one flew over the cucoos nest Essay -- essays research papers

ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST Q3 One of the main themes throughout the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is ‘societal repression over the individual’. The book is written by Ken Kesey and based around patients’ lives within a mental institution. Kesey uses the novel to voice his opinion concerning the oppressive nature of control those who enforce the control. Such a repressive feeling is amplified by the setting of the institution, the patients and Kesey’s tone throughout the novel. The setting of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a mental institution, in the countryside of Oregon during the 1960’s. At this time young Americans began to challenge conformity and live their lives around peace, love and drugs. LSD was a drug used both during the political uprising and in the novel as treatment for mental disorders. Kesey discusses how the world within the ward mirrors the world outside. ‘One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest’ contains examples of behaviour and attitudes displayed by characters within the clinical environment of the psychiatric ward, which can be compared to behaviour found within contemporary American society. Notions of leadership and hierarchy within a class, sexism, and crime and punishment play a vital role in the telling of the story. Chief Bromden, the book’s narrator, darkly and fearfully portrays the institution. Within the walls of the harsh, bleak institution are several authority figures known as the & quot;Combine" to the Chief. They control, direct, and manipulate every aspect of the lives of the patients. Nurse Ratched, who controls the Chief's ward, is the ultimate authority figure--a menacing, cold, callous, larger-than-life authoritarian who will stop at nothing to make sure the "Combine" maintains firmly in power. Kesey, through the Chief's narrative, creates a gloomy, hopeless world; a world where the facility's patients have nothing to look forward to except the inexorable clutches of insanity. The patients are exposed to painful treatments enforced by Nurse Ratched. The electroshock therapy table is shaped like a cross, with straps across the wrists and over the head. Ellis, Ruckly, and Taber who are classified as Acutes has their lives destroyed by electroshock therapy. It serves as a reminder to the rest of the ward what happens to those who rebel against the ruling powers. If the patients are not se... ...ically "castrated" him. He is accused of being homosexual and having nothing between his legs but "a patch of hair". He is constantly trying to hide his hands, which are white and beautiful. His final victory over the Nurse and women in general is when he walks out of the hospital against medical advice and has his wife pick him up, showing that he now controls his own life rather than being controlled by the women that surround him. Ken Kesey has written the novel in a very intelligent and contrasting way. The hospital is presented as a metaphor for the oppressive society of the late 1950s. The novel celebrates the expression of sexuality as the ultimate goal and denounces repression as based on fear and hate. Bromden’s slightly paranoid account may be the equivalent of Keseys. The tone of the patients compared with that of the Nurse is obvious. The Nurse is confident and well educated, taking full advantage of the ward patients. The patients are uneducated and easily manipulated. They are referred to as animals by Nurse Ratched immediately taking away their dignity and self-respect and treating them in an inhuman way. JARED THORNQUEST Word count = 1008