Ken Kessy's One Flew Over The Cuckoo

The novel “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” by Ken Kessy shows readers that when power resides in the wrong hands, it can cause people to lose their humanity. The novel is about a man named Chief Bromden who was forced by the government to go to a mental hospital due to his personal problems. The government had thought that if people’s personalities were different from others, they were considered crazy and did not have the right to live in a society until they were cured. This supporting point was shown through the type of form point of view. Even when one of the prisoners in the mental ward wanted to express themselves and not listen to the nurses, they would be tortured until they came to an agreement. This supporting point was displayed

through the use of the form Symbol. All the pressure of being perfect and normal leads people to ending their life, this was represented through the use of the form atmosphere. Through these 3 main ideas, readers are able to understand how form is used in the novel to help understand the main purpose of the story.

The government did not respect the citizens who were considered different, they were thought as garbage and were not allowed back into society until they were changed. Chief Bromden along with the other patients who were in the mental hospital once had a normal lifestyle, enjoying it to the fullest. Only problem was that the government had forced them to go to the mental hospital because they were considered different. Bromden and the other patients were there for a very long time and it felt like they would never leave. Some fell into depression and turned very violent against others while being locked in a building for so long. They were not respected by the nurses, which lead to the patients not respecting each other. Chief Bromden was quiet at first, but once McMurphy came he was able to open up and share his thoughts. Others had thought Chief Bromden was deaf and could not talk. At one point Bromden had started to give up and did not want to make a change in his life due to being affected by what the nurses did, “If you yell it’s just tougher on you. I hold back the yelling. I hold back till they get to my temples. I’m not sure it’s one of those substitute machines and not a shaver till it gets to my temples; then I can’t hold back.” (Pg. 7, Kesey).

This book was told from Chief Bromden’s point of view, first-person retrospective. He is an Indian and was put in the mental hospital because he was not same as others in society. Readers feel the pain he was actually going through from not being able to express himself by the author using the form first person, “The point of view is first-person retrospective, with narration by a patient, Chief Bromden, suffering from paranoid schizophrenia.” (Ferrell, William K.). Every little thing that happened in the mental ward was told in detail from his perspective, for example Bromden had stated, “She slides through the door with a gust of cold and locks the door behind her and I see her fingers trail across the polished steel – tip of each finger the same color as her lips.” (Pg.4, Kesey). Bromden had described his inner thoughts and was very descriptive when talking about his friends. Readers would understand how society was pushing them to be something they were not. There were a few flashbacks to his old life before he came to the hospital, talking about his own life looking back into his past.

The prisoners always tried to express themselves, not obeying the nurse’s rules, leading to them being tortured until they accepted what the nurses wanted. McMurphy had talked a lot to everyone once he came to the mental hospital. He stood out and would always discuss different life ideas with the other patients. Before he had come, the hospital was under control and everyone would listen to everything the nurses said. He had helped Bromden come out of his quiet zone to become socialized. The nurses started to realize that he was trying to make a change. They did not want him helping the others make a change in their personalities and the environment of the hospital. McMurphy had started to help others realize they had to improve themselves and make a change. The Big Nurse had stopped him right away when he went too far along with Bromden. The Nurse said that they would not understand until they were tortured, she had taken them both to the electric therapy table and shocked them until they were weak. Bromden had given up right away, trying to explain to McMurphy to just listen to the nurses. Bromden had described how the shock treatment felt like, he states, ““You are strapped to a table, shaped, ironically, like a cross, with a crown of electric sparks in place of thorns. You are touched on each side of the head with wires. Zap! Five cents’ worth of electricity through the brain and you are jointly administrated therapy and a punishment for your hostile go-to-hell behaviour, on top of being put out of everyone’s way for six hours to three days, depending on the individual.” (Pg. 62, Kesey)Towards the end McMurphy had started to become less active with others knowing it would be really hard to make an improvement.

