Ordinary People Character Analysis

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Regents-style comparative analysis of our 2006-2007 reading Book/Story Title Author Main Character(s) Ordinary People (1978) Judith Guest Conrad Jarrett; Dr. Berger; Calvin and Beth Jarrett; Buck; Jeanine Pratt One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1961) Ken Kesey Chief Bromden/Broom; R.P. McMurphy; Nurse Ratched; Harding; Cheswick “This is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona” (1995) Sherman Alexie Victor Joseph; Thomas Builds-the-Fire; Cathy; Victor’s father Shoeless Joe W.P. Kinsella Ray, Annie & Karin Kinsella; Shoeless Joe Jackson; J.D. Salinger; Moonlight Graham; Eddie Scissons; Mark; Richard; Bluestein The Great Gatsby (1925) F. Scott Fitzgerald Jay Gatsby; Nick Carraway; Tom and Daisy Buchanan; Characterization similarities: • The main characters come to a new sense of themselves and their place in the world. 1. Through the assistance of Dr. Berger, Conrad comes to realize that he is a good (though flawed) person; by forgiving himself, Conrad can deal with his family, the past and get on with living in the present. 2. Through McMurphy’s influence and rowdy joyous manner, Big Chief realizes the importance of truly living, rather than existing in a dream-like fog. 3. Victor Joseph and Thomas Builds-the-Fire come to understand the nature of their friendship and realize things about their shared history and sense…show more content…
In addition to hospital hijinks—including the arrival of a man with a hunting knife buried in his one remaining good eye—and the discovery of ‘angels’ in the woods (the angels turn out to be images on a drive-in movie theater screen), the story also features a lively example of the ‘unreliable narrator,’ as the person telling us the story often exists in an intoxicated haze and his observations are often NOT what they appear to
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