intimidation and humiliates, and debases the men in the therapeutic meetings to keep herself in a position of control. In their daily group meetings, she will often pick out one man and make him feel so uncomfortable and force him to tell his life story, even if he has never done anything wrong. She will then make fear grow within them by asking leading questions, twisting their words and never shows any sympathy to what they are saying. By doing this, Nurse Ratched is ensuring that she keeps complete control and power over the group. At one point in the novel, when everyone starts shouting their secrets, Chief Bromden says, “It was better than she'd...
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...then the ‘60s and ‘70s belonged to Ken Kesey. Being a novelist in this time period, Kesey had close affiliations with the counterculture that dominated the decade. In its own way One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is the twentieth-century Romantic manifesto, a ululation for the death of the individual before this rebellion went out of style and individualism along with it. This book verbalized what many where thinking: that the truly crazy in the world were the ones who wanted power while the truly sane were the ones who sought to be individuals and rebelled against authority. Because of this pronounced effect on society the book was a major contributor to the backlash against the entire psychiatric system in the early 1960s. As a result, state institutions began reducing their resident numbers and granting admitted patients more rights within the institutions. In addition to this change in the system, the book also pushed the development of more effective anti-psychotic drugs, thus allowing more patients to be treated within their own homes and live normal lives. Yet for many health professionals the book also had a profound negative effect, consequently changing the overall...
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...Ramandeep Lobana, ENG 4UO-A Wednesday July 16th, 2014 A Comparison of the Fatherly Figures in William Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1 and Dale Wasserman’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest A father figure is a man to whom a person looks up to and whom he treats like a father. Fathers who have an involved relationship with children are more likely to have an impact on their social and emotional development (Rosenberg). In the play, Henry IV ,Part 1 by William Shakespeare, there are two main plots that converge in a melodramatic action at the end. One of the plots is between Hal and his relationship with his father whereas the second plot is about Hotspur and other noblemen that form a rebellion against King Henry. In the other play, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Dale Wasserman, McMurphy, the protagonist, rebels against the authority of Nurse Ratched, the antagonist, to change the way the patients are treated. Through genuine love and leading Hal and the patients, both McMurphy and Falstaff act as father figures. However, McMurphy protects his patients whereas Falstaff’s cowardly behaviour restrains him from helping Hal. To start off, McMurphy and Falstaff give Hal and the patients advice that guides them and helps them cope with their difficulties. Firstly, McMurphy tries to educate the patients to give them a better understanding of Nurse Ratched's real personality. For example, when the patients tell McMurphy how caring Nurse Ratched is, McMurphy furiously tells...
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...Ken Kesey’s, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, takes place in an Oregon psychiatric institution. On the surface, the major characters in this book all seem like your average mental health patients and that their stories are all open and shut cases about people who are institutionalized because they are simply crazy. However, this is a book that deals with social issues that give a reader the opportunity to understand the complexity of who we are, how different we are from one another, and what influences each one of us. Inside the mental institution, each character could be the same as anyone else outside the walls in which they are confined. These characters represent a microcosm of what exists in everyday life in the outside world. In the “real world” as we know it, there are paranoid people like Chief Bromden; obsessive compulsives like George Sorenson; or someone like Randy McMurphy, who chose the mental institution as the lesser of two evils to pay for a crime he committed. In One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the most prominent social conflict emerges through the character of Randle McMurphy. McMurphy was the protagonist in this book and he was the one who showed the patients the way to rebuff the system, laugh, and defy authority through humor. The patients began to find strength in his leadership. However, McMurphy came to realize that the very people he was defying were the same people who would determine the timeframe of his release from the hospital. ...
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...Philosopher and writer Albert Camus exclaimed that “The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion”. Albert Camus in his quote tries to justify how simple an act of rebellion can be demonstrated, for one to rebel is for them to not be under the control or in the power of another. For someone's existence to be an act of rebellion is for them to challenge what is deemed to be accepted by a oppressive governed society. One’s existence in a non dictated society should allow for liberty in a political community where anyone can voice his/her opinion with full comfort and in turn should be recognized by any authority who governs them. However in an environment where one is...
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...I believe that this book, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, will be read 100 years from now as it provides an example of what our mental health care system may be like as of now. The events of this book are negative, the hierarchy of the future can use this as a manual on what to do and what not to do with regards to running a mental health care ward. One of the main themes of this book is emasculation by a head female figure and this is happening more often in today’s society though not much light is shed on it as most men are embarrassed by this. Nurse Ratched represents a kind of dictatorship in which the ward uses fear, suppression of their sexuality and their own personal insecurities to keep them in check. During their group therapy sessions she even turns them against each other by choosing one patient and having the others, what McMurphy calls, “peck at him”....
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...Part One: Plot/Form/Structure/Rhetorical Mode The novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kessey is organized into four parts with a total of twenty-nine chapters in the entire book. While there are four parts, the number of chapters in each part varies. Part one has the most, 15 chapters, while part 3 has the least, 2 chapters. Parts two and four have eight and four chapter, respectively. The story is told in chronological order over the course of what seems to be a few months, but it is impossible to be entirely sure how much time passes in the story. The story is narrated by a patient in the ward, known as Chief Bromden. Though Chief, as he is often called in the story, is six-foot seven-inches, he is described by his fellow ward mates as “scared of his own shadow.” Also, everyone in the ward believes Chief is deaf. In the beginning of part one, the characters are introduced, and the daily routine of the ward is explained. Each day is generally the same, starting with breakfast and showers, followed by chore time, group therapy, and free time. The patients are split into two groups: Acutes, people who are are thought to be curable, and the Chronics, those who are thought of as incurable. The days in the ward are very monotonous, but this all comes to an end when Randle...
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...explored in Ken Kesey's novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Perhaps the most obvious complaint against society is the treatment of the individual. This problem of the individual versus the system is a very controversial topic that has provoked great questioning of the government and the methods used to treat people who are unable to conform to the government's standards. McMurphy is an individual who is challenging and rebelling against the system's rules and practices. He eventually teaches this practice of rebellion to the other patients who begin to realize that their lives are being controlled unfairly by the mental institution. When McMurphy first arrives at the institution, all of the other patients are afraid to express their thoughts to the Big Nurse. They are afraid to exercise their thoughts freely, and they believe that the Big Nurse will punish them if they question her authority. One patient, Harding, says, "All of us in here are rabbits of varying ages and degrees...We need a good strong wolf like the nurse to teach us our place" (Kesey 62). This novel has a very strong theme of government rejecting those who are considered nonconformists in modern society. The government then places these nonconformists in mental institutions so it will not have to deal with them. This is society's way of ditching those with nonconformist attitudes so they will disappear from the world and be forgotten. According to one critic, oppressive, conformist...
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