Similarities Between The Handmaids Tale And One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

In the dystopian themed novels Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood, and One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey, all have ideas that directly relate to each other. The connecting threads woven throughout the books is symbolism, the rebellious anti-heros, repression of sexulaity, and the parallels between the unwanted individuals in each novel. Firstly, symbolism is a key element in both One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest as well as The Handmaid's Tale. The color red is prominent in Handmaid's Tale, while machinery is prominent in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Both symbols play essential parts in each story with red being the color of blood and the mark of the Handmaid's lost innocence as well as you

In Brave New World the outsider that hold the potential to disrupt the society is John. In The Handmaid's Tale it was Moria, and In One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest it is McMurphy. Each character had elements that rejected the society and then followed through on this rebellion with actions. With John it was through the rejection of multiple partners, as well as his hatred for Soma. This action which to the other citizens were normal enraged John to the point where he went into exile and torchered himself because he believed that their was so much sin that he needed to whip it out of himself as well as purge it from the world. Moria is another example because of her resistance to the control of the aunts to the point in which she then attacked a aunt, but Offered still held hope about how Moria was going to save her even as she was gone. Last, McMurphy is a terrible character in general but his arrival into the ward creates a beacon of hope for the patients to break this system in which controls them. He then tries to do this with his goading of Nurse Ratched as well as his rejection of all the rules set in place. The caste system within all the novels play a key role in the effect of these outsiders. In Brave New World you have the Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons. When whole, it makes each society thrive while under

In Handmaid’s Tale the Handmaid’s are dressed like nuns, whose gowns normally represent their repression of all sexual desires which is the the opposite of what Handmaid's represent. The Handmaid's are fertile women who are used to help with infertility. In Brave New World sexuality for John is repressed because he felt as if multiple partners is wrong. And One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest that an all men ward with the refined nurse who represent the repressed sexuality. Knowledge and history as well is repressed in all the novels. In Brave New World the society is based on a need to know basis for each job, and with only certain information told through dreaming as children, as well as history is only after Ford nothing before. In Handmaid's Tale reading for women is suppressed with the time any of this attempt to read anything is by visual pictures that have taken over instead. In One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest the patients are also on a need to know basis in which the aids have the power of what medicine the patient is taking, with only explained if one protests and then not explaining it fully, just enough to make the patient