One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

In Ken Kesey’s book, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, there were two main characters that were in a battle to have the majority of control over the ward. Throughout the story, they engaged in different acts of stubbornness to see who could display the most power and which of the two could stand their ground the longest without giving in to the other. These two characters were: Randle McMurphy, a new patient who was determined to change the ways of the ward, and Nurse Ratched, the head nurse of the asylum who preferred to have complete control over everyone and everything.

As a man who pretends to be deaf and mute, Bromden is considered to be a relatively unbiased character, yet he even displays strong feelings of hatred towards Nurse Ratched, proving just how evil she is. As Nurse Ratched enters the novel for the first time, she brings with her a noticeably ominous atmospheric change with, “A gust of cold,” (4) that represents her complete control over every aspect of the mental ward, even the weather. At the pinnacle of Kesey’s totalitarian society, Nurse Ratched represents the tendencies of an oppressive government or what Bromden calls, The Combine. For example, she suppresses the patients’ free will because regardless of the patients actual sanity, she is undeniably in control of their fates at the hospital. Besides McMurphy, the majority of the patients could leave on their own, but Nurse Ratched has been able to brainwash them into thinking that they are not suited to assimilate with others outside of the ward. Billy Bibbit says to McMurphy when he asks why they do not leave, “You think I wuh-wuh-wuh-want to stay in here? You think I wouldn’t like a con-convertible and a guh-guh-girl friend? But did you ever have people l-l-laughing at you? No, because you’re so b-big and so tough!” (162-163). Just like an oppressive government, Nurse Ratched convinces its people that they are worthless so they never feel powerful enough to retaliate. Like an alcoholic, Nurse Ratched needs her fix of power that makes her drunk and

​Red haired, rowdy, and raunchy are three words to describe the crazy, infamous McMurphy, while the Nurse is a prude, prideful and frigid ruler who is power-hungry over the mental institution. These two mixed together lead to a cunning war of dominance in the hospital. One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest is a 1962 novel by Ken Kesey depicting the patients at an Oregon psychiatric hospital and how the of the patients and staff change when a new patient, Randle McMurphy arrives. From McMurphy 's devious schemes to manipulate the system to get what he wants, to the Nurse sabotaging his friends ' opinions of him in order to gain the upper hand, this superiority struggle has a definite winner at the end of the novel: McMurphy. McMurphy wins this battle with the Nurse because although he died at the end, he still overcomes and finds ways to manipulate Nurse Ratched 's harsh rules and regulations throughout the book, and leaves an effect on Ratched and the ward that proves the influence and power he had over all of them.

Another theme in the novel is machinery taking over. Throughout the novel, Chief talks about implants and monitoring devices placed throughout the hospital. In his “visions'; he pictures the Big Nurse as various types of machinery, “So she really lets herself go and her painted smile twists, stretches to an open snarl, and she blows up bigger and bigger, big as a tractor, so big I can smell the machinery inside the way you smell motor pulling too big a load.';

In “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” by Ken Kesey, Nurse Ratched symbolizes the oppression of society through archetypal emasculation. The male patients at the ward are controlled, alienated and forced into submission by the superior female characters. Throughout the novel, there is a constant fear of female superiority; Randle McMurphy, the sexually empowered male protagonist, states how they are essentially being castrated. Castration, in the novel, symbolizes the removal of freedom, sexual expression and their identity. Furthermore, Nurse Ratched, the mechanical enforcer, represents American society: corruption, surveillance and the deterioration of individuality.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, written by Ken Kesey, was a very successful novel which was impactful on the world in the past, and still is today. Ken Kesey, a big believer in individuality and the freedom to be oneself, brought new meaning to the world of psychiatry that changed treatments forever. This book didn’t just affect American society, it had a global impact. All around the world there are people that are admitted into mental institutions, and this book changed treatments in these facilities. The novel also raised awareness of the psych ward culture in which this book took place.

Chief Bromden was committed to the hospital after he returned home from the second world war. Bromden served in the war as an electrician's assistant and was undoubtedly affected by the horrors of war. He often suffers from intense hallucinations about fog machines and air raids. The hallucinations serve as apparent metaphors for gas shelling and bombing raids that

Within the walls of the institution the novel takes place in, mental illness is a prominent theme. The fact that the narrator Chief Bromden is a diagnosed schizophrenic greatly affects the text and how people may interpret it. “Like a cartoon world, where the figures are flat and outlined in black, jerking through some kind of goofy story that might be real funny if it weren’t for the cartoon figures being real guys. . .” (Kesey 33). Bromden sees the world through his eyes like a cartoon and doesn’t have a clear grasp on reality due to his schizophrenia-plagued mind. Bromden views the people on the ward as

Many times throughout one of Ken Kesey’s most famous novels, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the book uses animals as symbols to represent the story’s plot. The animals usually relate to individual characters and their current struggles within the story. Animal imagery provides us with great insight to the themes that Kesey is trying to have us explore, and is a very good tool that the reader can use to help better understand and relate to the characters.

