12/7/14
intro to lit f block
Cuckoos nest
Chief Bromden:
1. “Before noontime they're at the fog machine again but they haven't got it turned up full; its not so thick but what I can see if I strain real hard. One of these days I’ll quite straining and let myself go completely, lose myself in the fog the way the other Chronics have, but for the time being I’m interested in this new man—I want to see how he takes to the Group Meeting coming up.” (Kesey, 42)
2. “I been silent so long now it’s gonna roar out of me like floodwaters and you think the guy telling this is ranting and raving my God; you think this is too horrible to have really happened, this is too awful to be the truth! But, please. It’s still hard for me to have a clear mind thinking on it. But it’s the truth even if it didn’t happen.” (Kesey,8)
3. “I hide in the mop closet and listen, my heart beating in the dark, and I try to keep from getting scared, try to get my thoughts off someplace else-try to think back and remember things about the village and the big Columbia River, think about ah one time Papa and me were hunting birds in a stand of cedar trees near The Dalles. ... But like always when I try to place my thoughts in the past and hide there, the fear close at hand seeps in through the memory. I can feel that least black boy out there coming up the hall, smelling out for my fear. He opens out his nostrils like black funnels, his outsized head bobbing this way and that as he sniffs, and he sucks in fear from all over the ward. He's smelling me now, I can hear him snort. He don't know where I'm hid, but he's smelling and he's hunting around. I try to keep still. ...
(Papa tells me to keep still, tells me that the dog senses a bird somewheres right close. We borrowed a pointer dog from a man in The Dalles. All the village dogs are no-'count mongrels, Papa says, fish-gut eaters and no class a-tall; this here dog, he got insteek! I don't say anything, but I already see the bird up in a scrub cedar, hunched in a gray knot of feathers. Dog running in circles underneath, too much smell around for him to point for sure. The bird safe as long as he keeps still. He's holding out pretty good, but the dog keeps sniffing and circling, louder and loser. Then the bird breaks, feathers springing, jumps out of the cedar into the birdshot from Papa's gun.)
The least black boy and one of the bigger ones catch me before I get ten steps out of the mop closet, and drag me back to the shaving room. I don't fight or make any noise. If you yell it's just tougher on you. I hold back the yelling. I hold back till they get to my temples. I'm not sure it's one of those substitute machines and not a shaver till it gets to my temples; then I can't hold back. It's not a will-power thing any more when they get to my temples. It's a ... button, pushed, says Air Raid Air Raid, turns me on so loud it's like no sound, everybody yelling at me, hands over their ears from behind a glass wall, faces working around in talk circles but no sound from the mouths. My sound soaks up all other sound.” (Kesey, 7)
4. “First time in a long, long time I’m in bed without taking that little red capsule (if I hide to keep from taking it, the night nurse with the birthmark sends the black boy named Geever out to hunt me down, holding me captive with his flashlight till she can get the needle ready), so I fake sleep when the black boy’s coming past with his light.
When you take one of these red pills you don’t just go to sleep; you’re paralyzed with sleep, and all night long you can’t wake, no matter what goes goes on around you. That’s why the staff gives me the pills; at the old place I took to waking up at night and catching them performing all kinds of horrible crimes on the patients sleeping around me.
I lie still and slow my breathing, airing to see if something is going to happen. It is dark my lord and I hear them slipping around out there in their rubber shoes; twice they peek in the dorm and run a flashlight over everybody. I keep my eyes shut and keep awake. I hear a wailing from up on Disturbed, loo loo loo—got some guy wired to pick up code signals.” (Kesey, 85)
5. “I’m further off than I’ve ever been. This is what it’s like to be dead. I guess this is what it’s like to be a Vegetable; you lose yourself in the fog. You don’t move. They feed your body until it finally stops eating; then they burn it. It’s not so bad. there’s no pain. I don’t feel much of anything other than a touch of chill I figure will pass in time.” (Kesey, 137)
These quotes represent Chief Bromden in many ways. He proves to be an independent character through these quotes. He also shows that he doesn’t need the help or opinion of anyone else to know what he stands for as a person. Although at many times he felt like giving up, he found ways to persevere through challenges he faced.
