1.
Literary Criticism

2. Biographical Approach
Work is the author
What aspects of the author’s personal life are relevant to this story?
Which of the author’s stated beliefs are reflected in the work?
Does the writer challenge or support the values of her contemporaries?
What seem to be the author’s major concerns? Do they reflect any of the writer’s personal experiences?
Do any of the events in the story correspond to events experienced by the author?
Do any of the characters in the story correspond to real people?

3. Historical Approach Work = period it was written
How does it reflect the time in which it was written?
How accurately does the story depict the time in which it is set?
What literary or historical influences helped to shape the form and content of the work?
How does the story reflect the attitudes and beliefs of the time in which it was written or set?
What historical events or movements might have influenced this writer?

4.
Marxist Approach
This approach focuses on man’s relationship to others in society, politics, religion, and business.
What is the relationship between the characters and their society?
Does the story address societal issues, such as race, gender, and class?
How do social forces shape the power relationships between groups or classes of people in the story? Who has the power, and who doesn’t? Why?
How does the story reflect the Great American Dream?
How does the story reflect urban, rural, or suburban values?
What does the work say about economic or social power? Who has it and who doesn’t? Any
Marxist leanings evident?
Does the story address issues of economic exploitation? What role does money play?
How do economic conditions determine the direction of the characters’ lives?
Does the work challenge or affirm the social order it depicts?
Can the protagonist’s struggle be seen as symbolic of a larger class struggle?
Do any of the characters correspond to types of government, such as a dictatorship, democracy, communism, socialism, fascism, etc.? What attitudes toward these political structures/systems are expressed in the work?

5. Formalist Approach
This approach focuses on form. The analysis stresses items like symbols, images, and structure and how one part of the work relates to other parts and to the whole.
Stick to the text only!
Tone, figures of speech, plot, diction, repetition, symbolism, ACTIONS
Is there a central or focal passage that can be said to sum up the entirety of the work? How does that one action or speech or dialogue capture the essence of the entire book?

6. Archetypal Approach
This approach focuses on connections to other literature, mythological/biblical allusions, archétypal images, symbols, characters, themes.
What universal experiences are depicted?
Does the protagonist undergo any kind of transformation?
Are the names significant?
Is there a Christ-like figure in the work?
Does the writer allude to biblical or mythological literature? For what purpose?
How does the story reflect the experiences of death and rebirth?
What archetypal events occur in the story?
What archetypal images occur?
What archetypal characters appear in the story?
What archetypal settings appear?

9. Ecocriticism (nature)
Ecocriticism (nature)
How is nature represented in this text?
How do we see issues of environmental disaster and crises reflected?
How are animals represented in this text and what is their relationship to humans?
How do the roles or representations of men and women towards the environment differ? MOTHER NATURE – hmmmm…
Where is the environment placed in the power hierarchy?
How is nature empowered or oppressed in this work?

10. Feminist Approach
Feminist critics attempt to correct or supplement what they regard as a predominantly male-dominated critical perspective
How is the relationship between men and women portrayed?
What are the power relationships between men and women (or characters assuming male/female roles)?
How are male and female roles defined?
What constitutes masculinity and femininity?
Do characters take on traits from opposite genders? How so? How does this change others’ reactions to them?
What does the work reveal about the operations (economically, politically, socially, or psychologically) of patriarchy?
What does the work imply about the possibilities of sisterhood as a mode of resisting patriarchy?
Suppression of women or the strong female voice
(Gay and Lesbian and Cultural (minorities)

11. Philosophical Approach
This approach focuses on themes, view of the world, moral statements, good vs. evil, human nature
What view of life does the story present? Which character best articulates this viewpoint?
According to this work’s view of life, what is mankind’s relationship to God? To the universe?
What moral statement, if any, does this story make?
What is the author’s attitude toward his world? Toward fate? Toward God?
What is the author’s conception of good and evil?
What does the work say about the nature of good or evil?
What does the work say about human nature?

