There has always been a set of rules anywhere. Without rules like airplane regulations and traffic regulations, society would be chaotic. The people within a certain society learn new words that could label other people, for example, good, pretty, smart, or insane. The society uses these labels in order to keep their lives organized and strict. When someone outside of the society believes in something different than the society’s labels, that person is incorrect because the society always believes they are right. Therefore, they are normal and anyone who does not fit in is classified as abnormal. Ken Kesey wrote One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest in order for his audience to understand what society calls normal and how it affects the people in …show more content…
the society and out of the society. Kesey makes his audience pay closer attentions to the rules, the labels, and who has created these rules and labels. Within his book, Kesey exemplifies someone who has felt suffocated by rules and conformity with McMurphy and other patients suffering from Nurse Ratched’s administration. Through Nurse Ratched characteristics in One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Kesey reveals the rules of conformity in comparison to the 1960’s civil rights. Kesey reveals rules of conformity being controlled by the strongest person in the society. Nurse Ratched has the audacity to change the ward to her version of normal. She is viewed as strong because she has the ability to set rules that everyone in the ward must follow. Like Nurse Ratched, the John F. Kennedy administrates over the entire United States and expects citizens to follow and believe that he is correct. Kesey states,“ They figured they were proposing just what she wanted, just what she was planning to propose in the meeting herself” (156). Kesey also states, “This world belongs to the strong, my friend! The ritual of our existence is based on the strong getting stronger by devouring the weak … (64). In his inaugural address, Kennedy states, “We dare not tempt them with weakness. For only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed”. Nurse Ratched and John F. Kennedy are strong because they have power to rule over the weak. JFK has earned his power through his presidency. Once someone becomes president they make the rules citizens will abide by. Within the civil right of the 1960’s, JFK had the power to make the weak stronger. In his inaugural address, he urges Americans to work together to keep the United States strong and end the fears many Americans face. Similarly, Nurse Ratched is used to reveal rules of conformity in the 1960’s because she is similar to the president: strong and can lead others. She is, on the other hand, different than John F. Kennedy because Nurse Ratched leads an asylum to become more stable in a society and the president guides an entire country towards freedom and peace. She makes rules that the ward must follow because her rules are the only way the patients will get better. Kesey reveals rules of conformity affecting the mindset of those a society disowns.
Once people are classified differently from a society, no one in the society tries to associate with those not in their society. During the 1960’s, there were two main groups of people: colored and whites. These separate groups formed their own society because everyone in that society has the same beliefs. The whites did not associate with the colored, and the colored did not associate with the whites. In the asylum in One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, they two societies are the patients in the asylum and the people outside of the asylum. Like the colored and whites, the patients in the asylum did not associate with the people outside of the asylum and the people outside of the asylum did not associate with the patients in the asylum. In his book, Kesey states, “Never before did I realize that mental illnesses could have the aspect of power, power… (238). Martin Luther King states, “But 100 years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and chains of discrimination”. Once someone is classified as different, they begin to build beliefs about the way they are treated. Kesey illustrates that patients within the ward have power in the outside world because they outside world are paying them more attention because they are different. With them being treated differently, the patients believe …show more content…
that they have power instead of realizing that they are not welcomed in the normal society. Within the civil rights in the 1960’s, MLK realizes that African Americans are not free because they are being discriminated everywhere they go. African Americans were being watched because they were not treated as equal to the Caucasians. Kesey reveals that rules of conformity are affecting the mindset of the people the society disowns because the abnormal are not abiding by rules, yet they tend to think of their abnormality as unique and powerful instead of what the society view them as: different and odd. Kesey reveals that the rules of conformity are unbreakable.
Nurse Ratched and McMurphy get into a fight because McMurphy is tired of Nurse Ratched not making any patients life better. In the civil rights movement of 1963, blacks fought whites because African Americans wanted to increase their power enough to be equal to the Caucasians. In Simon Hall’s view, “In the spring of 1963, as a shock nation watched Bull Connor unleash police dogs and high pressured hoes on Black school children in Birmingham, African American took to the streets across the South. The year 1963 saw more than 20,000 people arrested in more than 900 demonstrations …”. Kesey states, “She tried to get her ward back into shape, but it was different with McMurphy’s presence still tromping up and down the halls and laughing out loud in the meetings and singing in the latrines” (320). In 1963, fights broke out because blacks didn’t agree with the rules of conformity. Blacks wanted to be equal to whites and they tried anything to earn respect. McMurphy bashed heads with Nurse Ratched a lot because he wanted to make changes in the ward in order for every patient to receive help in the ward. The patients didn’t agree with the rules Nurse Ratched restricted the ward to, so McMurphy stood up and fought for what he believed in. Kesey reveals the rules of conformity within the
characters of his book and civil rights because he wants to show how set rules make people angry. He wants to show that being normal affects everyone because no one can be classified as normal. My thesis was developed based on my views that the 1960’s and One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest had in common. Rules of conformity are difficult to assess because no one is the same; the word normal shouldn’t be a characteristic of any human. Rules aren’t necessarily a bad thing to follow because they help the society function in an organized manner. Kesey reveals that rules of conformity should not define a society, yet a society cannot define normal because who can decide what a pretty picture looks like?