Chief Bromden proves to be a major character in the development of the novel because he is able to tell wrong from right, and he fights for what he believes in. Throughout the novel, Chief proves himself to be quiet and an observer. At first, he sees no problem in this. He admires watching everything and not participating, but later, when things change and the patients are fighting back against Nurse Ratched, he finally speaks up and joins in on the struggle. Chief Bromden has been at the Ward the longest and is able to leave whenever he pleases. He stays because he fears the outside society because of Nurse Ratched brainwashing them. Chief Bromden is important to the overall theme of rebellion because he is able to make correct decisions to change the future of the Ward. By staying on the outside of all of the rebellion at first, he was able to build a sense of camaraderie with Nurse Ratched and trust between them. Bromden also showed that although nurse Ratched sees him as a small person, he has the capability to become big and make a difference through fighting for what he believes in. He helps to advance this theme by staying by McMurphy’s side the entire time. Chief Bromden is a big person but because he sat in the corner and watched everything happen before him, he began to shrink as a person as did his confidence. Once McMurphy worked towards helping him to gain it back, he made Chief big again by having him lift the control panel to break the window. Chief Bromden sees that he is capable of doing this action and he then uses it against Nurse Ratched to finally be able to throw it against the window and escape from the horrible place he thought it to be and considered it his home away from the “distopian” society outside of the institute. Through brainwash and influence over the patients, Nurse Ratched created this imaginary world inside the mental hospital that made the patients think that the world outside was dangerous. In reality though, it proved to be almost the complete opposite. Although the society outside the Ward was portrayed as dark, dangerous, and not pleasurable, the Ward proved to be the same. There was little insight on the society beyond the ward but one could imagine it to be at least slightly better than the life all of the patients lived while inside the Ward.
Nurse Ratched:
1. “She listens a minute more to make sure she isn't hearing things; then she goes to puffing up. Her nostrils flare open, and every breath she draws she gets bigger, as big as tough-looking’s I seen her get over a patient since Taber was here. She works the hinges in her elbows and fingers. I hear a small squeak. She starts moving, and I get back against the wall, and when she rumbles past she’s already big as a truck, trailing that wicker bag behind in her exhaust like a semi behind a Jimmy Diesel. Her lips are parted, and her smile’s going out before her like a radiator grill. I can smell the hot oil and magneto spark when she goes past, and every step hits the floor she blows up a size bigger, blowing and puffing, roll down anything in her path! I’m scared to think what she’ll do.” (Kesey, 96)
2. “'What, Miss Ratched, is your opinion of this new patient? I mean, gee, he's good-looking and friendly and everything, but in my humble opinion he certainly takes over.’
The Big Nurse tests a needle against her fingertip. ‘I'm afraid’-she stabs the needle down in the rubber-capped vial and lifts the plunger-‘that is exactly what the new patient is planning: to take over. He is what we call a 'manipulator,' Miss Flinn, a man who will use everyone and everything to his own ends.’
‘Oh. But. I mean, in a mental hospital? What could his ends be?’
‘Any number of things.’ She's calm, smiling, lost in the work of loading the needles. ‘Comfort and an easy life, for instance; the feeling of power and respect, perhaps; monetary gain-perhaps all of these things. Sometimes a manipulator's own ends are simply the actual disruption of the ward for the sake of disruption. There are such people in our society. A manipulator can influence the other patients and disrupt them to such an extent that it may take months to get everything running smooth once more. With the present permissive philosophy in mental hospitals, it's easy for them to get away with it. Some years back it was quite different. I recall some years back we had a man, a Mr. Taber, on the ward, and he was an intolerable Ward Manipulator. For a while.’ She looks up from her work, needle half filled in front of her face like a little wand. Her eyes get far-off and pleased with the memory. ‘Mister Tay-bur,’ she says.
‘But, gee,’ the other nurse says, ‘what on earth would make a man want to do something like disrupt the ward for, Miss Ratched? What possible motive …?'
She cuts the little nurse off by jabbing the needle back into the vial's rubber top, fills it, jerks it out, and lays it on the tray. I watch her hand reach for another empty needle, watch it dart out, hinge over it, drop.
‘You seem to forget, Miss Flinn, that this is an institution for the insane.’” (Kesey, 27-8)
3. “In the glass Station the Big Nurse has opened a package from a foreign address and is sucking into hypodermic needles the grass-and-milk liquid that came in vitals in the package. One of the little nurses, a girl with one wandering eye that always keeps looking worried over her shoulder while the other one goes about it usual business, picks up the little tray of filled needles but doesn't carry them away just yet.” (Kesey, 27)
4. “First Charles Cheswick and now William Bibbit! I hope you're satisfied. Playing with human lives - gambling with human lives - as if you thought yourself a God!” (Kesey, 318)
5. "Right at your balls. No that nurse ain't some kinda monster chicken, buddy, what she is is a ball-cutter. I've seen a thousand of 'em, old and young, men and women. Seen 'em all over the country and in the homes - people who try to make you weak so that they can get you to toe the line, to follow their rules, to live like they want you to. " (Kesey, 60)
These quotes show the type of person Nurse Ratched is. Although she may be a female, she hides her femininity to gain more authority and control over the patients on the Ward. She has much respect from everyone that live in the ward and works there because of her power.
