Chief Bromden's Escape in Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest
How can you be big and small at the same time? In Ken Kesey's novel, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, Chief Bromden is one of the inmates in an insane asylum who escapes the Institution. Many of the other inmates are afraid of the Institution and cannot escape. How does Chief escape? McMurphy helps him break free. He teaches Chief how to be strong and independent again. He listens to Chief and helps him get back his self-confidence. McMurphy influences Chief to do things for himself. Having this help, Chief finds himself and his self-confidence. This leads to Chief escaping the Institution because he can face the world on his own without hiding under a false identity of being deaf.
Chief Bromden is a six foot seven tall Native American (half) who feels very small and weak even though by physical description, he is very big and strong. Chief does not have enough self-confidence and he is not independent. That is what makes him so small and weak. When Randle McMurphy, the new inmate in the asylum comes in, Chief is reminded of what his father used to be: strong, independent, confident and big. "He talks a little the way papa used to, voice loud and full of hell
" (16) McMurphy helps Chief gains back his self-confidence and teaches him to be independent.
In the control panel scene, McMurphy bets with the other men that he can lift the control panel even though it is too heavy for him. He is teaching Chief and the other inmates that even if you think you can't do something, you have to try. If you try and you fail that will be okay, but if you never try, you don't know what you can do. The other men and Chief have never tried to rebel against Nurse Ratched and the institution. They have watched others fail so they are afraid to try; but they are different. If they try, they might be able to defeat Nurse Ratched. They do not know about their own abilities. They lack the self-confidence and courage to do it for themselves. So McMurphy shows them how to try. "But I tried, though,' he says. Goddammit, I sure as hell did that much, now, didn't I?"(111)
During the second World Series vote, McMurphy gets Chief and twenty of the Acutes to raise their hands up.
Chief Bromden’s development in the story was evident mostly by his narrations throughout the story. Kesey created Chief’s initial character to be anxious and uncomfortable. This is most evident when he speaks about a certain “fog” in his narrations. The “fog” he hallucinates about may have been included as imagery of his inner apprehension and nervousness. "It's still hard for me to have clear mind thinking on it. But it's the truth even if it didn't happen"(13). Bromden had come to the conclusion that the fog was not real, but had trouble trying not to think about it. “When the fog clears to where I can see, I’m sitting in the dayroom” (9). This quote makes the reader feel that Bromden’s angst may cloud his perception and represent his desire to hide from reality. Besides the fog, Bromden als...
White characters such as Nurse Ratched and McMurphy show surprise that he is able to speak and understand them while the black boys claim that Indians can't read or write. Bromden justifies that he is victim to racial inequality when people look "at me [him] like I'm [he’s] some kind of bug" (26) or when people "see right through me [him] like I [he] wasn't there." Throughout Bromden's childhood, he realized that the white people thought he was deaf and mute and that even if he spoke, no one could hear him. In order to survive through the dangers of the social hierarchy he existed in through the ward, he feigns deafness. Bromden points out that, "it wasn't me that started acting deaf; it was people that first started acting like I was too dumb to hear or see or say anything at all." (178) Bromden, has also been constantly abused by the staff and other patients at the ward who call him Chief Broom, a derogation of his name as Chief and a mockery of his floor mopping “duties” in the ward that the black boys force upon him. Bromden's circumstances is illustrative of his race and of his entire tribe. The social criticism that Kesey portrays, emerges piecemeal through Bromden’s constant flashbacks and hallucinations of his village. Kesey compares Native Indian cohesion with the new estrangement accompanying the loss of Indian cultures and the adjustment of a white lifestyle to show the social unity once created by Indian traditions. By the end of
Bromden is nothing more than a crazy Indian who doesn't want to talk so. pretends to be deaf and dumb. Much of the understanding and respect is lost in the transition between book and movie. In the book, Bromden has flashbacks to his childhood, lighting on significant points in his childhood. His background is never even brushed upon in the movie. Of course it would have been nearly impossible to tell of Bromdens life in a movie, much less show the world from his point of view as in the book. Bromden is still a very interesting character but the real puzzle to his problems are lost in the process. & nbsp; McMurphy is a very sly, cunning man. He knows how to play his game. and does it well.
From the moment McMurphy enters the ward it is clear to all that he is different and hard to control. He’s seen as a figure the rest of the patients can look up to and he raises their hopes in taking back power from the big nurse. The other patients identify McMurphy as a leader when he first stands up to the nurse at her group therapy, saying that she has manipulated them all to become “a bunch of chickens at a pecking party”(Kesey 55). He tells the patients that they do not have to listen to Nurse Ratched and he confronts her tactics and motives. The patients see him as a leader at this point, but McMurphy does not see the need for him to be leading alone. McMurphy is a strong willed and opinionated man, so when he arrives at the ward he fails to comprehend why the men live in fear, until Harding explains it to him by
They both realize that in order to get their own way, they must gain control over their rival and the ward. McMurphy and Nurse Ratched have different methods of attaining and using what control they have. They have different motives for seeking control over others. They also have different perceptions of the amount of control they possess. Throughout the novel, these two characters engulf themselves in an epic struggle for the most control.
Tom Burwell,“whom the whole town called Big Boy” (Jean Toomer 39) and aptly so, is a manchild who never reaches maturity and understanding because of the environment around him.
When you first pick up the book, you will first notice that the story is told by one of the men who live in the ward. This is Chief Bromden; a half-Indian who is one of the long time committed men. In my eyes, the Bromden is a key character in the whole book. The Chief, in reality, is 6 foot 7 inches tall, but in his mind he sees himself as a man only two or three feet tall.
