A Rhetorical Analysis Of Girl Interrupted By Susanna Kaysen

Nathaniel Hawthorne, in his bold novel, The Scarlet Letter tackles a variety of themes that include: sin, guilt, redemption, postfeminism, and organized religion's abuse of power. Hawthorne spoke in a somber and grim tone, designed to arouse a sense of suspense for his readers. The audience in which he was addressing would have been conservative Christians and women suffragettes, all of whom reflected the ideologies during this time period. By instilling clever diction, Hawthorne exposes hypocrisy in Puritanism and objects against the religion's superfluous punishments; which force individuals to endure unnecessary and extreme suffering.

During the 1700’s the jails were not only used to confine criminals, but they confined people with mental illness as well. People with mental illness were subjected to inhumane treatment, even when the individual was admitted

In the book Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen, Susanna Kaysen was only 18 years old when she agreed to enter a medium security psychiatric facility in Boston, McLean hospital in April 1967, after a failed suicide attempt. She insisted that her over dose on aspirin was not a suicide attempt, but after a 20 minute interview the doctor decided she needed to be admitted to a hospital. During her prolonged two-year stay at the hospital Kaysen describes the issues that most of the patients in her ward have to deal with and how they all differently deal with the amount of time they must stay in the hospital for. While in the hospital Kaysen experienced a case of depersonalization where she tried to pull the skin of her hands to see if there were bones underneath, after a failed escape attempt. Soon, after going to therapy and analysis she was labeled as having recovered from borderline personality disorder. After her release she realizes that McLean Hospital provided patients with more freedom than the outside world, by being free responsibility of parental pressure, free from school and job responsibilities, and being free from the “social norms” that society comes up with. Ultimately, being in captivity gave the patients more freedom then in society and created a safe environment in which patients wanted to stay in.

Elle Woods was the typical sorority girl while at CULA- she loved shopping; her friends; and her boyfriend, Warner. With her father’s money on her side, Elle never prioritized her education or working. She assumed her future held a marriage to Warner and life as a trophy wife; but when Warner declares Elle a hindrance to his goals of graduating from Harvard University, she becomes determined to do the same. Realizing no amount of money could buy admission to Harvard, Elle works valiantly toward her goal and is accepted. As the movie comes to a close, the scene shifts to three years later with Elle addressing her classmates as she graduates alongside Warner. Though she does not speak excessively, Elle speaks of the passion, perseverance, and determination necessary for success. In her short, yet effective speech; Elle uses ethos and pathos to encourage her classmates to go forth in their law careers with courage and faith, and reminds them to never accept people as they appear on the surface.

In Ten Days in a Mad House, it is clear that reporter Nellie Bly’s point of view about the plight of the needy and mentally ill and the officials towards these people is they should be sympathized because they are ignored, living in tough conditions, or are poor and do not get the attention they deserve. These opinions are revealed through her use of humor, dramatic irony, and descriptive adjectives.

In this article, the incarceration of the mentally ill is encouraged because it is safer than keeping them in mental institutions. It claims that mental institutions are extremely dangerous by their very nature and the nurses there are trained to treat the mentally ill, not to keep them from hurting themselves or other people. In prisons however, the

This book presents two individuals, named Richard and Perry, who strived to do a few things once they were out of prison that were very horrific, and unbearable which by any means is not permissible. During and after the killings of the Clutter family, Perry comes to his senses and speaks on the aftermath of what these killings have brought upon him. “The sounds of breathing, the gasps, the hysterical inhalations of a man with a severed windpipe. When Perry said, “I think there must be something wrong with us,” he was making an admission he “hated to make” (110). Criminals who admit on their behavior. The position becomes, are they human beings anymore, or are they dehumanized? The fact that Perry Smith comes to the realization that they are demented, should they be given a chance? The level of detail that speaks

It had often times been argued that freedom, whether it be societal, political, spiritual, etc. was associated with insanity, but perhaps the truth of the matter is that it is not freedom that causes a furthering descent into madness, but instead oppression, as suggested in Native Son by Richard Wright, The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, and, in retrospect, even Rest in the Treatment of Nervous Disease by Silas Weir Mitchell emphasized how male supremacy reigned, as it was women who were diagnosed with hysteria and, as a result, were further subjugated. The argument that when one is free, one is more likely to go mad was often used to justify slavery and the limitations of women in society.

