Write an essay in which you discuss how your ideas about what it means to become a person, how we attain self-reliance, understanding the role of fantasy in a healthy life, what constitutes sanity and insanity, and what you believe is a useful human conception of the meaning of death, affect the way you read One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. This is a documented critical essay; that is, you are to combine your ideas with ideas from at least 4 other sources in coming to terms with the novel for yourself. At least 2 of these sources must come from critics whose works can be found in the back of the book. One source from our textbook, Writing Through Literature. The fourth source is the novel itself. There are many ways you could choose to complete this assignment. Your options are listed below, As always, you are to use the MLA style of documentation.

OPTION 1: Write an essay in which you perform a detailed character analysis of Chief Bromden. Your character analysis must deal with each of the five major ideas we’ve discussed in class: what it means to become a person, how we exhibit or attain self-reliance, the role fantasy plays in a healthy life, what constitutes sanity and insanity, and a human conception of the awareness and meaning of death. Be sure to use your analysis of the Chief’s character to exemplify what you think is Kesey’s main message about living life as a free human being.

OPTION 2: Write an essay in which you perform a detailed character analysis of R.P. McMurphy. Your character analysis must deal with each of the five major ideas we’ve discussed in class: what it means to become a person, how we exhibit or attain self-reliance, the role fantasy plays in a healthy life, what constitutes sanity and insanity, and a human conception of the awareness and meaning of death. Be sure to use your analysis of McMurphy’s character to exemplify what you think is Kesey’s main message about living life as a free human being.

OPTION 3: Pretend you are McMurphy’s long lost childhood friend, and you’ve heard about what he is doing there on the ward. Using what you know about becoming a person, attaining self-reliance, the role of fantasy in a healthy life, what constitutes sanity and insanity, and a human conception of the awareness and meaning of death, and how, and to what extent McMurphy’s actions in the novel exemplify these ideas, write a persuasive essay in which you attempt to convince him to clean up his act before something truly terrible happens. Hints: You may pretend you do not know the climax of the novel while writing the essay to McMurphy, and still use the ending of the novel in it to convince him not to do anything rash. You may also consider any critic’s character analysis of McMurphy to be a reasonable psychoanalysis of his mental condition. You do need to cite the works of critical literature as authorities or examples to prove your point to McMurphy. You do need to consider what you think McMurphy’s objections to your ideas would be, and you must deal with them effectively by acknowledging them, accommodating them, and refuting them as necessary. Consider carefully whether or not McMurphy is likely to be an audience predisposed to agree with you. Be sure to consider how all of your reasons for persuading McMurphy to stop might be viewed in light of what you think is Kesey’s main point about living life as a free human being, and the things McMurphy may feel he has to do because of his understanding of that message.

OPTION 4: Take up to five of the characters on the ward and discuss how they help you see important aspects of becoming a person, attaining self-reliance, the role of fantasy in a healthy life, what constitutes sanity and insanity, and a human conception of the awareness and meaning of death. Hint: You need not talk about more than one character per topic. You do need to talk about each idea completely, so that your readers are satisfied with the depth of your investigation of how the novel helps you see these aspects of the human condition. Take care to create transitions in your essay that suggest how each topic is related to the one that follows it. Be sure to write a conclusion that makes an important statement about how these aspects of the various topics work together in Kesey’s novel to present a unified statement about living in the world as a free human being, and explain why knowing this is important.

HOW TO SUCCEED: This assignment is fairly complex, so break it down before you attempt to get too far with it. Make sure you find ideas first (based on the Option you are responding to), then evidence from the novel, and then quotations in support of or in disagreement with your position from the critics (and mark those pages where you find the evidence). Remember that the reason for using the critics is to extend your own ideas, and not to have them jump on your bandwagon; after all, they wrote their essays before you wrote yours–you would actually be jumping on their bandwagon. Analyze this paragraph for important clues about how each paragraph or section of your essay ought to be structured to most easily do the things you need to do to succeed.