Nurse Ratched is a major character in the development of the novel because she has over all control over the Ward and eventually loses it because of the patients rebelling. Nurse Ratched is the Big Nurse that works at the Mental institution in which this novel is set. She begins the novel by having overall control of the patients of the ward, but after McMurphy comes into the story, it all changes. Nurse Ratched is important to the overall message of the book because although she is the antagonist and no one likes her, the message could not be conveyed without her. She shows that control over so many people for such a long time will eventually crumble by the fate of the people rebelling. This shines a light of the society during the time this book was written where feminism was frowned upon. This novel also shines a light on the different social classes and the power they had on the lower classes. As Nurse Ratched becomes aware that McMurphy is trying to break her down, tries to not let him win. She shows that even though he does things that are supposed to make her retaliate, she takes a breath and handles it so he doesn't get what he wants. Nurse Ratched helps to convey the theme of law and order because she places so many rules throughout the Ward to prevent any sense of rebellion. These rules provide a base and support for the institute so the patients will have a hard time breaking it down. An example of when Nurse Ratched uses her authority against the patients is when McMurphy is singing while he is using the bathroom and she walks over and tells him to be quit. She puffs herself up and makes herself seem bigger so she becomes more intimidating. McMurphy sees that he caught her off guard but she rebounds by enforcing her rules of the Ward and punishes him.
McMurphy:
1. “He [McMurphy] sounds like he’s way above them, talking down, like he’s sailing fifty yards overhead, hollering at those below on the ground. He sounds big…He sounds big in the way he walks.” (Kesey, 11)
2. “I [Bromden] could have watched McMurphy at that blackjack table all night, the way he dealt and talked and roped them in and led them smack up to the point where they were just about to quit, then backed down a hand or two to give them confidence and bring them along again. Once he took a break for a cigarette and tilted back in his chair, his hands folded behind his head, and told the guys ‘The secret of being a top-notch con man is being able to know what the mark wants, and how to make him think he’s getting it.’ (Kesey, 81)
3. “All through breakfast McMurphy’s talking and laughing a mile a minute. After this morning he thinks the Big Nurse is going to be a snap. He don’t know he just caught her off guard and, if anything, made her strengthen herself. He’s being the clown working at getting some of the guys to laugh. It bothers him that the best they can do is grin weakly and snigger sometimes.” (Kesey, 102)
4. “Even McMurphy doesn't seem to know he’s been fogged in. If he does, he makes sure not to let on that he’s bothered by it. He’s making sure none of the staff sees him bothered by anything; he knows that there’s not better way in the world to aggravate somebody who’s trying to make it hard for you than by acting like you’re not bothered.” (Kesey, 117)
5. “He keeps up high class manners around the nurses and the black boys in spit of anything they might say to him, in spite of every trick they pull to get him to lose his temper. A couple of times some stupid rule gets him mad, but the just makes himself act more polite and mannerly than ever till he begins to see how funny the whole thing is—the rules, the disapproving looks they use to enforce the rules, the ways of talking to you like you’re nothing but a three-year-old—and when he sees how funny it is he goes to laughing, and this aggravates them to no end. He’s safe as long as he can just laugh, he thinks, and it works pretty fair. Just once he loses control and shows he’s mad, and then it’s not because of the black boys or the Big Nurse and something they did, but it’s because of the patients, and something they didn't do.” (Kesey, 117)
These quotes from the novel come to show that McMurphy has a blunt personality. It also shows what kind of person he is and how much he analyzes each situation he is out into.