12. Psychological Approach
Psychological Approach
Dreams, suppressed desires, motives, and our response to a text as readers
Id, Ego, Superego
Why we do what we do and say what we say

13. Reader Response
Reader brings his or her experiences to the reading = multiple i____________________ of the text
Strength of Reader Response = more insights, student dependent, student becomes a stronger c_____________ reader. Allows reader to ask questions, make insights, and make p___________________ connections.

14. Questions to Ask What did you notice in the text?
What questions do you have?
What issues do you have?
Level of enjoyment?
Did the text challenge your beliefs?
How does the text relate to your personal struggles and victories?
Did the text invoke any personal memories?

15. Cuckoo’s Nest: Shutt’s favorite book
What did you notice in the text? -- conversational, fun, and then fragmented / hallucinations / fog / flashbacks / confusion
What questions do you have? – what happened to Chief / did Cheswick kill himself / the whole Kesey writing it under LSD
What issues do you have? – Chief killing McMurphy (movie scene)
Level of enjoyment? – love McMurphy’s honesty and humor, rebellion, battle with Ratched and the Black Boys / sexuality isn’t an evil thing / real macho
Did the text challenge your beliefs? – Chief killing McMurphy conflicted with my faith as it relates to mercy killing / rape scenes were disturbing
How does the text relate to your personal struggles and victories? – feel “trapped” as man reaching middle age / desire for youth / power of rebellion / clash with the way I was raised
Did the text invoke any personal memories? – my wife’s father as he relates to Chief’s father / Jack Kevorkian / Mr. Norris and his studies with sterilization in Virginia
And you know what? The older Shutt gets, the more life he lives—the more the novel changes and grows for him
What about you?

17. What does your response say about YOU – your fears, desires, and needs
What does your response say about YOU – your fears, desires, and needs? Where might this response have originated?

18. From Shutt’s Brain
Second favorite short story (The Lottery is #1). Drawn to the 2 audience members who volunteer, especially the one who gives the ultimate sacrifice – knowing that death is probably the end result. Both seemed to be lost, overlooked characters; sad; lonely; unknown; in need of identity. This was there 1 moment to be someone. I wanted someone to die. Why? Am I sick and demented? NOW I START TO DIG INTO MY SUBCONSCIOUS I can relate. Father left when I was 7 years old. Only had a few friends growing up. Kept to myself. Physically skinny. Not popular but also not bullied… just kind of there. Always thought that I had a lot to offer, many talents. Battled with depression. Always internally sought self-worth, to be somebody, to be recognized. Fear of growing old and never having really lived. My mom was a shell of her former self after the divorce—lost sight and job and country home. Always wanted to be there for her, to become someone, for her to be proud of something in her life since so much was gone. = relates to one who made ultimate sacrifice for self worth?

19. Thesis Statements Use key words from the questions
Don’t mention criticism EVER (use key words)
Entire essay proves the THESIS
All quotes used prove the THESIS

20. Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a retelling of the life of Jesus Christ with McMurphy as the Christ-like character who sacrifices his own life for the freedom of the patients.

21. In Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, McMurphy is the rebel who battles the novel’s villain Nurse Ratched with the help of his faithful companions, Chief and Harding.

22. In Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Chief’s hallucinations reflect a nostalgic past where Chief finds both peaceful familiarity and conflict.

23. Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a powerful tale of rebellion, and it is through the novel’s main character of McMurphy that I am challenged to rethink the direction of my own life.

24. In Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the tearing of Ratched’s uniform and the lifting of the hydrotherapy unit are the two most important scenes as both reveal the central theme of the novel: the need for freedom only found in that of individuality.

25. In Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the Black Boys represent the suppressed anger of the African American during the 1950s and 1960s.

26. In Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Chief Bromden ultimately embraces his Id, which enables him to break the shackles of conformity and to embrace self-identity.

27. Life in the ward after McMurphy’s arrival in Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest depicts that of Kesey and the actions of the Merry Pranksters of the 1960s.

28. Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest depicts an empty, emasculated life when one embraces conformity.

29. In Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, nature is an oppressed entity—manipulated and destroyed by society and industry.

30. Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, criticizes the communist, authoritarian system of government and instead, encourages one of anarchy.

31. Chief’s character, in Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, is a direct reflection of Ken Kesey’s life during his time working for the Oregon mental health system.