Cuckoo's Nest Blog #1

Hero: There doesn't really seem to be a hero in this story. Unlike in The Great Gatsby, our narrator here, Chief Bromden, is essentially just that - a narrator. He might as well not exist as an actual character and just be an omniscient narrator. He doesn't really have any values that we could agree or disagree with, he just tells things as they're happening to both him and the people around him. Whenever the Big Nurse does something to him, such as having him shaved before his electroshock therapy, he doesn't comment on how evil he thinks she is, he's simply relaying the events. McMurphy can't be our hero, either, since he has values that society disapproves of, and none of the other characters are major enough or have values that line up with ours to count as the hero.

Anti-hero: McMurphy is the anti-hero because while his values do conflict with society's, he also is honorable at the same time. As shown on page 40, 41, and 42,not only has he done many things that society disapproves of (such as assault and battery and rape) he has also pretended to be crazy so as to avoid going to a work camp. While these are bad things, his good aspects are that he realizes that Nurse Ratched is a bitch and he wants to screw with her system, something society and the audience can approve of because we realize that she is not a good person.

Villain: Nurse Ratched is obviously meant to be the villain of the story. While it would seem like she's a good woman, seeing as how her job is meant for 'fixing' those that are 'broken', her portrayal is nothing short of villainous. This is shown not only by the patients' view of her (such as Harding's sarcastic rant on page 55 of my copy and his affirmation of the fact that everyone hates her on page 56: "No one's ever dared come out and say it before, but there's not a man among us that doesn't think it, that doesn't feel just as you do about her [...]") but also by the things she does. On page 45, she manipulates and goads the patients to talk about embarrassing and incriminating secrets. ""Am I to take it that there's not a man among you that has committed some act that he has never admitted?" She reached in the basket for the log book. "Must we go over past history?". She's practically threatening them, but with an air of sugar-sweetness. While she doesn't seem to be obviously evil - she's not beating the patients or anything - she's very manipulative and coy. The definition of a villain is one whose values go against society's, and while she is doing what society wants (fixing broken people) she is not doing it out of the goodness of her heart, she's doing it because it allows her to manipulate people and gain utter control.