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One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest Research Paper

2290 Words10 Pages

Regan Kelley

Mr. Irby

English 3

17 May 2023

Morality in Literature

The definition of morality is the separation of right and wrong to a person or society. Each person and society have their own set of rules that they follow regarding morality. However, some of these rules have become universal. For example, murder is wrong or the golden rule treat people how you want to be treated should be applied to everyone. Although Ken Kesey portrays adequate imagery, similes, and characterization in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s nest it does not make up for the offensive language, generalization, and sexual situations in the book that go against those universal moral rules. That is why the novel should be banned from the school curriculum. …show more content…

The books narrator is Chief Bromden who is a Patient there who has been there for many years. He is an interesting narrator because he pretends to be deaf so all the other patients feel like they can say anything around him which gives him access to lots of information. The hospital is run by Nurse Rachet who, at least in the point of view of Bromden, is a dictator type and rules with an iron fist. Then the main character comes in McMurphy who a child rapist is who went to the mental hospital instead of jail. He gets the hospital to change and bend to his will through his charisma and unwillingness to give up. One change he made is getting nurse rachet to allow some of the patients to go on a fishing trip where they drink and have prostitutes. This eventually causes McMurphy to get lobotomized and then killed by the narrator Chief …show more content…

Many people think that Ken Kesey provides great characterization throughout the book. However, the characterization is very demeaning and is not positive growth for the character. The first example is Billy Bibbit and his character growth throughout the whole book Nurse Rachet makes a point of scaring and controlling Billy because he has a deep seeded fear of his mother and all women. This is solved in Ken Kesey’s book by supposedly making a man out of him and convincing him to sleep with a prostitute. Once he caught with the prostitute, he still gets scared of Nurse Rachet and does not just accept what he did and blames it on Mcmurphy, so the character development is being no less scared of women just paying to sleep with one and then getting the rest of the people in the hospital in trouble for his mistake. Not only does he not change he makes horrible acts in the process. This is just part of the book that makes it unfit to be taught in a school. Some school districts have already banned it like Belluve district who banned it for not being decent for school (Sutherland). The next example of the so-called characterization is the fog that chief Bromden specifically talks about. He describes it as a safe place for him and all the other patients when it’s just an addiction. “It is possible to become "addicted" to positive behavior” (APA PsychNet). At first the medicine is a positive behavior and is

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In order to create a realistic feel of the characters and story, Kesey created his characters that used adult graphic language to express themselves. For example, Harding explains how the patients are too weak to face Nurse Ratched saying, “’ this world… belongs to the strong, my friend! The ritual of our existence is based on the strong getting stronger by devouring the weak. We must face up to this. No more than right that should be this way.

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In the novel, McMurphy attacks the nurse brutally and attempts to kill her, “doctors and supervisors and nurses prying those heavy red fingers out of the white flesh of her throat as if they were her neck bones, jerking him backward” (Kesey 319). Also, the narrator shows mercy towards McMurphy by smothering him in his sleep, “and scissor the kicking legs with mine while I mashed the pillow into the face. I lay there on top of the body for what seemed days. Until the thrashing stopped” (323).

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The Retainment of The Cuckoo’s Nest Cencor ship has been a topic of discussion for an awfully long time, a part of this is what should be taught to our children. More recently, that discussion has brought the banning of certain books. In the 2022-23 school year 1,477 books have been banned in the United States. One of these books that is on the chopping block is Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Although some parents and scholars are overreacting to objectional material in schoolbooks and trying to get them banned, Cuckoo's Nest contains material such as symbolism, theme, and plot that is beneficial to teaching.

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One Flew Over Society’s Utopia In 1962, Ken Kesey shook Americans across the nation with his book One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest illustrates controversial topics in society as triumphant and was therefore under scrutiny since its publication. The novel expresses material, such as nonconformity, rebellion, freedom of the mind, and the hardships of having a mental illness. It also challenges many levels of reality and social norms, such as glorifying corrupt juveniles, criminal activity, and depicting images of obscenity, all which landed the novel a spot on the banned books list.

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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.

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His rebellious and free mind makes the patients open their eyes and see how the have been suppressed. His appearance is a breath of fresh air and a look into the outside world for the patients. This clearly weakens Nurse Ratched’s powers, and she sees him as a large threat. One way or another, McMurphy tends to instigate changes of scenery. He manages to move everyone away from her music and watchful eye into the old tube room.

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