The author Ken Kesey was born in La Junta, Colorado and went to Stanford University. He volunteered to be used for an experiment in the hospital because he would get paid. In the book “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”, Kesey brings up the past memories to show how Bromden is trying to be more confident by using those thoughts to make him be himself. He uses Bromden’s hallucinations, Nurse Ratched’s authority, and symbolism to reveal how he’s weak, but he builds up more courage after each memory.
In One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, role reversal puts a woman, Nurse Ratched, in control of the ward, which is important in creating a contrast to traditional power. Within the ward Ratched has ultimate power by “merely [insinuating]” (p. 63) a wrongdoing and has control of the doctors. Soon after the first confrontation with Randle McMurphy (Mack), her power is demonstrated through the submissive and obedient manners of all there (152). Ratched is shown as having great power within the ward and outside, despite that time periods constriction of being a women, showing an important contrast to traditional power structures.
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
The novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey tells a story of Nurse Ratched, the head nurse of a mental institution, and the way her patients respond to her harsh treatment. The story is told from the perspective of a large, Native-American patient named Bromden; he immediately introduces Randle McMurphy, a recently admitted patient, who is disturbed by the controlling and abusive way Ratched runs her ward. Through these feelings, McMurphy makes it his goal to undermine Ratched’s authority, while convincing the other patients to do the same. McMurphy becomes a symbol of rebellion through talking behind Ratched’s back, illegally playing cards, calling for votes, and leaving the ward for a fishing trip. His shenanigans cause his identity to be completely stolen through a lobotomy that puts him in a vegetative state. Bromden sees McMurphy in this condition and decides that the patients need to remember him as a symbol of individuality, not as a husk of a man destroyed by the
Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest explores the dysfunctions and struggles of life for the patients in a matriarch ruled mental hospital. As told by a schizophrenic Native American named Chief Bromden, the novel focuses primarily on Randle McMurphy, a boisterous new patient introduced into the ward, and his constant war with the Big Nurse Ratched, the emasculating authoritarian ruler of the ward. Constricted by the austere ward policy and the callous Big Nurse, the patients are intimidated into passivity. Feeling less like patients and more like inmates of a prison, the men surrender themselves to a life of submissiveness-- until McMurphy arrives. With his defiant, fearless and humorous presence, he instills a certain sense of rebellion within all of the other patients. Before long, McMurphy has the majority of the Acutes on the ward following him and looking to him as though he is a hero. His reputation quickly escalates into something Christ-like as he challenges the nurse repeatedly, showing the other men through his battle and his humor that one must never be afraid to go against an authority that favors conformity and efficiency over individual people and their needs. McMurphy’s ruthless behavior and seemingly unwavering will to protest ward policy and exhaust Nurse Ratched’s placidity not only serves to inspire other characters in the novel, but also brings the Kesey’s central theme into focus: the struggle of the individual against the manipulation of authoritarian conformists. The asylum itself is but a microcosm of society in 1950’s America, therefore the patients represent the individuals within a conformist nation and the Big Nurse is a symbol of the authority and the force of the Combine she represents--all...
People often find themselves as part of a collective, following society's norms and may find oneself in places where feeling constrained by the rules and will act out to be unconstrained, as a result people are branded as nuisances or troublemakers. In the novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, the author Ken Kesey conveys the attempt McMurphy makes to live unconstrained by the authority of Nurse Ratched. The story is very one sided and helps create an understanding for those troublemakers who are look down on in hopes of shifting ingrained ideals. The Significance of McMurphy's struggles lies in the importance placed on individuality and liberty. If McMurphy had not opposed fear and autocratic authority of Nurse Ratched nothing would have gotten better on the ward the men would still feel fear. and unnerved by a possibility of freedom. “...Then, just as she's rolling along at her biggest and meanest, McMurphy steps out of the latrine ... holding that towel around his hips-stops her dead! ” In the novel McMurphy shows little signs like this to combat thee Nurse. His defiance of her system included
The Black boys are under the control of Nurse Ratched and are ordered to do what ever she wants them to. This is due to, the hatred from whites to blacks before the 1960’s. This issue started to shift because of public speakers like Martin Luther king and Malcom X, even though both were killed, they both had a major impact on the equality and power between whites and blacks. The hatred that white people had for black people was still lingering, but was not as large as before the 1960’s (Flaherty, Seidman, McLelland, Holler, par 2-3). In relation to the Black Boys in the novel of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest they are considered Nurse Ratched’s slaves, they are the only black men in the whole asylum which makes them stand out and makes them visibly different than all the other men. Nurse Ratched teaches them to hate the patients, so the only power that the Black Boys have is over the patients. Chief Bromden explains the Nurse’s strategies that she uses with the Black Boys, he says “She appraises them and their hate for a month or so and then lets them go because they don’t hate enough” (Kesey, 27). Power dynamics are evident here because of the way the Nurse treats the Black Boys, she teaches them to hate and if they do not hate enough then she will get rid of them. This point very important because it gives reason to how patients were mistreated in insane asylums. Even though the Black Boys have some power over the patients they are still under control of Nurse Ratched. Using the Feminist lens, these points are important because inequality is created because by the power of the Nurse over the Black Boys. Yet, the Black Boys are used the way that they are because of the color of their skin, there is a physical inequality illustrated because they stand out so much compared to everyone else in the ward. The
