One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest: Examining the Psyche of Literature and of Society

Randle P. McMurphy vs.

(The Big) Nurse Ratched

Cuckoo’s Nest

The most important novel of the 20th Century, because it helps us study the arc and progression of America’s people—and our conflicts:

gay vs. straight (choice? nurture? nature?) young vs. old (age) Christian vs. _________ (creed) black vs. white (race) poor vs. rich (class)

Dialectics = the study of opposing forces

What were the 1950s like? Boring, strict, dull Post-WWII optimism Innocence “Leave it to Beaver” Straight-laced (and

straitjacketed) Paranoid Specific gender roles Establishment-building

http://www.sitcomsonline.com/photos/leaveittobeaveronline.jpg

http://genderroles1950.blogspot.com/

What do you know about the (late) 1960s?

Drugs Vietnam “Revolution” of everything,

including sexual (birth control pillliberated women of this era)

Peace, love—not war A great loosening (morals) Tie-dyed, “Anti-Establishment” Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Credence Clearwater

Revival, Rolling Stones, Janis Joplin, The Doors, Elvis Presley, The Grateful Dead, & The Beatles—

http://library.thinkquest.org/21342/pictures/led-zeppelin.jpg

1957

1967

The Beatles Show the Difference from the 1950s to the 1960s

What do you know about hippies?

Drugs Flag burning Bra burning Gender role rejection San Francisco Flower Power Woodstock

What do you know about McCarthyism?

The ESTABLISHMENT was trying to maintain the social order it had worked so long and hard to create

The Crucible by Arthur Miller “Witch hunts” Red Scare Hysteria

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAmccarthyism.jpg

McCarthyism: The Age of Anxiety

http://www.lambiek.net/artists/b/block_h/block_fire.gif

Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is an allegory with symbolic characters.

These characters enter combat that is symbolic of the conflict in America—between the “establishment” and the “anti-establishment.”

http://www.filmreference.com/images/sjff_01_img0365.jpg

“Establishment” “…term for a traditional

conservative ruling class and its institutions. In this context the term may also refer to that which is mainstream.”(wikipedia.com)

“Mainstream” = old, rich, white, male, Christian

“The Man” is another term for this concept.

“Tricky Dick” Richard Nixon, who was despised by hippies for continuing the Vietnam War

“Anti-Establishment” “[An entity that] goes against

the conventional social, political, and economic principles of a society.” (wikipedia.com)

“Counterculture” is another term that applies here.

“Punk” “V for Vendetta” 1984 Young vs. Old