One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest Half #1

Synopsis:

• Bromden is the narrator who lives in an insane asylum and hallucinates.

• A new patient arrives, Randle McMurphy and is very friendly and has a big smile and laugh nobody has heard in a long time.

• Nurse Ratched victimizes Harding and also attempts to victimize McMurphy but then McMurphy brings humour to the meeting and explains that his rape case was not actually rape.

• It seems as if McMurphy is only at the ward to rebel against Nurse Ratched.

• McMurphy explains the meaning of a “pecking party” and relates it to the ward and also calls Nurse Ratched a “Ball cutter”.

• McMurphy tells Bromden he knows he's not deaf and that it is all an act.

• McMurphy attempts to make Nurse Ratched loose her temper by trying to change the schedules and she calmly refuses and keeps her composure.

• Bromden perceives the hospital as a slaughterhouse where not only humans, but also humanity, is murdered.

Characters:

Since it is the first half of the book many characters are introduced. The narrator in this story is Chief Bromden and he is a round character. He suffers from hallucination and paranoia and has received numerous electric shock treatments. He is half Indian, six foot seven and has been in the hospital for ten years which is longer than anyone else in the ward. Randle McMurphy, a big red-headed covered in scars and tattoos, is the protagonist. A gambling man and a psychopath that had come from a work farm because of his recent sentence. McMurphy is rebellious and throughout the first half of the book, tries his best to make Nurse Ratchet break out of her perfectly composed outer shell. Bromden describes Nurse Ratchet as “the Big Nurse” since she is in charge of everything. In this story she is the antagonist. She rules the ward with an iron hand and Bromden describes her appearance as having “skin like flesh-coloured enamel and lips and fingertips the strange orange color of polished steel.” Her purpose is to humiliate the patients and lower their self esteem slowly rendering them inhumane.

Point of View:

Chief Bromden narrates the story in first person and tells the story as it appears to him. Though he has hallucinations his state of mind provides interesting metaphors related to the hospital and society in general.

Setting:

The setting takes place at a mental hospital in Oregon in the 1950s. The reason the setting is important is because it is the big nurses setting. She owns the ward and everything in it and can do anything she wants with it. Another reason why it is important is because McMurphy tries changing the setting and bringing the outside world in.

Writer’s style:

The writer’s style is descriptive, rational, colloquial and thoughtful. Making Bromden the narrator is a smooth move because Bromden is very sharp and descriptive. As for the dialogue, Kesey lets the men in the story use all kinds of language whether it’s appropriate or inappropriate.

Statement of Themes:

So far in the story the theme is power or use of power against others because Nurse Ratched uses her power against the patients in the ward and because of how harsh she is, the patients are afraid of her and do what ever she tells them to do.