So I'm supposed to be writing an essay...
Jun. 18th, 2005 08:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
readingredheadAs the title says, I really should be working on my problem novel essay for Mr. McClure. But Lord knows I can't write a good essay without planning, and yet if it feels too much like planning then I'm in trouble because I get out of that planning mode. So I've decided to ramble on in here since that way it doesn't feel like real planning because I don't have Microsoft Word open. (Wow, the human mind works in insane ways.)
The prompt: well, sadly I can't find it in the mess of papers strewn about on my desk. I guess that's more than slightly pathetic. Still looking...
Found: e e cummings poems, my historiography paper, an essay for NHS, list of books for help in learning calculus. Not found: essay prompt.
Heh. So. Still no luck. Oh well, I guess I'll have to call Katie about it tomorrow. But basically the "prompt" is something along the lines of Every novel is centered around several problems, which are questions that cannot be answered yes or no. (For example, "Who is the main character of Hamlet?" is not a problem; "Why is Hamlet the main character?" is.) After reading one of the works above, write an essay discussing one of the prominent problems. Cite at least three critical opinions. And that's all that I can really remember, I really have to remember to call Katie about this, I should see the actual prompt. I don't particularly want to have to cite the critical opinions, since I'd rather this essay be about my opinion, so I'll work those in later. Much later...
Basically, though, I know what I'm going to do. My novel: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. My problem: How reliable is the narrator, and how does his reliability (or lack thereof) affect or enhance the substance of the story? How does it affect or enhance the meaning of the story?
And now folks, for my "answer," I give you the first draft of the problem essay...
The Debatable Sanity of the Universe
In the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, author Ken Kesey uses the environment of patients in a mental hospital to explore the question of sanity and normalcy in America during the early 60's. On the surface the novel appears to be a legitimate portrayal of an insane asylum and the patients therein, but on closer inspection the reliability of the narrator, one of the patients at the asylum, should be questioned. It is through Chief Broom's eyes that the readers see the story, but considering that the Chief is currently housed within a mental institution, how trustworthy are his observations? How might his narration affect the story's substance? And is the meaning of the novel skewed at all by the flaws of its teller? Though on the surface it would seem obvious that the reader's trust should not lie in Chief Broom as a narrator, by the end of the novel the author's points have been so well established that it is hard to even label the Chief as completely insane.
First, and key to the discussion of this topic, there is the question of what exactly constitutes sanity. In the novel, many of the men have voluntarily entered the mental hospital and are not required to remain there. Rather, they stay apparently due to their own will, not contemplating the force of society that led them to go there in the first place. Even the resident doctor, when explaining the idea behind group therapy, states that it is important for the patients to work together to combat their various psychoses because "society is what decides who's sane and who isn't, so you got to measure up." (p. 48) However, all of this is shaken up by a new admission, a man by the name of Randle Patrick McMurphy, who questions the views of the men in his ward, in particular their subservience to the nurse on their ward, referred to as Big Nurse, who stands in many cases for the conformative force of society. Exactly the effect that society has had on the men in the ward can be seem by how many of them are not "committed," or required by law to be in the mental hospital. McMurphy is so shocked when he finds this out, because he cannot fathom why someone would stay there of their own free will, especially given the complaints they have. " 'Tell me why,' " he says. " 'You gripe, you bitch for weeks on end about how you can't stand this place, can't stand the nurse or anything about her, and all the time you ain't committed. I can understand it with some of the old guys on the ward. They're nuts, But you, you're not exactly the everyday man on the street, but you're not nuts.' They don't argue with him." (p. 167-8) Thus, it is shown that ultimately many of the patients are not "nuts," as McMurphy would judge them, but that the society they live in has termed them "different," and they have decided or been forced to decide to seek medical help. One patient, Billy Bibbit, is made to stay by his mother, who is a personal friend of the Big Nurse. Another, Sefelt, is a voluntary patient due to his epilepsy. In this novel, the author plays with the accepted meaning of sanity, transforming it into something synonymous with conformity. If sanity is conformity, then few of the characters can be termed sane, but by the usual definition of sanity, many of the patients are not that bad.
However, the fact that sanity is imposed by society does not change the fact that having delusions about fog machines in the ward and the overarching power of the super-secret "Combine" are very good indicators of an unstable mind. These are only a few of the stumbling blocks in the reliability of Chief Broom, the story's first person narrator. The half-Indian, who for the majority of the novel pretends to be deaf and dumb, is very possibly paranoid delusional, describing "long spells -- three days, years -- when you can't see a thing, know where you are only by the speaker sounding overhead like a bell buoy clanging in the fog. When I can see, the guys are usually moving around as unconcerned as though they didn't notice so much as a mist in the air." (p. 104) The fact that the other patients in the ward do not seem to notice these spells of "fogging" further suggests that they are created by the Chief's imagination. "Nobody complains at all about the fog," the Chief notices on one occasion. (p. 114)
...And if I write anymore I think I'll go insane. So I'm leaving now to write something fun, actually. Later.