McMurphy proves himself to be one of the major characters in the development of this book because he breaks down the rules of the Ward, and gets under Nurse Ratched’s skin. McMurphy is a new patient at the ward that comes in thinking he is going to be the one in charge. When McMurphy begins to take charge of the patients, he notices there is one thing standing in his way, Nurse Ratched. McMurphy sees ways to break her down along with the rules of the ward. These rules that the patients have to follow serve as a support for keeping the Ward under control. As McMurphy breaks down those Supports, the Ward begins the crumble. McMurphy is an important character because he was the very first to challenge the authority. He shows to all of the patients at the Ward that they are living under the control of one woman, that they don’t have anything to show for their lives. Once the patients are taken under McMurphy’s wing, they become unstoppable. The overall message of the book is freedom. McMurphy pokes at the idea of freedom throughout the entire book. Although some of the patients later see McMurphy as a guy who is focused solely on winning, he helps the patients to achieve the overall goal of each patient finding their true selves and becoming them. McMurphy advances the theme of freedom through breaking down the rules because with every rule he changes or alters in any way, the Ward becomes one step closer to crumbling. The Ward crumbling in this novel is a symbol for the patients finally getting their freedom. He also advances this theme by getting Nurse Ratched’s got. In other words, McMurphy does everything in his power to catch her off guard and create havoc throughout the Ward to a point where she can’t control it anymore. An example of when McMurphy gets under Nurse Ratched’s skin was when he was singing extremely loud while using the bathroom. When Nurse heard him singing, she was caught off guard and she showed that to McMurphy. This helps to advance the theme of freedom because he is able to obtain more of the slack the patients are given through breaking down Nurse Ratched and all of the rules she created for order throughout the Ward.
The Staff:
1. Black Boys:
“They're out there.
Black boys in white suits up before me to commit sex acts in the hall and get it mopped up before I can catch them.
They're mopping when I come out the dorm, all three of them sulky and hating everything, the time of day, the place they're at here, the people they got yo work around. When they hate like this, better if they don’t see me [Bromden]. I creep along the wall quiet as dust in my canvas shoes, but they got special sensitive equipment detects my fear and they all look up, all three at once, eyes glittering out of the black faces like the hard glitter of radio tubes out of the back of an old radio.” (Kesey, 1)
2. Black Boys:
"They're mopping when I come out the dorm, all three of them sulky and hating everything, the time of day, the place they're at here, the people they got to work around. When they hate like this, better if they don't see me...They laugh and I hear them mumbling behind me, heads close together. Hum of black machinery, humming hate and death and other hospital secrets. They don't bother not talking out loud about there hate secrets when I'm nearby because they think I'm deaf and dumb." (Kesey, 3)
3. Jap Nurse:
"The nurse-about as big as the small end of nothing whittled to a fine point, as McMurphy put it later-undid our cuffs and gave McMurphy a cigarette and gave me a stick of gum. She said she remembered that I chewed gum. I didn't remember her at all." (Kesey, Page 278)
4. Jap Nurse:
"She worked over his cuts, flinching every time he flinched and telling him she was sorry...'It's not all like her ward,' she said. 'A lot of it is, but not all. Army nurses, trying to run an Army hospital. They are a little sick themselves.’” (Kesey, 279)
5. Jap Nurse:
"Yes. I'd like to keep men here sometime instead of sending them back, but she has seniority." (Kesey, Page 278)
In the first and second quote, you can see the opinion of the black boys from Chief’s point of view to understand what kind of person Chief wants you to see the black boys as. In the third fourth and fifth quote, the Jap Nurse shows herself to be a feminist and gentle when caring for McMurphy and Bromden. Che is the complete opposite of Nurse Ratched, showing McMurphy another way in which she is different.
The Black Boys and the Jap Nurse every much represent two different side in this novel. The Black boys never show any mercy when tending to the patients. They make it seem as though they have no remorse for others’ pain or feelings. On the other hand though, The Jap Nurse, although not a major character, she plays an important role in showing feminism in a novel where masculinity is dominant. She tends to McMurphy and Bromden as if they were precious to her. She shows remorse when she causes their cuts to hurt and she apologizes every time. although the black boys and the Jap Nurse seem very different, they are also similar in the way that they are both under the control of Nurse Ratched. The Jap Nurse admits tot he fact that Nurse Ratched has overall say over who goes where in the Ward. Both the black boys and the Jap Nurse seem to be intimidated by the Big Nurse and how much power she holds.The black boys help to convey the theme of law and order as well as the Jap Nurse. the black boys do everything in their power to keep the law that has been out in place by the Big Nurse. They follow every instruction that Nurse Ratched gives them. If they didn't follow what she said, then there would be no sense of control over the Ward, and there would be no support for the Ward. The Jap Nurse did the same. She followed the orders of Nurse Ratched and cared for McMurphy and Bromden not allowing them to leave the Disturbed until Nurse Ratched says that they can come back down to the Ward. The black boys and the Jap Nurse also convey the message of masculinity and femininity in this novel. The black boys show masculinity because they take charge and have strength over the patients and control what they do. The Jap Nurse shows femininity because she is timid with her work and shows that she cares and has emotions. She also shows that she has remorse unlike the black boys.