In the story there were symbols like the fog and the electric therapy table. When the patients had not listened to the Big Nurse she would make sure they were tortured until they agreed with her,
She talks to him about how they, the patients downstairs on our ward, at a special group meeting yesterday afternoon, agreed with the staff that it might be beneficial that he receive some shock therapy unless he realizes his mistakes. All he had to do is admit he was wrong, to indicate, demonstrate rational contact, and the treatment would be canceled this time. (Pg. 242, Kesey)

They would shock them in different levels and if they still did not listen, the charge would get stronger. For example when McMruphy and Bromden had got into a fight with the back men, the nurse took them right away for the shock therapy. McMurphy was strong enough to hold in his pain, but Bromden could not take it and listened to what the nurse wanted them to do, “By his pretense, the chief is beyond their reach, and thus he is left alone to enjoy his own private world. However, even he has to undergo shock treatments.” (Whissen, Thomas Reed). The shock therapy is a very good symbol which relates to our society today. For example in certain parts of America there is still capital punishment, people are killed for committing a crime if it is very serious. Citizens want a change by getting rid of the punishment because they believe people make mistakes. This relates to McMurphy a lot, he tried very hard for others to help them by rebelling against nurses, but in the end he still ended up dying.

A lot of the patients were under a lot of stress due to being always told they needed to be perfect and normal leading people to ending their life. The hospital wasn’t like the ones in our society, all nice and fancy. The mental hospital Bromden went to had an atmosphere of a prison. Readers are able to understand from how Bromden reacts to the environment in the ward, for example Bromden had stated,

I hide in the mop closet and listen, my heart beating in the dark, and I try to keep from getting scared, try to get the thoughts off someplace else – try to think back and remember things about the village and the Big Columbia River, think about ah one time papa and me were hunting birds in a stand of cedar trees near The Dalles. . . . But like always when I try to place my thoughts in the past and hid there, the fear close at hand seeps in through memory. (Pg. 6, Kesey)

Patients had felt weakened because of all the negative thoughts that were being exchanged with each other. McMurphy had got a few patients to look past all the bad things happening. He was able to sneak in a girl to let the patients understand what they were missing out on. One of the patients had slept with the girl and was caught by the Big Nurse. She made him feel very bad for what he did and saying that she would tell his mother about everything he did. He had become very stressed and ended up killing himself by slitting his throat. Everyone was affected by listening to everything the nurse had to say. The environment was very devilish, there was never a time where the patients looked forward to getting out one day.

The mental ward had a lot of rules that made the patients not able to express themselves and do what they like, “The American democratic dream renders one equal in potentia to all others.

Accordingly, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is a tragic portrayal of a working-class hero's moral ascension and the implications for contemporary American males of that messianic encounter with society's limitations upon personal freedom.” (Baurecht, William C.). People were bullied by others for being different, for example Bromden was very quiet at the start, but by the end he started to open up. Once McMurphy had arrived, he showed others that they didn’t need to listen to the Big Nurse because she was just trying to control them. He had made it much more enjoyable for the patients who felt miserable. The environment in the mental hospital was not the greatest as Bromden states, “The things I’ve had to clean up in these meetings nobody’d believe; horrible things, poison manufactured right out of skin pores and acids in the air strong enough to melt a man, I’ve seen it.” (Pg. 131, Kesey). This related to the prison system in our society because the police do not treat the prisoners fairly just because they are different from others. The police even beat the people in the prison if they see anyone dong something they don’t like. Just because they made a mistake doesn’t mean they don’t deserve a second chance to learn and improve. The nurse had taken advantage of her power and tortured who ever came in her way and did not

listen.

The purpose of the novel is proven through the author using three sources of form: point of view, atmosphere and symbol, to contribute to the supporting points. These people in Chief Bromdens society suffered a lot, not getting a chance to show people who they truly were. They had no choice to refuse going to the mental hospital, and if they were to not listen they would be physically and mentally harmed until they did. This was too much stress for a lot of the patients and only a few were weak enough to end their life. As hard as McMurphy tried to make a change, it was no use because his voice could not be heard outside the mental ward. Having a lot of power is a privilege and sometimes it is used in the wrong way to weaken others.