Ken Kesey in his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo 's Nest question a lot of things that you think almost everyday. With this famous portrait of a mental institute its rebellious patients and domineering caretakers counter-culture icon Kesey is doing a whole lot more than just spinning a great yarn. He is asking us to stop and consider how what we call "normal" is forced upon each and every one of us. Stepping out of line, going against the grain, swimming upstream whatever your metaphor, there is a steep price to pay for that kind of behavior. The novel tells McMurphys tale, along with the tales of other inmates who suffer under the yoke of the authoritarian Nurse Ratched it is the story of any person who has felt suffocated and confined by our
What is the deciding factor in determining what is sane: what is natural, or what is socially acceptable? In Ken Kesey’s novel One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and later the movie the novel inspired, this conflict is ever present in its Oregon setting of a psychiatric hospital. Throughout the novel, characters with minor quirks and disabilities are shamed and manipulated by the tyrannical Nurse Ratched in an attempt to make them “normal”—that is, conforming to her rigid standards. In fact, the only time these characters overcome their personal challenges is when they are emboldened by the confidence of an outsider, McMurphy, who encourages embracing natural instincts and rejecting conformity. In one particularly apt scene, McMurphy’s recounting
In the film One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, the audience is shown the character of Mc Murphy who brought out the conflict of authority, obedience, and disobedience. The film introduces Nurse Ratched as head of the ward and the main authority figure. What this essay will focus on is if Nurse Ratched really ever is negligent? She is simply just doing her job. Would Mcmurphy be considered to be the so-called “evil” character in the film? When he arrives he causes so much chaos between the patients and the nurses. Would the audience agree Mcmurphy is even responsible for a patient's death within the ward?
Ken Kesey’s novel “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” is a story about a band of patients in a mental ward who struggle to find their identity and get away from the wretched Nurse. As audiences read about the tale, many common events and items seen throughout the story actually represent symbols for the bigger themes of the story. Symbols like the fishing trip, Nurse, and electroshock therapy all emphasize the bigger themes of the story. The biggest theme of the story is oppression. Throughout the course of the story, patients are suppressed and fight to find who they really are.
Everybody wants to be accepted, yet society is not so forgiving. It bends you and changes you until you are like everyone else. Society depends on conformity and it forces it upon people. In Emerson's Self Reliance, he says "Society is a joint stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater." People are willing to sacrifice their own hopes and freedoms just to get the bread to survive. Although the society that we are living in is different than the one the Emerson's essay, the idea of fitting in still exists today. Although society and our minds make us think a certain way, we should always trust our better judgment instead of just conforming to society.
Ken Kesey the author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo 's Nest, allows the reader to explore different psychoanalytic issues that plague the characters in his novel. Carl Jung disciple of Sigmund Fraud created “The Collective Unconscious” his theory based on how the mind can be easily overtaken by many outside factors from the past or present and even those that one is born with. The novel takes place in an asylum that is aimed to contain individuals that have mental issues from schizophrenia to repressed memories that are causing insanity. The nurses are seen as tyrants and actually worsens health of the patients turning some from acutes to chronics (incurable), while the patients are limited by their initial conditions or their developing conditions
While McMurphy tries to bring about equality between the patients and head nurse, she holds onto her self-proclaimed right to exact power over her charges because of her money, education, and, ultimately, sanity. The patients represent the working-class by providing Ratched, the manufacturer, with the “products” from which she profits—their deranged minds. The patients can even be viewed as products themselves after shock therapy treatments and lobotomies leave them without personality. The negative effects of the hospital’s organizational structure are numerous. The men feel worthless, abused, and manipulated, much like the proletariat who endured horrendous working conditions and rarely saw the fruits of their labor during the Industrial Revolution in the United Kingdom and United States in the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century (“Industrial Revolution” 630).
The author of One Flew over the Cuckoo 's Nest, allows the reader to explore different psychoanalytic issues in literature. The ability to use works literature to learn about real world conflicts allows us to use prior knowledge to interact with these problems in reality. Ken Kesey, the author of the above novel and Carl Jung, author of “The Archetype and the Collective Unconscious” wrote how the mind can be easily overtaken by many outside factors from the past or present. The novel takes place in an asylum that is aimed to contain individuals that have a mental issue or problem. The doctors and care takers are seen as tyrants and barriers that inhibit the patients to improve their health, while the patients are limited by their initial conditions