Bigger is a young black man living in the Southside of Chicago with his mother and two younger siblings. His family lives in a one room apartment, leaving little space for privacy. After being awoken by the sudden clang of an alarm clock, the Thomas’s start their day like every other before it. As the family is getting dressed a large rat runs into the room, causing chaos. Bigger trapped the rat in a box, giving it no way to escape. Looking at Bigger “the rat’s belly pulsed with fear. Bigger advanced a step and the rat emitted a long thin song of defiance, its black beady eyes glittering” (Wright 6). The fear that pulses in the belly of the rat is the same fear that runs through Bigger. Bigger is trapped within the physical walls of his run-down apartment and the city lines that the white society has put around the Chicago Black Belt. Bigger and the black community have no choice or way to escape. The confinement of these areas causes Bigger to feel confusion and anger towards those who have put him
Gibson and Mika Haritos-Fatouros, they inform readers about psychologist Stanley Milgram’s studies. “Milgram proposed that the reasons people obey or disobey authority fall into three categories. The first is personal history family or school backgrounds that encourage obedience or defiance. The second, which he called “binding,” is made up of ongoing experiences that make people feel comfortable when they obey authority. Strain, the third category, consists of bad feelings from unpleasant experiences connected with obedience,” ( Milgram 247). Although the nurse isn’t harmful the patients still feel obligated to respect and obey her. The complication begins when McMurphy joins the group. First of all, Randle McMurphy is not disturbed, he’s not crazy. He’s just a rebellious man who doesn’t follow any orders. He had the group steal a bus and steal a boat to go fishing and so he could spend time with his old friend Candy. He doesn’t respect Nurse Ratched and always seems to have a problem with her. He causes everyone to speak up, which isn’t a bad thing but causes disorder and the patients act up. For example, the scene where Cheswick starts yelling at the nurse and disobeys her orders doesn’t sit down and pouts about not getting his cigarettes back. From the start of the movie to the middle it seems that they were gaining a new authority figure, McMurphy himself. “The Greek example illustrates how the ability to torture can be taught. Training that increases binding and reduces strain can cause decent people to commit acts, often over long periods of time, that otherwise would be unthinkable for them” (Gibson, Haritos-Fatouros 249). The rebellious Mac has an influence on the rest of the ward to think it is okay to be against the rules. The quote “You bargained your freedom for the comfort of discipline,” (Jones Gibson, Haritos-Fatouros 247) has a similar meaning to McMurphy's actions. Mac gets a bit out of
...ed. He had to cover his eyes and his mother and sister dress out of respect. To understand Bigger is to understand his mindset, and I agree with the critic when he goes to explain there is nothing to do with the environment but the way that you react with being in that environment. Biggers hardship truly made it easier to understand the way that a black male thinks while not have a male role model or support from your mother in these times encouraging him to be the best man that he can but being hard on him to be the man that she believed that men of Biggers race she be, act and the thing that Bigger does. Everything has a reason but once you’re pushed to the edge there is nothing left to do but jump of move aside and let the other person fall. In this case Bigger fell because his mind wasn’t strong enough to understand that he could go about things differently.
On the morning of the fishing trip on Nurse Ratched's ward, one of Ratched's aides called Bromden illiterate because he was half-Indian. The General statement made by the aid, which was in the quote "`Why, who you s'pose signed chief Bromden up for this foolishness? Inniuns ain't able to write.'" (191), describes Kesey's racism toward Indians. The quote reflects how Indians in Kesey's novel are portrayed as illiterate. Bromden also represents the Indians as imprisoned at the mercy of white people. In Kesey's novel Indians, such as Bromden's father were forced to hand over their land to white people. The Indians' land was very important to them and being forced to give up land was essentially giving up their freedom.
Chief Bromden dealt with many difficulties throughout his life in his village and in the army which ultimately caused him to become scared and anxious. This fear and anxiety made him believe that he “shrank” and became much smaller than he physically is. Previously in the novel it is said that Chief Bromden measures in at six feet and seven inches (Kesey, 23), but in the quote above, Bromden describes himself as small and weak, which is the shown effect of his hidden wound of fear and anxiety.
This also demonstrates how much power McMurphy has gained so far over Ms. Ratched. In the novel, Ms. Ratched tries to take away all of the power that McMurphy has gained over her by blaming McMurphy for making the lives of the hospital patients worse, and that McMurphy was the cause for the deaths of patients William Bibbit and Charles Cheswick. This angers McMurphy, and causes him to choke her with the intent to kill her, in the novel, Chief Bromden describes, “Only at the last---after he’d smashed through that glass door, her face swung around, with terror forever ruining any other look she might ever try to use again, screaming when he grabbed her and ripped her uniform all the way down the front.
Unable to see McMurphy imprisoned in a body that will go on living (under Nurse Ratched’s control) even though his spirit is gone, Chief smothers him to death that night. Then he escapes the hospital and leaves for Canada and a new life. We begin to see the different situations in which the patients struggle to overcome. Whether insane or not, the hospital is undeniably in control of the fates of its
As a young man Bigger was a magnet to trouble; however, his identity is unveiled once he attains a job at the home of the Dalton’s. Operating in the mind of double-consciousness prompts two murders, the rape of his girlfriend and fleet from the police; result in Bigger facing a trail for such charges. Wright depicts Bigger, as uncertain of his actions, “I didn’t want to kill,” Bigger shouts. “But what I killed for, I am! It must’ve been pretty deep in me to make me kill”(Native Son