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Another character comparison from the book and the movie was the Chief and Nurse Ratched. First Nurse Ratched was the leader or person in charge of the psych ward she wanted everyone to obey her and not question what she was had to say. If people or her patients questioned her
Throughout the beginning of the novel it is evident that some characters over use their powers, one of these characters being Nurse Ratched. Nurse Ratched uses her position in the ward to take advantage of the patients and make sure that they adhere to everyone of her daunting commands. Nurse Ratched “tends to get real put out if something keeps her outfit from running like a smooth, accurate, precision-made machine” (Kesey 28) because she has been on the ward for so long that when something doesn 't go according to her plan, she starts to get mad and will often try to use her power to come down on the patient 's. Nurse Ratched is in control of the whole ward and when someone does something that isn 't in her manuscript she gets irritated. The ward will be run her way and only her way, “ under her rule the ward inside is almost completely adjusted to surroundings” (Kesey 28).
However, to Nurse Ratched, this window illustrates her dominance over the ward. “The Big Nurse watches all [that the patients do] through her window” (42). Kesey’s glass division between the sane and the insane demonstrates Nurse Ratched’s overall want of authority. Correspondingly, the Big Nurse is a wolf amongst the hospital full of rabbits. As Harding explains to McMurphy that the patients are essentially small rabbits in the forest that is the mental institution, he also notes that Nurse Ratched is the “strong wolf” that teaches the rabbits their place, much like the hierarchy of nature (61).
Nurse Ratched is the enermy of the worst kind in this book Nurse Ratched feeds on order, and she wants total power , she plans mind games with her patients. Ratched as the head nurse and as a woman. she is able to move things so that most situations fit her ideas. If Nurse Ratched needs to, she uses the force to get things done. She smiles a lot and verbalizes.
• To what extent could the narrator of the novel be considered unreliable? The narrator known as Chief could be considered unreliable because on page 69 Harding says that he heard Chief received over two hundred shock treatments. These shock treatments may have down a great deal of damage to his mind. Multiple times throughout the novel Chief mentions that a fog is forming over his mind and all around him.
Kesey explains that men cannot handle a female leader throughout the text. The Nurse suppresses the masculinity of the patients because she would have no power against them in their full strength. The men would not respect her power and revolt. Though Kesey’s characters convey misogynistic messages in the novel, the reader understands it as a critique of the male conscience. This timeless novel promotes awareness of gender issues in an uncommon fashion that relates to problems in today’s social
Throughout Ken Kesey’s, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the balance of power is challenged in the psychiatric ward. Out of the several leaders that appear in the novel, Nurse Ratched and McMurphy are the most prominent. During Nurse Ratched and McMurphy struggle for power, they share many of the same qualities. It is argued that: “McMurphy and Ratched are alike in intelligence, military service, distinctive (if opposite) clothing, and conventionally masculine qualities” (Evans). These small similarities; however, do not distract the characters from fighting for their individual beliefs.
Nurse Ratched is the top nurse in charge and, she wishes nothing but dominate control over the men. Her voice gets polite and controlling when she gets angry with the patients. Her tightly rolled hair implies the horns on her head, lending a visual weight to her role as McMurphy’s
Nurse Ratched’s strongest power is refusal to fancy McMurphy, who has claimed to be the archetypal ‘ladies man’. This makes Nurse Ratched an out of the ordinary nurse or
However the arrival of a new patient, McMurphy’s makes other patients to rebel against authority that Ratched uses to control them. Through out the book Nurse Ratched actions shows how an authority figures like her can often abuse their power by enforcing rules on “less” inferior individuals which leads to problems. Nurse Ratched is known as the authority figure in the hospital. The patients see no choice but to follow her rules that she had laid down for them. She uses the force of her hatred and fear to get things done.
In the struggle between freedom and power, McMurphy’s sacrifice allows freedom to prevail. His leadership in a rising rebellion parallels many of the countercultures that arose during the 1960s. His rebellion fights against Nurse Ratched in the way that the countercultures fought against the government and society in the past to the present. The men in the asylum are unknowingly unhappy before the arrival of McMurphy. Through his antics, the men are saved from society in the form of Nurse Ratched’s regime.
“While the ward remains orderly and on schedule beneath the tyranny of Nurse Ratchet, the men are subdued and drugged beyond any human recognition. The patients are distinguished as either Acute or Chronic, depending on their severity, but within the ward at the very beginning of the novel, they are essentially equal in their actions and humanity” (Maupin-Thomas). This shows that Nurse Rachet is a dictator. The significance of this is in the 1950’s and 60’s is when the cold war was ramping back up. So, this book is a form of anti-Soviet Union propaganda, connecting tyrannical rule of the Soviet Union to nurse rachet.
Accessed 7 Dec. 2017. Laura Quinn gives the reader a deeper understanding of Nurse Ratched's role in in the novel. Quinn gives a brief summary of how One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest related to society at the time. During the 60s America is recovering from a recent war, and most teenagers used this war to voice their opinions to create a change in America. Laura gives a summary of how Chief Bromden, Randle McMurphy, and Nurse Ratched alter the book's plot.
Kesey has used characterisation to get the idea that in this novel there are aspects of venerability and strength. In Nurse Ratched’s case, Kesey has made it so that she is shown with strength and power over the whole ward, including the black men in white, other nurses, and mainly the patients. An example of Nurse Ratched’s power over the patients is when she says to Billy Bibbit, “What worries me, Billy, ' she said- I could hear the change in her voice- 'is how your mother is going to take this.” This shows how one sentence was able to debilitate Billy into begging Nurse for forgiveness and restraint of telling his mother.
The movie was mostly focused on the feud between the warden/nurse Ms. Ratched and McMurphy. McMurphy tried to go against the hard-set plan set by the institution. More he tried to establish dominance and leadership within the group. This threatened the nurse’s ways of subduing patients, and they felt of less importance in their own institution. This led to a bitter rivalry and because of it the nurse tried to subdue, with same techniques as with other patients, McMurphy even after realizing that he was not a mentally unstable person.
