Character Analysis of Mcmurphy

1. Randle Patrick McMurphy charges into the Mental Hospital and challenges Nurse Ratched also known as the “Big Nurse” in attempts to topple what she has established. In “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” emptiness, placement, and apathy loom in the beginning of the novel, however once Randle Patrick McMurphy arrives the order of combines takes a drastic turn… for the good! McMurphy is a complex character because he can be seen either as a negative influence or as a positive influence because of his actions in the story. However, McMurphy a positive influence because of his actions within the novel.

With McMurphy’s continuous outburst or rebellion, Nurse Ratched sentenced him to receive Electroshock Therapy, the second worse punishment patients would receive for misbehaviour. Determined to put on a strong exterior “he insisted it wasn’t hurting him. He wouldn’t even take his capsules. But every time that loudspeaker called him to forgo breakfast and prepare to walk to Building One, the muscles in his jaw went taunt and his whole face drained of colour, looking thin and scared-” (Kesey 241). Enduring the excruciating experience of Electroshock therapy only heightened the image the other men upheld for McMurphy and contributed to his heroism. Through the fight with the black boys and his fight to stay strong through Electroshock Therapy, McMurphy’s determination was evident to the other patients of the ward.

Kesey has also given this novel great Symbolic value. As an opposer to the McCarthy scheme, he has used the mental hospital as a scale model of how society breaks free of society's conformity. McMurphy acts as the ‘liberator', or rebel of the ward's excessively strict conformity. He saves the patients from "the

Randle McMurphy, the protagonist, is introduced to break down the nurse’s oppressive ways. McMurphy, a con man who was sentenced to a work farm, was diagnosed as a psychopath and sent to the mental hospital, which he much preferred. Serving as a savior figure to the patients of the ward who have already been battered by the Big Nurse, McMurphy causes interference to the nurse’s control. He supports the men as they are ridiculed in meetings and supports their attempts to change policy. Although he does help other patients, he first looks out for himself. He cons the patients out of their money and then follows the nurse’s rules for awhile because of the threat of being kept on the

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a novel written by Ken Kesey during a time in our society when pressures of our modern world seemed at their greatest. Many people were, at this time, deemed by society’s standards to be insane and institutionalized. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is set in a ward of a mental institution. The major conflict in the novel is that of power. Power is a recurring and overwhelming theme throughout the novel. Kesey shows the power of women who are associated with the patients, the power Nurse Ratched has, and also the power McMurphy fights to win. By default, he also shows how little power the patients have.

McMurphy can also be considered a tragic hero. Although he could almost always take control of a situation and never let the combine get the best of him, he could not always control his temper. It was the one think that could get him in trouble because Nurse Ratched could not punish him with electric shock therapy unless he had an outburst. The best thing that McMurphy could have had in the hospital was patience and a calm temper because the only weapon Nurse Ratched had was to try to frustrate him. Since she has ultimate power on the ward, she could do anything she wants and make any rules. For instance, when the patients wanted to watch the world series and they clearly had a majority, she didn’t let them because she wanted them to know that she has authority

In Ken Kesey's novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest the patients in a mental institution are put through a restorative treatment in order to follow the line and fit into society. McMurphy, he who breaks boundaries inspires the rest of the patients to live their lives when they are slowly giving up their struggle for life, to rebel against the authority of the Big Nurse and her undermining attempts to get them to submit to her power and rules. Uniformly disturbing the principal at Welton Academy and a group of determined parents attempt to conform the lives of their children to the ideals of society in the movie Dead Poets Society. The students follow the new ideas brought on by a teacher only to learn of the obstacles that face them. A romantic non-conformist, McMurphy and Keeting who challenge the system and its leaders in turn becoming the ultimate sacrifice, brings them to a new vision. They inspire the oppressed and give them confidence to be successful like Bromden and Todd or to reject reality and fail like Billy and Neil.

