NationMaster - Encyclopedia: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (novel)

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1962) is a novel written by Ken Kesey. It is set in an Oregon asylum, and serves as a study of the institutional process and the human mind. Image File history File links Cuckoo_nest. ... Kenneth Elton Kesey (September 17, 1935 â€“ November 10, 2001) was an American author, best known for his novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, and as a counter-cultural figure who, some consider, was a link between the beat generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. ... For other uses, see Country (disambiguation). ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... This article is about the literary concept. ... A publisher is a person or entity which engages in the act of publishing. ... Viking Press was founded on March 1, 1925, in New York City, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim. ... Year 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Hardcover books A hardcover (or hardback or hardbound) is a book bound with rigid protective covers (typically of cardboard covered with cloth, heavy paper, or sometimes leather). ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ... ISBN redirects here. ... This article is about the literary concept. ... Kenneth Elton Kesey (September 17, 1935 â€“ November 10, 2001) was an American author, best known for his novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, and as a counter-cultural figure who, some consider, was a link between the beat generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. ... This article is about the U.S. state. ... A psychiatric hospital (also called a mental hospital or asylum) is a hospital specializing in the treatment of persons with mental illness. ...

The story was adapted into a Broadway play by Dale Wasserman in 1963, and a film directed by Miloš Forman and written by Lawrence Hauben and Bo Goldman in 1975. Gary Sinise in the 2001 revival In 1963, one year after Ken Keseys bestseller novel was published, Dale Wassermans stage adaptation made its Broadway premiere, running through 1964. ... Dale Wasserman, a prolific writer of drama, admits to little more than being born (1917). ... One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest is a 1975 film directed by MiloÅ¡ Forman. ... Jan TomÃ¡Å¡ Forman (born February 18, 1932), better known as MiloÅ¡ Forman, is a film director, actor, screenwriter and professor. ... // January 28 - George Lucas creates the second draft of what would eventually become Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. ...

The book's epigraph is: In literature, an epigraph is a quotation that is placed at the start of a work or section that expresses in some succinct way an aspect or theme of what is to follow. ...

Plot introduction

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was a direct product of Kesey's time working as an orderly at a mental-health facility in Menlo Park, California. Not only did he speak to the patients and witness the workings of the institution, he received electroconvulsive therapy and took psychoactive drugs (notably LSD, psilocybin, mescaline and DMT) as well as the same drugs as the patients to gain a deeper insight into their lives.^{[citation needed]} This article is about orderlies in medical work. ... Menlo Park is a city in San Mateo County, California in the United States of America, in the San Francisco Bay Area. ... Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), also known as electroshock, is a controversial psychiatric treatment in which seizures are induced with electricity for therapeutic effect. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... Lysergic acid diethylamide, commonly called LSD, LSD-25, or acid. ... Psilocybin (also known as psilocybine) is a psychedelic alkaloid of the tryptamine family, found in psilocybin mushrooms. ... Mescaline (3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine) is a psychedelic alkaloid of the phenethylamine class. ... Dimethyltryptamine (DMT), also known as N,N-dimethyltryptamine, is a psychedelic tryptamine. ...

Plot summary

Narrated by the gigantic but docile and schizophrenic Columbian Indian "Chief" Bromden, who has pretended to be a deaf-mute for years, this story focuses on the antics of gleefully rebellious Randle McMurphy, a transferee from a workfarm prison to a mental hospital. The all-male asylum is based upon the old Pendleton, Oregon asylum (now the Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution). With little medical oversight, the hospital ward is run by the buttoned-up, middle-aged Nurse Ratched (or "the Big Nurse") and her orderlies, whom the Chief describes as resentful black men. Schizophrenia is a psychiatric diagnosis denoting a persistent, often chronic, mental illness variously affecting behavior, thinking, and emotion. ... R.P. McMurphy (Jack Nicholson) receiving electro-shock therapy in the 1975 film adaptation. ... Pendleton is a city located in Umatilla County, Oregon. ... Louise Fletcher as Nurse Ratched in the 1975 film. ...

McMurphy constantly antagonizes the Big Nurse and upsets routine. Betting on himself, McMurphy tries and fails to lift a heavy shower room control panel. He runs a card table, captains the ward's basketball team, comments on Nurse Ratched's figure, incites the other patients on the ward to conduct a vote on watching the World Series on television, and organizes a supervised deep sea fishing trip. The Chief, opening up to McMurphy due to the latter's rebellion, reveals late one night that he can speak and hear. McMurphy presents a discipline problem and challenge to the Big Nurse's authority, and the two become engaged in a power struggle. After a fight incident, the Big Nurse sends McMurphy off the ward for two weeks for electroshock therapy on a cross-shaped table and electrodes that resemble a "crown of thorns," as one patient describes it. Electroconvulsive therapy, also known as electroshock or ECT, is a controversial type of psychiatric shock therapy involving the induction of an artificial seizure in a patient by passing electricity through the brain. ...