The prompt: well, sadly I can't find it in the mess of papers strewn about on my desk. I guess that's more than slightly pathetic. Still looking...
Found: e e cummings poems, my historiography paper, an essay for NHS, list of books for help in learning calculus. Not found: essay prompt.
Heh. So. Still no luck. Oh well, I guess I'll have to call Katie about it tomorrow. But basically the "prompt" is something along the lines of Every novel is centered around several problems, which are questions that cannot be answered yes or no. (For example, "Who is the main character of Hamlet?" is not a problem; "Why is Hamlet the main character?" is.) After reading one of the works above, write an essay discussing one of the prominent problems. Cite at least three critical opinions. And that's all that I can really remember, I really have to remember to call Katie about this, I should see the actual prompt. I don't particularly want to have to cite the critical opinions, since I'd rather this essay be about my opinion, so I'll work those in later. Much later...
Basically, though, I know what I'm going to do. My novel: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. My problem: How reliable is the narrator, and how does his reliability (or lack thereof) affect or enhance the substance of the story? How does it affect or enhance the meaning of the story?
And now folks, for my "answer," I give you the first draft of the problem essay...
The Debatable Sanity of the Universe
In the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, author Ken Kesey uses the environment of patients in a mental hospital to explore the question of sanity and normalcy in America during the early 60's. On the surface the novel appears to be a legitimate portrayal of an insane asylum and the patients therein, but on closer inspection the reliability of the narrator, one of the patients at the asylum, should be questioned. It is through Chief Broom's eyes that the readers see the story, but considering that the Chief is currently housed within a mental institution, how trustworthy are his observations? How might his narration affect the story's substance? And is the meaning of the novel skewed at all by the flaws of its teller? Though on the surface it would seem obvious that the reader's trust should not lie in Chief Broom as a narrator, by the end of the novel the author's points have been so well established that it is hard to even label the Chief as completely insane.
First, and key to the discussion of this topic, there is the question of what exactly constitutes sanity. In the novel, many of the men have voluntarily entered the mental hospital and are not required to remain there. Rather, they stay apparently due to their own will, not contemplating the force of society that led them to go there in the first place. Even the resident doctor, when explaining the idea behind group therapy, states that it is important for the patients to work together to combat their various psychoses because "society is what decides who's sane and who isn't, so you got to measure up." (p. 48) However, all of this is shaken up by a new admission, a man by the name of Randle Patrick McMurphy, who questions the views of the men in his ward, in particular their subservience to the nurse on their ward, referred to as Big Nurse, who stands in many cases for the conformative force of society. Exactly the effect that society has had on the men in the ward can be seem by how many of them are not "committed," or required by law to be in the mental hospital. McMurphy is so shocked when he finds this out, because he cannot fathom why someone would stay there of their own free will, especially given the complaints they have. " 'Tell me why,' " he says. " 'You gripe, you bitch for weeks on end about how you can't stand this place, can't stand the nurse or anything about her, and all the time you ain't committed. I can understand it with some of the old guys on the ward. They're nuts, But you, you're not exactly the everyday man on the street, but you're not nuts.' They don't argue with him." (p. 167-8) Thus, it is shown that ultimately many of the patients are not "nuts," as McMurphy would judge them, but that the society they live in has termed them "different," and they have decided or been forced to decide to seek medical help. One patient, Billy Bibbit, is made to stay by his mother, who is a personal friend of the Big Nurse. Another, Sefelt, is a voluntary patient due to his epilepsy. In this novel, the author plays with the accepted meaning of sanity, transforming it into something synonymous with conformity. If sanity is conformity, then few of the characters can be termed sane, but by the usual definition of sanity, many of the patients are not that bad.
However, the fact that sanity is imposed by society does not change the fact that having delusions about fog machines in the ward and the overarching power of the super-secret "Combine" are very good indicators of an unstable mind. These are only a few of the stumbling blocks in the reliability of Chief Broom, the story's first person narrator. The half-Indian, who for the majority of the novel pretends to be deaf and dumb, is very possibly paranoid delusional, describing "long spells -- three days, years -- when you can't see a thing, know where you are only by the speaker sounding overhead like a bell buoy clanging in the fog. When I can see, the guys are usually moving around as unconcerned as though they didn't notice so much as a mist in the air." (p. 104) The fact that the other patients in the ward do not seem to notice these spells of "fogging" further suggests that they are created by the Chief's imagination. "Nobody complains at all about the fog," the Chief notices on one occasion. (p. 114)
...And if I write anymore I think I'll go insane. So I'm leaving now to write something fun, actually. Later.
