Feminism Is A Futile Cause
Feminism is a Futile Cause
Twentieth century literature is not always sympathetic to feministic sentiments. Novels such as One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Age of Innocence, and All the King's Men, try to undo the prominent effects the feministic movement of the 20th century. Women's denial of their inferiority is the underlying fear that materializes in these three books to produce reactionary actions and attitudes from their patrimonial society in order to prevent the inversion masculine and feminine role in the western culture. The patrimonial society dominates in all three novels, and its presence is a leviathan of power and intimidation that demolishes any hope for an upheaval of feminine leadership, independence, and liberation from the gender restraint. Although Ken Kesey, Edith Wharton, and Robert Warren incorporate strong female characters in their books, these characters ultimately succumb to the morass of egotism, authority, and limitations imposed by their male counterpart. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Age of Innocence, and All the King's Men show how detrimental social interaction with men is to women by exemplify how women's leadership, independence, respect are reduced by methods of alienation or rejection and how the virtues and perceptions of strong women are also altered through such interactions.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest emphasizes the unnaturalness and peculiarity of a woman in authoritative role by a close examination of the forceful Nurse Ratchet's character. Nurse Ratchet embraces the essence of unnaturalness because she performs her job with an aberrant accuracy and a smooth precision of a mechanically man-made robot. All elements of womanhood are lost in her because she [unsexes] herself with the china-doll smile, the porcelain face, and the army trouser that hides her visage of womanhood (45). Critic Irving comments that " the Big Nurse is no longer a woman [
] All of her gestures, commands,...
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