One night, after bribing the night orderly, McMurphy breaks into the pharmacy and smuggles bottles of liquor and two prostitute girlfriends onto the ward for a party, including some of the patients. McMurphy persuades one of the women to seduce Billy Bibbit, a timid, boyish patient, with a terrible stutter and no experience with women. Neglecting to clean up before the morning shift arrives, McMurphy and the other patients fall asleep. The staff returns and discovers the aftermath of the party. The staff finds the night orderly and the rest of the ward, in the minds of the patients, comically askew. The Big Nurse finds Billy Bibbit and the prostitute in each other's arms, partially dressed, and admonishes him. Billy asserts himself for first time, answering the Big Nurse without stuttering. The Big Nurse then threatens to tell Billy's mother what she has seen. Billy has an emotional outburst, and once left alone in the doctor's office, fatally slits his own throat. Nurse Ratched angrily blames McMurphy for the loss of life. Provoked, McMurphy attempts to strangle her, ripping off the front of her uniform, and he is removed to the Disturbed ward, where he undergoes a lobotomy. Stuttering is a speech disorder in which pronunciation of the (usually) first letter or syllable of a word is repeated involuntarily. ... Look up Lobotomy in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

When McMurphy returns, he is wheeled onto the ward on a bed, in a near-vegetative state similar to its most elderly patients. The Chief realizes that if other patients see McMurphy in that condition, Nurse Ratched will have ultimately "won," demoralizing the patients who were only beginning to assert themselves as men because of McMurphy's influence. The Chief smothers McMurphy with a pillow to suffocate him during the night. He does this so that McMurphy can die with dignity rather than lie there as a representation of what happens when one tries to buck the system. Chief Bromden then lifts and carries the shower room control panel to the window, throwing it through the window and escaping.

Themes

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest refers constantly to different authorities that control individuals through subtle and coercive methods. The novel's narrator, the Chief, combines these authorities in his mind, terming them "The Combine" in reference to the mechanistic way they manipulate and process individuals. The authority of The Combine is most often personified in the character of Nurse Ratched who controls the inhabitants of the novel's mental ward through a combination of rewards and subtle shame. Although she does not normally resort to conventionally harsh discipline her actions are portrayed as more insidious than those of a conventional prison administrator. This is because the subtlety of her actions prevents her prisoners from understanding that they are being controlled at all. The Chief also sees the combine in the damming of the wild Columbia river where his Native Americans ancestors hunted, and in the broader conformity of post-war American consumer society. The novel's critique of the mental ward as an instrument of oppression comparable to the prison mirrored many of the claims that French intellectual Michel Foucault was making at the same time. Similarly Foucault argued that invisible forms of discipline oppressed individuals on a broad societal scale, encouraging them to censor aspects of themselves and their actions. This article is about the people indigenous to the United States. ... Consumerist redirects here. ... Michel Foucault (pronounced ) (October 15, 1926 â€“ June 25, 1984) was a French philosopher, historian and sociologist. ... This article is about cultural prohibitions in general, for other uses, see Taboo (disambiguation). ...

Characters

Chief Bromden: The novel's Native American narrator, the Chief has been in the mental hospital since the end of World War II. Bromden pretends to be deaf and dumb, and he is privy to many of the ward's dirty secrets. Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki TÅjÅ Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000...

As a young man, the Chief was a high school football star, a college student, and a war hero. After seeing his father, a true Indian chief, humiliated at the hands of the government and his wife, Bromden succumbs to schizophrenia. Bromden believes society is controlled by a large, malignant organization which he calls "The Combine".

Bromden sees people as they seem, not as they appear. While he is a very powerful man of over six-and-a-half feet tall, he sees himself as a small man, and strong-spirited people such as McMurphy and Ratched as large. It is only when McMurphy helps him regain his self-respect that he finally stops hallucinating.

Randle Patrick McMurphy: A fun-loving, swaggering convict sent from a prison. He is forceful and guilty of battery and gambling (he had also been charged with, but never convicted of, statutory rape). McMurphy is transferred from a prison work farm to the hospital, thinking it will be an easy way to serve out his sentence. He has a fine time hustling the patients, until he realizes that he is more than a diversion for them; he gives them the lives they are too afraid to live for themselves. In himself he discovers devotion to his friends and capacity for self-sacrifice. In the end, McMurphy overplays his determination to fight Nurse Ratched's rule, which costs him his freedom, his health, and ultimately, his life. Randle Patrick McMurphy, or R P McMurphy for short, is an Irish-American mental patient from Ken Keseys novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest. ... This article or section does not cite any references or sources. ...

