Examples Of Feminism In One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

Society takes control over so many aspects in our lives that it’s often difficult for us to speak against it. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, written by Ken Kesey, explores a great deal of issues society was facing during the 60’s. Using the 1960’s second wave of feminism we get a feel of what society was like during the time. We are also presented with various parallels between the book and religion. While Kesey not only provides us with an avant-garde work of literature, he also gives us a different perspective on the control society thrived to maintain, not only as women but in a religious aspect. In the 1960’s, the civil rights movement was the act inspiring the second wave of feminism. The passing of the civil rights act protected women

In pages 159, McMurphy is described objectifying Mrz.Ratched as he asks about her breast measurements. She brushes it off and Kesey writes “She walks right on past him, ignoring him just like she chose to ignore the way nature had tagged her with those outsized badges of femininity, just like she was above him, and sex, and everything that’s weak and of the flesh”. Kesey presents the idea of female normality as weak, being less than, the very reason why the feminist second wave was happening. An attempt to stand up to men and society and fight for their

While she’s asleep it rises in her throat and into her mouth, drains out of that corner of her mouth like purple spit and down her throat, over her body. In the morning she realises that she’s stained again and somehow figures that it's not really from inside her -how could it be? A good Catholic girl like her?- and she figures it's on account of working evening among a whole ward of people like me”