Any patients/characters:
1. Billy Bibbit:
“‘Good morning, Miss Ratched,’ Billy said, not even making any move to get up and button his pajamas. He took the girl’s hand in his and grinned. ‘this is Candy.’ The Nurse’s tongue clucked in her bony throat. ‘Oh, Billy Billy Billy—I’m so ashamed for you.’” (Kesey 314)
2. Harding:
“McMurphy doesn’t say a word. He’s got that same puzzled look on his face like there’s something isn’t right, something that he can’t put his finger on. He just sits there looking at Harding, and harding’s rearing smile fades ad he goes to fidgeting around from McMurphy staring at him so funny.” (Kesey 194)
3. Harding:
“I got sick. It wasn’t the practices, I don’t think, it was the feeling that the great, deadly, pointing forefinger of society was pointing at me- and the great voice of millions chanting, ‘Shame. Shame. Shame.’ It’s society’s way of dealing with someone different.” (Kesey 257)
4. Cheswick:
“And got his fingers stuck some way in the grate that’s over the drain at the bottom of the pool, and neither the big lifeguard nor McMurphy nor the two black boys could pry him loose, and by the time they got a screwdriver and undid the grate and brought Cheswick up, with the grate still clutched by his chubby pink and blue fingers, he was drowned.” (Kesey 175)
5. Cheswick:
“And that afternoon in the meeting when Cheswick said that everybody’d agreed that there should be some kind of showdown on the cigarette situation, saying, ‘I ain’t no little kid to have cigarette kept from me like cookies! We want something done about it, ain’t that right, Mack?’ and waited for McMurphy to back him up, all he got was silence.” (Kesey 172)
These quotes represent the characteristics of these characters. Billy Bibbit is a confident man when he is given the resources to become confident, but he is broken down shortly after by Nurse Ratched when she takes away his confidence because she believes it give him too much power. Harding is portrayed as a man who is more feministic than the other men on the Ward. He is shown this way because of the way society views the people that relate to Harding. He thinks that Nurse Ratched has a right to be in charge because he believes that someone needs to have the control. In Cheswick’s Quotes, he is portrayed as having confidence in speaking when he thinks that he has someone to back him up on what he is saying. When he realized that the one person he thought was backing him up, McMurphy, gave Cheswick silence, he sat back down and slumped in his chair in dismay. Cheswick’s confidence in speaking was soon after taken from him at his realization. Although moments after Cheswick sat back down, McMurphy walked over to the glass station and punched a hole through the glass, Cheswick was still upset that McMurphy hadn’t said anything to Cheswick to help him maintain his confidence. These characters are alike in the sense that they all see McMurphy as a leader figure and they care about his input in certain situations. Billy Bibbit helps to convey the message of confidence along with Cheswick and Harding because they all lack their own confidence at some point in the novel. When they maintain their confidence they say what they please and no one can stop them, that is until someone rips it away like Nurse Ratched did Billy or McMurphy did to Harding and Cheswick. Although it was taken away in fear go them having too much power while they obtained that confidence, they made a difference when they had it.
Motifs:
1. Difference of hands on the patients
“He’s [Harding] got hands so long and white and dainty I think they carved each other out of soap, and sometimes they get loose and glide around in front of him free as two white birds until he notices them and traps them between his knees; it bothers him that he’s got pretty hands.” (Kesey, 20)
2. Connections to Religious parables
"Ellis pulled his hands down off the nails in the wall and squeezed Billy Bibbit's hand and told him to be a fisher of men." (Kesey, 234)
The connections to religious parables becomes apparent later in the novel. After the characters fully develop and their characteristics are seen, connections are soon able to be made. McMurphy in many ways represents Jesus. The way he takes the patients under his wing and guides them to what is right is a representation of Jesus. He comes into the ward to show the patients the difference between showing forced individuality and becoming your own person. The patients in the ward soon after become McMurphy’s disciples being in that they follow him in the fight against Nurse Ratched. Although Nurse Ratched tries to turn them away from McMurphy, they know what is right and stay by McMurphy’s side in the fight against Nurse Ratched. He also represents the figure of Jesus because he sacrificed his life to save those of his disciples and every one else who followed him. Nurse Ratched represents Judas because during his fishing trip with his 12 disciples he is betrayed by a Judas figure. McMurphy is betrayed by Nurse Ratched because she tries to stop the trip from occurring because she does not want the patients to leave her control. This advances the theme because it developed the story of a religious metaphor that is known to many. This shows the novel from a different angle and shows the reader the purpose of the novel.
3. Laughter
“Whack his leg and throw back his head and laugh and laugh, digging his thumb into the ribs of whoever was sitting next to him trying to get him to laugh too.”
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