The staff

Nurse Ratched: The tyrannical head nurse of the mental institution, who exercises near-total power over those in her care, including her subordinates. She will not hesitate to restrict her patients' access to medication, amenities, and basic human necessities if it suits her needs. McMurphy's casual, rule-disregarding presence in Nurse Ratched's institution is a constant bother, as neither threats, nor punishment, nor shock therapy will stop him, or the patients under his sway. Nurse Ratched eventually has McMurphy lobotomized, after, in a fit of rage, McMurphy nearly chokes her to death. However, the damage is done, and Nurse Ratched's rule is broken after McMurphy's attack leaves her nearly unable to speak, and unable to intimidate her patients, subordinates, and superiors. Louise Fletcher as Nurse Ratched in the 1975 film. ...

Washington, Williams, and Warren: Three black men who work as aides in the ward. Williams is a dwarf, his growth stunted after witnessing his mother's rape by white men. The Chief says Nurse Ratched hired them for their capacity to hate. They are cruel and vindictive men who are unable to dominate McMurphy.

Dr. Spivey: The spineless ward doctor. While Nurse Ratched managed to drive off all the other doctors, she kept Spivey because he always did as he was told. Harding suggests that the nurse may threaten to expose him as a drug addict, though whether he really is an addict is unknown. McMurphy's rebellion inspires him to stand up to Nurse Ratched by presenting some fresh ideas.

Nurse Pilbow: The night nurse for the ward. Her face, neck and chest are stained with a profound birthmark. She is intensely Catholic, and, according to the Chief, spends her time off praying for the birthmark to disappear or scrubbing it furiously until her skin bleeds. She blames the patients for infecting her with their evil, and takes it out on them. A birthmark is a blemish on the skin formed before birth. ...

The Japanese Nurse: A tiny woman, she runs the upstairs ward, which is reserved for violent or otherwise unmanageable patients. She treats her patients kindly and openly opposes Nurse Ratched's methods.

The PR man: A strange individual who is responsible for the hospital's public relations. The patients suspect he wears a corset and sometimes he laughs hysterically when there are no other staff around. In a nightmare, the Chief sees him cut off the testicles of a dead patient as a trophy. // Dictionary. ... A luxury hourglass corset from 1878. ...

Geever: A night aide. He is the one who discovers that the Chief is hiding old wads of gum under his bed.

Mr. Turkle: An elderly African American aide who works the late shift in the ward. The Chief notes that Turkle is far more kindly than the other aides. He agrees to allow McMurphy to host a party and sneak in prostitutes one night. He is a marijuana user, and shares his joint with some of the patients during the party. An African American (also Afro-American, Black American, or simply black) is a member of an ethnic group in the United States whose ancestors, usually in predominant part, were indigenous to Africa. ... A Cannabis sativa plant The drug cannabis, also called marijuana, is produced from parts of the cannabis plant, primarily the cured flowers and gathered trichomes of the female plant. ...

The "Acutes"

The acutes are patients who can still be cured. With few exceptions, they are there voluntarily.

Billy Bibbit: A nervous, shy patient with an extreme speech impediment. Billy cuts himself and has attempted suicide numerous times. Nurse Ratched is a close friend of Billy's overbearing mother, who treats him like a child despite his being in his mid-thirties. To alleviate Billy's fear of women, McMurphy sneaks a prostitute into the ward so Billy can lose his virginity. Upon being discovered the next morning, Billy speaks for the first time without stuttering. It is only after Nurse Ratched threatens to tell his mother that Billy resorts back to his nervous ways. Billy slits his own throat in the Doctor's office.

Dale Harding: The unofficial leader of the patients before McMurphy arrives. Harding is an intelligent, good-looking man who is ashamed of his secret homosexual tendencies. Harding's beautiful yet malcontented wife is a source of shame for him; he cannot pleasure her, making him feel even less like a man.

George Sorensen: A Swedish man with germaphobia. He spends his days washing his hands in the ward's drinking fountain. McMurphy manages to convince him to lead a fishing expedition for the patients. Afterwards, the staff try to forcibly delouse him, conscious of the mental anguish that they are causing him. The de-lousing is mainly retribution by the nurse for McMurphy's takeover of the ward, rather than medical care. McMurphy and the Chief stop the de-lousing and, because of their actions, end up in the Disturbed ward. Germaphobia is a term used to describe a pathological fear of germs. ...