After leaving the hellish work farm where he serving his prison sentence, McMurphy arrives at the ward, which is exponentially more dull and drab in comparison. The impact of his arrival at the ward is seen instantly. The enthusiasm and energy he brings to the ward is so uncharacteristic, that even some of the Chronics, who are longstanding patients that have become “machines with flaws inside that can’t be repaired,” show some life (Kesey 10). In his typical westernized fashion, McMurphy arrives at the hospital with the aura of “a frontier

Although the nurse has seemingly won because the patients were not able to achieve their primary goal, in reality, their real victory is their combined resistance against Nurse Ratched. The adventure on the fishing boat also exhibits how the patients aid McMurphy in his rebellion. Though he charges them for their endeavor, they once again decide to accompany him and go against the institution, further implying their admiration for him and his cause. Even though McMurphy knows that the nurse will likely punish the twelve other patients severely for lying and leaving the ward with a prostitute under false pretenses, he does so anyway, showing that he will risk great punishment to help his “disciples.” Finally, the patients support the party that McMurphy has in the ward with alcohol and the two prostitutes. The main reason behind this event was to ensure that Billy Bibbit, one of the patients on the ward who lacked self-confidence, got to have a date with Candy, one of the prostitutes whom Billy liked. This event is another example of how McMurphy would risk trouble for himself for the betterment of others and how they supported him in his actions.

McMurphy learns that involuntarily committed patients cannot leave the hospital without staff approval. Therefore, he cannot leave at the end of his six months sentence, but when Nurse Ratched says he can and he begins to submit to her authority. However, by this time, he had become the leader for the other patients. Their sanity, their claim to manhood lies in the balance. Cheswick, dismayed by McMurphy’s surrender, commits suicide.

When norms of society are unfair and seem set in stone, rebellion is bound to occur, ultimately bringing about change in the community. Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest demonstrates the conflict of individuals who have to survive in an environment where they are pressured to cooperate. The hospital's atmosphere suppresses the patients' individuality through authority figures that mold the patients into their visions of perfection. The ward staff's ability to overpower the patients' free will is not questioned until a man named Randal McMurphy is committed to the mental institute. He rebels against what he perceives as a rigid, dehumanizing, and uncompassionate

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a controversial novel that has left parents and school authorities debating about its influence on students since its publication in 1962. The novel describes the inner workings of a mental institution, how the patients are emasculated and mistreated by the terrifying Nurse Ratched, who will go to any length to control them. But in comes McMurphy, a criminal who chose to go to an asylum rather than serve physical labor; he disrupts the order of the hospital with his big personality and loud opinions, undermining the authority of Nurse Ratched and encouraging the patients to live their own lives, until he too, is silenced forever by authority. With his novel, Ken Kesey paints society as an oppressive

While I agree that the heart of this novel is the power struggle that ensues and that RP McMurphy is not "mentally ill", the other patients are more clearly suffering illnesses, to reach the conclusion that McMurphy himself is "not crazy". As readers, we must first examine what it means to be "crazy", both to ourselves and to society at large. When researching Ken Kesey and his life, I had stumbled upon an interesting fact. Ken Kesey heard of a government program that paid people to take part in experiments with psychedelic drugs. When I heard this, I was so shocked, I thought “wow this is going to be a very interesting book.” There were things that I really enjoyed about the book, such as the narrator, McMurphy, and the crazy parties they both threw. Things that I disliked about the book was the death of poor Billy Bibbit, how nurse Ratched treated the

When McMurphy finds out that he is one of two patients that are involuntarily committed to the hospital, it makes him realize that he alone is fighting for his freedom, and the others have been repressed by Ratched to the point of being afraid to rebel against her or simply leave. McMurphy fights until the end to free these men of their emasculation even if it

McMurphy is a gambling Irishman and convict, who grows tired of laboring at the Pendleton prison farm. To escape prison life, he feigns insanity and gets himself involuntarily committed to a mental hospital in Oregon. He tries to bring about a change at the hospital, for he does not like the fact that grown men act like "rabbits" and are scared of the Big Nurse. He tries as hard as he can to "get her goat", by not doing the duties he is given. He also ironically ends up serving as a