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Billy’s Vote

Pages 100 - 126

The ward had been slow all day, nothing to do but continue our Monopoly game. We’d been at it for a few days at this point, I don’t even know how many days it’d been since we first passed Go. Mac was the banker. I think Harding made him banker, said he’s smart with money. He’s smart with money alright, just not any of his own! Lost maybe $20 by then playing poker. No, I didn’t lose it. I got robbed!
Cheswick’s got a funny look on his face, the kind he gets before he throws a fit and stamps his feet at Miss Ratched. 

“Martini, roll the damn dice!” Martini ain’t paying him any mind, he’s got one dice in his left hand and the other in his mouth. I don’t think he even realizes he just chews on stuff. His mouth is like a vacuum, one of those big fields in space NASA says is sucking up light. I saw it on the news last week, the space programs aren’t just to win the race against the Soviets. They also seen big fields of nothing swallowing light, massive chunks of space gone in a flash. That dice ain’t so different, its shiny surface approaching the black chasm in the back of Martini’s throat.

“For god’s sake Martini don’t swallow the fuckin’ dice!”

Mac screams as he reaches into Martini’s mouth and yanks the dice out.

He’s like a father, yanking a tooth out of a petulant toddler. He wipes the dice off on his shirt and clacks them together in his hand, rolling them for Martini. Martini couldn’t care less, he’s drifted somewhere else now. I don’t know where he drifts when he’s got that blank, vacant stare. I wish I could see what he sees. We played for about an hour. Longest damn hour of my life.

“Could all acute ward patients report to the day room? Group therapy shall begin in 3 minutes.” Miss Ratched’s soft voice echoes over the loudspeaker. It’s not very loud in the tub room, almost faint. Like a spirit drifting in and out of the room. Maybe that’s what Martini sees. 

We scoot chairs to the dayroom, clear the tables, and all sit down. Miss Ratched is holding her folders and that notebook. That damn notebook. Mac calls it the “God damn motherfuckin’ book of the devil.” I wrote down something he said on Tuesday, he started blabbering about one of his past “flings” I hate when he does that. Can’t talk about girls like that, Mother warned me so.

“M-m-m-miss Ratched? C-could I talk a-a-a-about myself today? I-I-I-I just feel li-like it.”

She nods and we begin. I don’t share often, and usually when I do I talk about Mother. This time was different, I had other things on my mind. Mac talks about the military a bit. Got me thinkin’. I was almost an army man. Almost.

I felt like I talked for days, my throat dry as a desert by the time she asked me to get off the topic of my stutter. I couldn’t help it. I got lots to say, but my throat don’t got the time to say it. It’s in a hurry, it wants all words vacated and closed up. “Spit it out! C’mon, say it with your chest! Speak up, boy!”

I’ve heard that kinds of stuff all my life. Nothing’s new. Never new stuff on the ward. Miss Ratched moves the topic along. Now she wants me to talk about the girl. Mother never liked girls. Says they take me away from her.
“So, Billy, do you think your Mother is overbearing in a sense? I mean, me and her are old friends and I’ve never gotten that sense from her, but perhaps you could shine a light on your perspective.”
“I-I-I-I-I just f-f-f-feel there’s got to b-be a better way to be a p-p-p-p-parent! I don’t w-want to be just an e-e-extension of h-her! I’m n-not no o-octopus arm!”

“Yeah, Billy’s his own man!” Cheswick pipes up and stands on his feet, the little brat he is. Biggest middle-aged brat I’ve ever seen. I hate it, he doesn’t let a man fight his own battles. Ain’t nobody needs a little puppy like him chirping at everyone everywhere. 

“S-s-s–s-shut up Cheswick!” “Calm down Mr. Bibbit, our meeting is going to conclude soon. No need for hostility. Save your thoughts for the next meeting.” She intermittently puts her finger to her lips and shushes me, like she’s blowing candles between her words. “Now with that, I believe this meeting shall come to a close if nothing else is to be said.” Mac’s not happy, he’s still got something to say. He always does.

“As a matter of fact, ma’am, there does happen to be something. Remember that vote we had a day or so back – about the TV time? Well, today’s Friday and I thought I might just bring it up again, just to see if anybody else has picked up a little guts.”

“Mr. McMurphy, the purpose of this meeting is therapy, group therapy, and I’m not certain these petty grievances–”
“Yeah, yeah, the hell with that, we’ve heard it before. Me and some of the rest of the guys decided–”

“One moment, Mr. McMurphy, let me pose a question to the group: do any of you feel that Mr. McMurphy is perhaps imposing his personal desires on some of you too much? I’ve been thinking you might be happier if he were moved to a different ward.”

