One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest Research Paper
Drugs and Insanity Against Society
The author of the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Keasey, received his inspiration for the book while volunteering at a veteran's hospital. This is where he was first introduced to LSD. The moment he tried it, he became addicted, and began experimenting on himself with the drugs, observing the effects. The novel deals with the tyrannical rule of head Nurse Ratched in a mental hospital somewhere in Oregon. She runs all business and daily life in the asylum to her every whim and rules the ward by fear and manipulation. This has gone on for as long as the narrator, Chief Bromden, can remember. However a new patient, Randle McMurphy, enters the hospital and begins to wreak havoc upon the system put in place by the nurse. In One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Keasey, the author demonstrates the use of psychotropic drugs and its effects in conjunction with counterculture through the tyrannically controlled mental hospital ruled by Nurse Ratched. The asylum setting of the novel also gives access to observe the characterization of the novel by analyzing the different strains of insanity exhibited by each patient. The representation of the individual vs. society come through the conflict of Randle McMurphy and the social order of the asylum.
The 1950s, during which Ken Keasey wrote One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, saw arise in a literary movement known as counterculture, along with counterculture come was a large role in the creation of this novel, the use of psychotropic drug, LSD. The increasingly popular counterculture movement focus on literary elements that were outside of what was considered mainstream at the time. “The late 1950s, the time period in which the book was written and set, saw the end of a decade in which people outside the mainstream were often viewed with suspicion” (Malin 227). The style in which the novel was written involves powerful emotional and sensational imagery, sometime creating scenes
The author of the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Keasey, received his inspiration for the book while volunteering at a veteran's hospital. This is where he was first introduced to LSD. The moment he tried it, he became addicted, and began experimenting on himself with the drugs, observing the effects. The novel deals with the tyrannical rule of head Nurse Ratched in a mental hospital somewhere in Oregon. She runs all business and daily life in the asylum to her every whim and rules the ward by fear and manipulation. This has gone on for as long as the narrator, Chief Bromden, can remember. However a new patient, Randle McMurphy, enters the hospital and begins to wreak havoc upon the system put in place by the nurse. In One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Keasey, the author demonstrates the use of psychotropic drugs and its effects in conjunction with counterculture through the tyrannically controlled mental hospital ruled by Nurse Ratched. The asylum setting of the novel also gives access to observe the characterization of the novel by analyzing the different strains of insanity exhibited by each patient. The representation of the individual vs. society come through the conflict of Randle McMurphy and the social order of the asylum.
The 1950s, during which Ken Keasey wrote One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, saw arise in a literary movement known as counterculture, along with counterculture come was a large role in the creation of this novel, the use of psychotropic drug, LSD. The increasingly popular counterculture movement focus on literary elements that were outside of what was considered mainstream at the time. “The late 1950s, the time period in which the book was written and set, saw the end of a decade in which people outside the mainstream were often viewed with suspicion” (Malin 227). The style in which the novel was written involves powerful emotional and sensational imagery, sometime creating scenes
Cited: Faggen, Robert. Personal Interview. 21 Jan. 1994. Interview Keasey, Ken. One Flew Over the Cuckoo 's Nest. London, England: Penguin Books Ltd, 1962. Print. Malin, Irwing. Books Abroad. Vol. 39. No.2. Spring 1965. Rpt. In Twentieth Century Literary Criticism. Vol. 34. Detroit: Gale, 1988. Print. Rutten,Kris R., et al. “The Rhetoric Of Disability: A Dramatic Narrative Analysis Of One Flew Over the Cuckoo 's Nest.” Critical Arts: A South-North Journal of Cultural & Media Studies 26.5 (2012): 631. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 22 Feb. 2013 Tanner, Stephen. Ken Keasy. Boston: Twayne Publishers Inc, 1983. Print.