Charles Cheswick: A loudmouthed patient always demanding change in the ward, but who never has the courage to see anything through. He finds a friend in McMurphy, who is able to voice his opinions for him. After McMurphy loses his confidence when he learns that his stay in the ward is indefinite, Cheswick drowns himself in the swimming pool.

Martini: A patient who suffers from severe hallucinations. He frightens McMurphy by talking about the people who "need [McMurphy] to see them", that is, the people who need McMurphy to stand up for them.

Scanlon: A patient obsessed with explosives and destruction. Aside from McMurphy and Bromden, he is the only non-vegetative patient there by force, the rest could leave at anytime. It is Scanlon who convinces the Chief to escape.

Sefelt and Fredrickson: Two epileptic patients. Jim Sefelt refuses to take his anti-seizure medication, as it makes his hair and teeth fall out. He is plagued by seizures, which the Chief believes are controlled by Nurse Ratched. Bruce Fredrickson takes Sefelt's share of the medication, because he is terrified of the seizures. Epilepsy (often referred to as a seizure disorder) is a chronic neurological condition characterized by recurrent unprovoked seizures. ...

Max Taber: A patient who was released before McMurphy arrived. The Chief recalls how, after questioning what was in his medication, Nurse Ratched had him 'fixed.' He walked out of the hospital a sane man, a tribute to the Combine's awesome and terrible power.

The "Chronics"

The Chronics are patients who will never be cured; they are held at the asylum to intimidate the Acutes and to remind them that they could be in the Chronics' place if they don't comply. Many of the Chronics are in vegetative states.

Ruckly: A hell-raising patient who challenges the rules until his lobotomy. After the lobotomy, he sits and stares at a picture of his wife, and occasionally screams profanities. He is kept in the ward as a reminder of what happens to patients who get out of line.

Ellis: Ellis was put in a vegetative state by electroshock therapy. He stands against the wall in a Christ-like position (arms outstretched, hands cupped), day after day, as if he were nailed there. Electroconvulsive therapy, also known as electroshock or ECT, is a controversial type of psychiatric shock therapy involving the induction of an artificial seizure in a patient by passing electricity through the brain. ...

Pete Bancini: Bancini suffered brain damage at birth, but managed to hold down simple jobs until he was institutionalized. He sits, wagging his head and complaining how tired he is. The Chief remembers how once, and only once, he lashed out violently against the aides, telling the other patients that he was a living miscarriage, born dead.

Rawler: A patient on the disturbed ward, he says nothing but "loo, loo, loo!" all day and tries to run up the walls. The Chief believes he has been wired to receive radio transmissions. One night Rawler castrates himself while sitting on the toilet and bleeds to death before anyone realizes what he has done.

Old Blastic: An old patient who is in a vegetative state. The first night McMurphy is in the ward, Bromden dreams Blastic is hung by his heel and sliced open, spilling out his rusty guts. The next morning it is revealed that Blastic died during the night.

The Lifeguard: An ex-professional football player, he still has the cleat marks on his forehead from the injury that scrambled his brains. While he is the lifeguard at the hospital pool, he remains in the disturbed ward because he occasionally tackles the nurses. This is fine with him, because he doesn't realize he's in a mental hospital. It is the lifeguard who tells McMurphy that he will stay in the hospital until Nurse Ratched decides he may go, regardless of his original prison sentence. Look up Football in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For other uses, see Lifeguard (disambiguation). ...

Colonel Matterson: The oldest patient in the ward, he suffers from severe senile dementia and cannot move without a wheelchair. He spends his days "explaining" objects ("Mexico ... is a walnut."). The Chief believes there is logic to his babbling. Dementia (from Latin demens) is progressive decline in cognitive function due to damage or disease in the brain beyond what might be expected from normal aging. ...

Supporting characters

Candy: The prostitute that McMurphy brings on the fishing trip. All the men in the ward, including the doctor and the vegetative chronics, are struck by her beauty. Billy obviously has a crush on her, and McMurphy arranges for her to visit Billy in private (after paying McMurphy a fee).

Sandra: Another prostitute and friend of McMurphy, she shows up with Candy on the night of the party. She and Sefelt sleep together (Sefelt has a seizure while they are having sexual intercourse, giving Sandra an experience she'll never forget).

Vera Harding: Dale Harding's beautiful wife, she visits him faithfully, but flirts with the other men while she's there. Harding mocks her lack of education and refinement; she mocks Harding's lack of manhood.

Contents

Plot introduction

Plot summary

Themes

Characters

The staff

The "Acutes"

The "Chronics"

Supporting characters

Further reading

Editions

See also

Contents

Plot introduction GA_googleFillSlot("encyclopedia_square");

Plot summary

Themes

Characters

The staff

The "Acutes"

The "Chronics"

Supporting characters

Further reading

Editions

See also

Plot introduction