From the moment that the apple touched Eve’s lips, women have been seen as an embodiment of all that is evil. This reflects misogynistic societal beliefs that women are below men. While many of the prejudices towards women are hidden in modern American society, some misogynistic stereotypes are still present. In Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, one can see many misogynistic and sexist undertones. Big Nurse Ratched is in a position of authority over a large group of men and is seen as a tyrannical and unjust ruler. Although most of her methods would have been seen as awful when used by any person, the saturation of bad women in the novel creates an unfavorable picture of women in general. The balance of power in the ward is never equal; it is either in the hands of women, or of men. Nurse Ratched is determined to take power from the men, while McMurphy is determined to win it back. Therefore, a push-pull situation is created, in which each group is attempting to take power from the other. Kesey’s misogynistic tones create the feeling that men and women cannot be equal; for one to rise, the other must fall.
One of the defining characteristics that embody men is their manhood. Take away this manhood, and the person is stripped of power, thus becoming genderless. One of Nurse Ratched’s methods for extracting power is a metaphorical castration. From the moment McMurphy enters the ward, he understands the nurse’s methods. He knows that “what she is is a ball-cutter… [she tries] to make you weak” (54). McMurphy goes on to tell the men that by removing their balls, the Nurse is removing a source of their strength. By implying that men’s power resides in their sexuality, Kesey is giving in to sexual stereotypes about men. In ...
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...done in a completely passive manner, and it at times seems as if she is not doing anything at all. The cunning demonstrated by the nurse is Kesey saying that women realize that they do not have the inherent powers that men do. The nurse is afraid of McMurphy and therefore must remove the parts of him that are threats. In doing this, she must remove what makes him a man. The misogyny demonstrated by Kesey shows women as exploiters, which, ironically, is what the nurse names McMurphy. The nurse creates a ward full of genderless robots. McMurphy is the hero, because he breaks free from the mold. Women have always attempted to break out of whatever they are trapped in, and are often the ones who encourage others to do so as well. Kesey’s words create a world where women want everyone to fit the mold, as well as being the main obstacles between men and their freedom.
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.
In Ken Kesey’s novel, “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”, he engages the reader with Nurse Ratched’s obsession with power, especially against McMurphy. When Nurse Ratched faces multiple altercations with McMurphy, she believes that her significant power is in jeopardy. This commences a battle for power in the ward between these characters. One assumes that the Nurses’ meticulous tendency in the ward is for the benefit of the patients. However, this is simply not the case. The manipulative nurse is unfamiliar with losing control of the ward. Moreover, she is rabid when it comes to sharing her power with anyone, especially McMurphy. Nurse Ratched is overly ambitious when it comes to being in charge, leaving the reader with a poor impression of
"One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" by Ken Kesey is about a man named Chief Bromden. He is half Indian and is locked up in a mental institute. He has led everyone in the ward to believe that he is deaf and dumb; instead he is just quiet and observant. Big Nurse is the head of the ward and mentally controls every patient she has, not allowing them to become better. McMurphy is a transfer to the ward and loosens up the atmosphere. He is a very relaxed, outgoing, funny guy that loves to joke around and be loud. When he too notices the Big Nurse's mental control on everyone, he sets out to help the patients become sane and not be influenced by the Big Nurse. One of the possible themes for this story is that women, although not physically stronger than men, can mentally be stronger than men and can control them with that alone. In the following paragraphs I will show how Kesey portrays women's control.
The struggle for independence begins in the resistance against the system and its rules; Kesey uses characterisation of McMurphy and his gang to show this shift in power and the fight for freedom, while Weir utilises the symbolism of the Dead Poets Society. McMurphy's arrival to the ward muddles the Big Nurse's "outfit from running like a smooth , accurate, precision-made machine" (p. 25). McMurphy encourages the other patients to support his revolt against Nurse Ratched and her "modern matriarchy" (p. 67). By the end of the novel, Kesey develops his characters to be able to even "to pop and snort to keep from laughing" (p. 296) in "a place where the men won't let themselves loose and laugh" (p. 45) to express the development of their revolt. Weir,
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
One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest uses Juvenalian satire to illustrate his message that women were beginning to achieve stature and control as they climbed up the proverbial corporate ladder and were making headway in other facets of society. For Kesey to get his point across, he used sexist language and exaggerated how the male characters in his novel viewed women (Kurkowski).
When norms of society are unfair and seem set in stone, rebellion is bound to occur, ultimately bringing about change in the community. Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest demonstrates the conflict of individuals who have to survive in an environment where they are pressured to cooperate. The hospital's atmosphere suppresses the patients' individuality through authority figures that mold the patients into their visions of perfection. The ward staff's ability to overpower the patients' free will is not questioned until a man named Randal McMurphy is committed to the mental institute. He rebels against what he perceives as a rigid, dehumanizing, and uncompassionate environment. His exposure of the flaws in the hospital's perfunctory rituals permits the other patients to form opinions and consequently their personalities surface. The patient's new behavior clashes with the medical personnel's main goal-to turn them into 'perfect' robots, creating havoc on the ward.