To begin with, he creates a barrier between him and the patients at the ward. He describes himself as "… just old Broom Bromden the half-breed Indian back there hiding behind his mop and can't call for help" (11). Chief Bromden believes that isolating himself from the patients of the mental institute, will allow himself to be alone and feel how he would like without anyone being behind his back. Secondly, Chief Bromden pretends to act dumb and deaf around others. He says, "… they think I'm deaf and dumb. Everybody thinks so" (10), and the Chief becomes aware that acting deaf and dumb makes him feel better emotionally. He wants to portray himself in this way so that nobody recognizes him. Also, the people in the ward make him feel isolated and worthless. He constantly says, "I'm cagey enough to fool them that much. If my being half Indian ever helped me in any way is this dirty, it helped me being cagey, helped me all these years" (10). The patients in the ward treat him poorly and the Chief knows that guarding and isolating himself from them will give him peace and quiet. By creating a barrier and being treated poorly by the patients of the ward, Chief realizes he needs to socially isolate himself to be able to live without people impacting his

The Mayo Clinic has said that having delusional thoughts, hallucinations and paranoia are symptoms of mental illness, which multiple characters aside from McMurphy parade within the ward. Although, the Chief is very deceiving of his character when he acts like he’s deaf and dumb in front of everybody but in reality isn’t, Chief stills displays signs of insanity. Chief is always having these hallucinations about the fog and is detached from reality when he thinks about things like the combine (Kessey). Hallucinations involve sensing things while awake that appear to be real, but are just thoughts created by the mind (U.S. National Library of Medicine). Harding conveys major paranoia which is his reasoning for being

In Kesey’s 1950s novel ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest’ Nurse Ratched’s relationship with male patients is based upon differences they hold about gender and identity. Nurse Ratched is portrayed as a masculine misandrist figure that gains power from emasculation. She carries “no compact or lipstick or woman stuff, she’s got that bag full of a thousand parts she aims to use in her duties” . This implies nothing womanly about her as she prioritises her “duties”, suggesting that she aims to control her male patients by ridding her feminine qualities. In addition, she is shown in robotic with a chilling aura. This is evident when she slid “through the door with a gust of cold and locks the door behind her” . This indicates that as a power figure her only concern is controlling her male patients, making sure they are obedient and abiding by her rules. “Gust of cold” implies that by doing so she wholly ruins her relationship with the males due to her “cold” and callous methods. Daniel J. Vitkus states she is “the Big Nurse, an evil mother who wishes to keep and control her little boys (the men on the ward) under her system of mechanical surveillance and mind control.” Yet, can be argued that she is fulfilling her role of working as a Nurse within a mental institution. However Vitkus’s critique is similar to when McMurphy says “Mother Ratched, a ball-cutter?” McMurphy is a hyper masculine force against Ratched’s emasculating norms. Their relationship is essentially a power

The portrayal of sanity and insanity, consciousness and unconsciousness, clarity and opacity in one’s psyche is one of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’s most examined themes. The analysis of this theme, and Kesey’s commentary that extends from it, further asserts this novel as a classic according to Sainte-Beuve’s definition. Insanity is first introduced as a central theme in the novel through with the inherent unreliability present in Bromden’s retelling of the novel, as it is all told in a flashback, and even he admits that his memory still isn’t “clear”. Kesey explores altered states of consciousness in his novel through both insanity and hallucinogenic medication, with one of the first examples of hallucination being Bromden imagining that,

War changes everyone, and while some of the changes are for the better, many veterans are left with horrifying memories and devastating ailments. Chief was not lucky enough to make it out of the war unscathed, which becomes exceedingly evident when he describes his time in the military. While Chief doesn’t seem to have any physical injuries obtained while at war, he acquired a mental illness from the horrifying scenes he was exposed to on a daily basis. "The state of "being sick" goes far beyond the physiology of the injury or pathogen afflicting the individual. Illness is a state of being of the whole mind and body" (Xenakis 8). PTSD is so much more than an inconvenience or a struggle for veterans; it is an illness. Chief has flashbacks to when he was fighting while he is being treated for his schizophrenia, and when he slips into the “fog”. He is constantly reliving the horrible conditions that he had to endure while in combat, which explains why he seems to have gone

Chief Bromden displays characteristics of a schizophrenic through symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations, and lack of emotion and social interaction. His version of reality of the psychiatric ward is distorted, often referring to the “hum of black machinery,