The Chief and McMurphy are inmates of a mental institution. In what sense are they also heroes? How should we understand “heroism” in the context of this novel? According to the context of “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest”, Kesey defines a hero a person as average as others but able to see a problem that requires courage, determination and kindness to be solved, and takes it upon oneself to fix it. Regarding this definition, McMurphy and Chief are major examples. On one hand, despite the fact that McMurphy’s initial motives are just to entertain himself and to gain partial power, as the novel progressed, McMurphy starts to feel obligations towards other patients and perceives their dependence on him. Sequentially, in the meantime he challenges other patients to stand up for themselves, he gains the willingness to battle against the oppressive society for the benefit of all the patients. That being said, when he is given an opportunity to escape the hospital, McMurphy denies and would rather make an ultimate sacrificial attack to ensure that Nurse Ratched cannot use Billy’s death to undo everything they have gained. To conclude, in the process of starting out sane and powerful but willing to sacrifice himself to the extent of ending up as a helpless vegetable, McMurphy portrays himself as a …show more content…
“Because he knows you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy.” (214). Henceforth, McMurphy, in an attempt to bring the genuine laugh back to all the patients, continuously breaks the rules. Remarkable that by the end of the fishing trip, Harding, Scanlon, Doctor Spivey, and Sefelt are all finally able to participate in real laughter, which can be regarded as a sign of their physical and psychological recovery. McMurphy is a prominent example of a