The dominant discourse of conformity is characterised predominantly by influencing to obey rules described by Kesey’ novel ‘One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest’. At the start of the novel, all the acute and the silence chronic conform to Nurse Ratched’s rules before the arrival of McMurphy. Since, she was in complete control over the ward until McMurphy arrived. After he arrived, he begins to take control of the patients. He begins to take the role of leader, a leader that was unexpected. Kesey has foregrounded the character, McMurphy to be different thus creating a binary opposite that is represented in the novel. Kesey shows the binary opposites as being good versus evil. The former represents the con man McMurphy, and the latter represents the head nurse, Nurse Ratched. An example of this would be, “She’s carrying her wicker bag…a bag shape of a tool box with a hemp handle…” (pg.4), showing that Nurse Ratched is a mechanic. McMurphy is portrayed as being a good character by revitalising the hope of the patients by strangling Nurse Ratched. This revitalise the hope for the pa...
“Power comes from temperament but enthusiasm kills the switch”. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken kesey reveals how the struggle for power and authority is shown in the psychiatric hospital. Ken kesey expresses this mastery through Nurse Ratched and McMurphy and their effect on the patients in the ward. Nurse Ratched has all the power due to her technically being in charge of the ward. The patients “men” are powerless with their acceptance and obedience to her actions. However, everything changes when McMurphy arrives. His confidence and charisma give him some type of power that challenges and disrupts the Nurse’s drunkening thirst for power. Power in this novel is lost, gained and repossessed.
The story of Cuckoo’s Nest took place in the 50’s-60’s, an era where men were considered the dominant gender of their society. The characters almost certainly knew this also, but one character who knew this for sure was Nurse Ratched. Ratched may seem like a grouchy, evil lady--which she is-- but she is also the symbol for emasculation. In the story, instances are shown of her hiding her feminine qualities such as “And in spite of all her attempts to conceal them, in that sexless get-up, you can still make out the evidence of some rather extraordinary breasts”(55). By the author using the untraditional role of a woman as the main antagonist, readers have a tendancy to be more drawn to what makes her so powerful and scary. And the part that makes Nurse scary is the fact that she does not want to be seen as a woman! She understands the political underlyings of her era and if she wants to maintain a position of strength, then all ties to her gender must be cut loose. The odd choice of a female character creates more interest for the readers to pay attention to the story. The idea of emasculation, getting the power of male sexuality taken away, is also very present in the story. The symbol of this idea is shown with Rawler and his suicide. Rawlers death was described as “ Old Rawler. Cut both nuts off and bled to death, sitting right on the can in the latrine, half a dozen people in there with him
Characters such as McMurphy and Nurse Ratched, exhibit many archetypes that better explain their unconscious actions. Carl Jung’s article on archetypes and Key Kesey’s characters perfectly correlate with the definitions of The Mother and The Anima Archetypes. For example, The Anima Archetype explains how, in men, that they tend to present forms of infatuation, idealization, and fascination with the opposite sex. In addition, in women, The Anima will radiate as a form of fate or destiny and stray away from the ideas of the conscious mind, which might be more possible or realistic. In the novel the protagonist, Randall McMurphy, develops The Anima Archetype when he bets the other patients that he can overcome the head nurse at the institution. The Anima developed because of his sudden infatuation with the nurse. This archetype explains the unconscious mind by verifying what McMurphy really feels involuntarily or naturally. Another Archetype that developed to justify the results of the unconscious is The Mother Archetype. Nurse Ratched, the lead nurse at the mental institute, display features of this archetype by setting up specific rules and regulations for the patients. In women this archetype shows love, care, and a diminishing expression of individuality. The mother tends to
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
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...
In the novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey argued that this presumed model society was actually quite the opposite. Kesey argued this through the use of the characters in the novel. Nurse Ratched was a character who symbolized the communist rule in Russia, and she displayed absolute power over the patients in the ward. She was depicted as what was wrong with society, and the patients feared her as the Americans feared communists. Randle McMurphy retaliated against Nurse Ratched in order to challenge her control, just as the Americans fought against Communism in the Cold War. Although it seemed as though there were some positive aspects of domestic life in the 1950s, Ken Kesey argued that American society at the time was tainted due to the roles of fear, the rejection of those who were different, and t...
In Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, the author refers to the many struggles people individually face in life. Through the conflict between Nurse Ratched and McMurphy, the novel explores the themes of individuality and rebellion against conformity. With these themes, Kesey makes various points which help us understand which situations of repression can lead an individual to insanity. These points include: the effects of sexual repression, woman as castrators, and the pressures we face from society to conform. Through these points, Kesey encourages the reader to consider that people react differently in the face of repression, and makes the reader realize the value of alternative states of perception, rather than simply writing them off as "crazy."