What do birds symbolize in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest?

In the novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, birds symbolize freedom, hope, and fear.
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What do geese symbolize in one flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest?

The geese also represent freedom because they are free to do what they want and go about their own business, without noticing the dog, or the patients in the mental institution. The “good fisherman” who “catches hens” represents the nurse and how she “catches” the men in the mental institute.
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What does McMurphy's laugh symbolize?

The longer McMurphy is on the ward, the more the men begin to laugh. Laughter becomes a symbol and an active representation of the men's freedom, even though they are basically imprisoned by the ward and by society.
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What does fog symbolize in one flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest?

In this novel, fogs symbolize a lack of insight and an escape from reality. When Bromden starts to slip away from reality, because of his medication or out of fear, he hallucinates fog drifting into the ward. He imagines that there are hidden fog machines in the vents and that they are controlled by the staff.
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What animal does Harding say that Cheswick is?

McMurphy is everything that Cheswick is not; McMurphy is willing to challenge Nurse Ratched, while all the other patients are afraid to engage in battle with her. Harding, another man on the ward, describes Cheswick to McMurphy when McMurphy first arrives at the institution. 'Cheswick there is a rabbit,' he says.
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Hidden Meaning in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest – Earthling Cinema



What is the importance of the dog and the geese to Chief?

Why is that important? The Dog is McMurphy and the Geese are the combine. He sees them outside the ward. This shows some foreshadowing when the Dog is walking into the pathway of an oncoming car.
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Why does Cheswick drown himself?

At one point McMurphy decides to fall in line when he learns his stay in the ward is indefinite and his release is solely determined by the Big Nurse. As a result, Cheswick drowns himself in the ward's swimming pool when he decides he himself will never escape the relentless Big Nurse.
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What mental illness does McMurphy have?

Each film takes up specific gendered mental illnesses – Susanna is diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder, seven times more likely in women than men, and McMurphy with Anti-Social Personality Disorder, three times more likely in men than women.
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What does Nurse Ratched symbolize?

A former army nurse, Nurse Ratched represents the oppressive mechanization, dehumanization, and emasculation of modern society—in Bromden's words, the Combine. Her nickname is “Big Nurse,” which sounds like Big Brother, the name used in George Orwell's novel 1984 to refer to an oppressive and all-knowing authority.
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What mental illness does Chief Bromden have?

Chief Bromden presented a long-standing history characterized by the complex features of Schizophrenia.
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What is unusual about McMurphy?

What is unusual about McMurphy? McMurphy does not act like others. He is loud, laughs, and very bold.
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Why did they transfer McMurphy from the work farm to the mental institution?

He is transferred to the ward from a prison work farm, where he decided the relaxing life in a ward would be favorable to the physical labor of the farm. He meets Nurse Ratched, the woman running the ward, and quickly notices the ways in which she keeps the ward under her absolute control.
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Why does McMurphy laugh at Chief Bromden?

McMurphy's laughter, while healing to the patients, is disrupting to the Big Nurse and her Black Boys. Bromden mentions that laughing must be the only thing that keeps McMurphy from falling captive to the combine's power, “He's safe as long as he can laugh,” (Kesey, 117).
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What does Bromden see when he looks out the window?

Bromden's realization, upon looking out the window, that the hospital is in the countryside symbolizes the broadening of his perceptual abilities under McMurphy's influence. He watches as animals interact with man-made creations.
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Who is the bull goose loony?

bull goose loony an oxymoron. A bull indicates masculine qualities while a goose indicates feminine. A loony, of course, is someone not entirely in control of their mental faculties and perhaps unable to discern whether they are a bull or a goose. chronic lasting a long time or recurring often.
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What does Chief Bromden symbolize?

Chief Bromden, a tall American-Indian mute is the central character that symbolizes the change throughout the text and also throughout society. Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest uses this character that is subject to change as the narrator event though his perceptions cannot be fully trusted.
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What is Nurse Ratched's one weakness?

When McMurphy attacks her and tears her shirt open in front of the men, he reveals her weakness—she's a woman after all. Big breasts don't lie.
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Is Nurse Ratched a psychopath?

In the book and the film of “One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest”, Nurse Ratched was not a psychopath, she was an unbelievably mean, sadistic person. The original Nurse Ratched's actions during the story show us that something terrible must have happened in her past to make her this way.
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What was Nurse Ratched's first name?

And the actress playing the ultimate authority figure, Nurse Ratched, was Louise Fletcher. Now, almost half a century later, Nurse Ratched has been given a first name - spoiler alert, it's Mildred - and a backstory.
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Why did McMurphy get a lobotomy?

McMurphy is given a lobotomy for his attack on Nurse Ratched. When he is returned to the ward after the operation, he is a vegetable. That same night, Bromden suffocates McMurphy with a pillow.
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What was wrong with Billy bibbit?

Billy Stutters

Billy Bibbit's psychological problems manifest themselves as a stutter. Billy reveals in group therapy that he flunked out of college because he had to quit ROTC.
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What is Martini disease?

Martini. Another hospital patient. Martini lives in a world of delusional hallucinations, but McMurphy includes him in the board and card games with the other patients.
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Is Chief mentally ill Why or why not?

By Ken Kesey

Chief Bromden is a Columbia Indian who suffers from schizophrenia. Although he plays a central role in the story, he is largely an observer. Chief is an interesting narrator because he is certainly not unbiased, and his mental illness can also shed doubt on his reliability.
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Why does Nurse Ratched remember Mr Taber so fondly?

Nurse Ratched remembers Mr. Taber so fondly because supposedly he was a success of one of her controlling and tyrannical experiments. She describes Mr. Taber as an “intolerable Ward Manipulator” (p.
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What is the moral of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest?

“The biggest lesson “One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest” teaches us is that there is not always one way to treat those with mental health issues. We, as a society, must try our best every day to approach people in the way that is best for them.”
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