In her first journal entry Kaysen tells how the decision for her to go to McLean Hospital was based on a twenty minute conversation with a psychiatrist. Kaysen had been picking at her acne and been acting out in ways which would not be considered unusual for teens today, but at the time it was a sufficient excuse for commitment to an institution. In an interview, Kaysen further develops the idea that her illness was influenced by outside factors saying, “ [Her] retrospective account of her confinement at McLean Hospital makes a cultural intervention that challenges the notion that mental illness is rooted solely in the individual.” (Kaysan, 18). Being surrounded by girls with serious illnesses forced Kaysen to assume the role of a girl with a real mental illness. Society forced her to find something wrong with herself in an attempt to fit in. Kaysen questions what mental illness truly is. She asks,“Was everybody seeing this stuff and acting as though they weren't? Was insanity just a matter of dropping the act?” (Kaysen 41). Because Kaysen was labeled as being mentally ill although she was not, it became hard for her to tell what truly pronounced someone as mentally ill. Was everyone slightly crazy or were just some better at hiding it then others? Living in such an uptight society, people had no choice but to put on an act of perfection. When someone began to “drop the

Stevenson’s autobiography Just Mercy, his main emphasis is on mass incarceration and extreme punishment across the country. Whereas, in “A Gun to His Head as a Child. In Prison as an Adult,” written by Audra D.S. Burch, the article focuses on how childhood trauma affects the future of children. There are various similarities between both texts, which support each other’s main point. Both of the texts are centered on incarceration of young males who many cases were victims of growing up in abusive environments; whether it be abuse of drugs or domestic abuse, it led them to one place: jail.

In Ken Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and the film Girl, Interrupted directed by James Mangold, the authors look at American psychiatric institutions of the 1960s and explore the idea that hospitals act as a microcosm for society, where characters are used as symbols to represent aspects of society. The settings represent conformity and rebellion, prejudice against minorities and authority figures ruling absolutely. Both authors use stylistic features to position the audience to respond to ideas common in both texts.

In Ken Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, an individual’s capacity for self-sacrifice is affected by compelling circumstances. The novel follows the experiences of Chief Bromden and his fellow patients within a psychiatric hospital ruled by an authoritarian Nurse Ratched, who imposes strict rules within the facility in order to maintain stability. The novel is centred on Randle McMurphy’s and Nurse Ratched’s rivalry caused by their polar opposite views on how the institute should be run. McMurphy, a boisterous patient, believes that his fellow patients should have more freedom, on the other hand Nurse Ratched believes in the institution being run like a dictatorship where discipline is the important aspect for stability.

Throughout history, mental illness has been labeled as a defining deformity, that harnesses in its “victims,” into a box, parallel to the familiar “mime in a box” image. In a world where we glorify “normality,” a lack of illness, which by all means is a gift, the beauty of one mind takes away from the beauty of an outlier, even though, ironically people may not even recognize their differences. Hester, at a glance suffers from a literal scarlet letter, but an imprint on her brain may exist as well. Irrational actions, sudden emotional episodes, and destructive thoughts can only prevail for so long following sin; Hester’s persona has branches of self-defeating personality disorder, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder. No one of her time, however, will bring the issue to light, Hester will be left known as the mistress, a witch, or “A,” rather than to explore her “complicated” condition. As decades pass, Hester’s state will remain, as the “A,” the mark of the stigma on mental illness today. When left neglected, society rejects the possibility that under a visible coating, mental deformities may lie; those who are divergent, who require affection more, are made subordinate, marginalized with no quest for a cure.

The novel, Girl, Interrupted is a memoir of author Susana Kaysen’s life and her journey through early adulthood as she suffered with Borderline Personality Disorder. The novel captures her time at McLean Hospital, a psychiatric hospital located in Belmont, Massachusetts. Kaysen divides the novel into separate anecdotes of events and fellow patients she encountered during the two years she was admitted at Mclean.

Freedom. A goal. A liberty. A myth. So many descriptions for a single concept. Yet the main idea is the same: to be free of restrictions, free to be whatever you wish. It is a life necessity, one that was, unfortunately, and still is, restricted throughout history, resulting in many chasing after its acquisition. Humans currently live in a time, in several nations, where freedom is a right, a necessity of life freely given. However, throughout history, freedom has been kept to only a minority, resulting in individuals struggling to change society for freedom to be distributed to the majority of people, a battle that took years, centuries to accomplish. This fight for true autonomy took many forms, both violent and peaceful. Literary works, in particular, have been major agents to this cause, serving as both reminders of those struggles and remembrance to readers of the endeavors those authors sought to accomplish. Two particular works, The Awakening by Kate Chopin and The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, spearheaded movements for freedom by tackling the prejudice of gender roles, expressing through their novels’ characters and experiences the arguments for individual freedom and the challenges that must be conquered to achieve those goals for future generations.