One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey

I recently read One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest for the first time in my life. There are a series of books I mean to read throughout my life - the cult classics, the old time favourites and the must reads. Some of these include: 1984 (read), The Bell Jar (read), Catch 22 (just bought and reading), Animal Farm (not read yet), A Brave New World (read), Of Mice and Men (Not yet read), The Colour Purple (read) etc. etc. etc. The list goes on and slowly but surely I will read them all.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest's blurb reads: "Chief Bromden, half American-Indian, whom the authorities believe is deaf and dumb, tells the story of a mental institutions ruled by Big Nurse on behalf of the all-powerful Combine.

Into this terrifying grey world comes McMurphy, a brawling gambling man, who wages total war on behalf of his cowed fellow-inmates. What follows is at once hilarious and heroic, tragic and ultimately liberating."

Anyway, the One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest... it's a novel one, that's for sure (excuse the pun). It's odd how so many of these supposed classics are so strangely written. I found when reading this book that I was often focusing so much on the style of the writing that I would loose my way with what was happening with the plot and have to re-read whole sections again. When conversations ensued it became a battle to understand who was saying what as Kesey often stated it once and left you to figure out the rest through punctuations and the back and forth style of writing.

Chief Bromden is the narrator of the story which flickers between present day ward reality, Bromden's childhood and the unreality of his own mental thoughts and illness. I've heard much about One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest before I came to read the book and expected a deep heart wrenching tale of life in a mental institution that led to liberation for the inmates through the arrival of the lively McMurphy. While reading the book I found it not to be the case, it was interesting and readable but the style of writing made me come to dislike reading the book and wished to reach the end. It felt slow moving and too details in areas I didn't care about but at times skimmed over things I wanted to know more about.

I can see how the style of writing is adapted to fit in with the mental state of the patient narrating the story but it was extremely tiresome in the beginning and especially when he talked about the Columbine/Machines in the walls of the ward. When more interesting things start to happen in the ward with McMurphy and Bromden such as when they're sent for Electro Shock Therapy I began to become more engrossed in the story and it is possible to see the strength inside McMurphy and the way in which he can help the other inmates realise their own strength.

For such a dramatic ending of the story it appears to occur extremely quickly and without much tension, one minute McMurphy's alive the next he isn't and you've reached the last page... I can see there is an extremely good story hiding in the mixed up words of this book but reading it didn't seem to bring it out too well. When looking back at the story of the book I can see it is a very good story with lots of ins and outs that would enthral the viewer it's just the style of writing I did not like that marked the book down in my opinion. I have recently bought the DVD of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and hope that it is better than the book and shows the story for what it is without tripping itself up on the language used in the book.

Read reviews and/or buy the book

Read reviews and/or buy the DVD

I will do a DVD review once I have watched it.

Stairs

When I was going up the stairs I met a man that wasn't there, he wasn't there again today, I wish, I wish he'd go away.

Adbusters Nov/Dec - #68 Volume 14, Number 6

I was in Waterstones a while back looking at magazines and went to pick up the usual Creative Review to see if the new Sony Bravia advert was mentioned in it... nothing. I've been becoming more and more bored with the content of Creative Review since they redesigned it a couple of years back (definitely not an improvement as the majority of it is taken up by adverts for one thing or another - none of which are relevant to me at this stage.) Then my hand glanced over Adbusters, I had heard of this magazine but it was never one readily available in my local newsagents. I flicked through the pages and was instantly enthralled, sucked in, and consumed.

The page that caught me the most was on about a woman’s memories of being a small child in the car on a journey with her family as she contemplates the meaning of family and how wrong it is. Instantly I was reminded of the book The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, the style of writing and the content and the way in which it played with my mind and thoughts. We take it all for granted, the way our family is run, the way in which things should happen. Like in my previous post I said how I wouldn't be happy with a bucket of KFC as a Christmas dinner but maybe for other families that's normal? Maybe even special.

This has all become more apparent in my life of late; the Christmas period was certainly an odd one for me this year. I was working thirteen hour shifts at a local pub/club back home and crashing at my boyfriend’s house almost every night which saved me the half hour drive back to my house where my family lived. The Christmas spirit failed to creep up on me at all... not even now do I feel like I should be feeling Christmassy - it usually happens eventually but I think I missed the bandwagon this time. Anyway, living in Leeds with five other people from other types of family backgrounds and lifestyles it has become ever more clear that the way my family do things isn't the way other families do things. When different families happen to merge - such as living with new housemates or staying with a boyfriends family it becomes ever more relevant that it's all a case of compromise. In past conversations with my parents about their childhood traditions it is easy to see how they have compromised, merged and added new traditions through out their life together to create what I consider to be a "normal" family Christmas.

Check out the Adbusters website here

Burger King advert

This post is about the new Burger King 'Whopper' advert that was released a few months ago... ok it's funny, it's mocking and extremely gender specific. I don't have a problem with that; the thing that bothers me about this advert is one specific line in the lyrics of the song which has since been revoked. Below are the lyrics as much as I can discern from the only copy of the advert I found with the original lyrics and here you can see the original advertisement on YouTube:

"I am man hear me roar in numbers to big to ignore and I'm way too hungry to settle for chick food. ‘Cause my stomachs starting to growl and I'm going on the prowl for a pure beef double whopper, man that's good. Oh yes I’m a guy, I'll admit I've been fed quiche. Wave tofu goodbye, now it’s for the purest beef I reach. I will eat this meat, 'til my inny turns into an outty. I am starved, I am encouragable, and I need to stuff this 100% pure beef flamed grilled good thing down, yeah I am hungry, I am encouragable, I am man."

The line that bothers me is "'Til my inny turns into an outty" relating to the size of one's belly... surely when reading the lyrics the people in charge of advertising for Burger King would have realised this did not give off particularly encouraging connotations to consume Burger King products?! Especially in the supposedly so much more health conscious world we are attempting to create.

The world appears to be split in two by health and fast food. There are companies pulling us in all directions through advertising, Burger King, McDonalds, KFC. A recent KFC "Family bucket meal" stated that Christmas was sorted - all you needed was their BUCKET of food... Christmas dinner, would you be thankful with greasy chips, slimy chicken and fat coated coleslaw all washed down with a litre or so of coke and a slab of ice cream? I know I wouldn't. How can anyone begin to imagine that any food that is supplied in a bucket is healthy? What are we doing?

Supermarkets and product manufacturers are taking a step in the right direction, slowly but surely showing us the healthier options on packaging but now there is the large debate about whether it should be numerical or colour coordinated... because merging the two is too difficult?.. Why can't we all just work together to create a better, healthier world? But at the moment, let’s face it - if we don't care enough to look after our own bodies how will we ever come to care enough about the world that we live in?