She cuts him off again, but this time ain’t nobody listening to her. She’s got that voice of daggers, but her words ain’t touching Mac. He’s a mountain of a man with skin hard as rocks. Mac kept arguing, he wanted that vote. In a way, we all wanted it. I put my hand up this time, I knew I had to. All us acutes did. I didn’t mean it as disrespect to Miss Ratched, I swear I didn’t.

But I felt like it told her something, something I’ve wanted to say for a long while. I had lots to say, and this time my hand had the time to say it. 

Why Billy?

I used Billy Bibbit’s character as a speaker since I feel a personal connection to him somewhat. Billy as a character struggles greatly with asserting himself to his mother and Ratched, and it’s specifically told he was institutionalized at the suggestion of his mother to Ratched, although he is a full grown adult and is not permanently committed. His character is something I personally relate to when it comes to assertion and confidence. In my writing I wanted to create a descriptive scene and show the amount that could go on in Billy’s mind as a character yet still preserve the very limited he speaks about due to his reservations. Billy is thinking a lot but not talking much.

My artwork takes place during the staff meeting at the ward. The staff are all giving their opinions on how to deal with McMurphy’s actions with the TV incident. Most of the doctors and nurses decided that they should move Murphy to the “disturbed” group. One staff member, Alvin, did not agree. He was met with instant backlash from his colleagues. “Here he comes, all two hundred and ten red-headed psychopathic irishman poids of him, right across the interviewing table at you.” (135) They provide the hypothetical scenario I have chosen to depict in the artwork to attempt to scare him into changing his views.

The significance of this scene is its impact on the rest of the staff members, especially Alvin. He says “I’m afraid i’ll have to withdraw my suggestion… if only for my own protection” (135) This scenario he poses is completely theoretical. McMurphy physically had not attacked anyone in the ward. He hasn’t punched any staff in the ward. Yet this theoretical scenario is believed to be true and destined to happen to everyone in the meeting. It preys on people’s natural thoughts of self preservation. This is something people do in real life. They provide scenarios that aren’t real and haven’t happened yet which changes people’s actions and opinions. This is a manipulation technique, and as it is helpful to be aware of theoretical scenarios that could come to pass, people should live in the moment .

I wanted my artwork to portray that it is all a theoretical scenario. One way I’ve seen this achieved is through comic books and thought bubbles. This drove me to go with the animated comic book style. The cloud around the image is supposed to represent the thought bubble, the way the whole scene is inside the peoples heads. To add onto the economic book style I added the “POW” for a more dramatic punching effect. To keep the image as accurate to the book as possible I gave McMurphy a large build and curly hair.

Everyone in the Ward is working, doing their chores, Bromdon specifically is cleaning but what makes his chore so special is where he is cleaning. The staff around the Ward decided to let him clean the staff room because Bromdon has tricked everyone into believing that he is deaf and that his disability allows him to be in the staff room because he supposedly can’t hear what the staff members are saying/planning. Before Bromdon goes to clean the room McMurphy asks If they will know that he can hear and that he’s been hearing every conversation they had around him. This shows how only McMurphy knows his secret and he can trick everyone except the known trickster, McMurphy. The way Bromdon describes the condition of the meeting room and it seems unreal and disgusting, on page 131, “The things I’ve had to clean up in these meetings nobody believes me; horrible things, poisons manufactured right out of skin pores and acids in the air strong enough to melt a man. I’ve seen it.” this shows the types of things going on behind the scenes where the rest of the patients can’t see. Why do they trust Bromdon with this job? Was he the only option? Because he can still see and talk not being able to hear won’t stop him from letting others know about what goes on back there. Also is this what he is cleaning real? I started to think this because of the question of whether or not Bromdon is a reliable narrator because he sees thing comes into play here and I am not sure if the air from acid has melted a man. The staff has gotten used to him cleaning there for such a long time they aren’t even bothered by his presents and they treat him like he is invisible as described by Bromdon on page 131, “I move around my chores, and they see right through me as I wasn’t there”. This also means he hasn’t told anyone about what goes on in there because if he did they would find out and realize that he is lying about his hearing. That is why I think maybe he told McMurphy about what is going on or McMurphy’s high intellect helped him figure out that Bromdon is playing a trick. All of this leads up to my art piece where I drew Bromdon cleaning up what is supposed to be acid and a skull is seen which represents the melted man, I also made sure that Bromdon was colored in lightly because he seemed invisible over there. With the staff, I put them all around a table and Big Nurse looked small but was the only one standing to show her power over everyone there because she even said she gains full control when she is in the meetings. All of these details add up and make a scene that you would see if you were in the staff room and seeing what goes on in there.

I chose to create a late 1940s era monopoly board with quotes from the book scattered throughout and a clock in the middle. The book, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, By Ken Kesey is set in the 1960s, but I assumed that the psychiatric facility would not have the most up to date, or new board games, which is why I used a 1940s Monopoly board for my inspiration. The clock in the middle showcases squiggly hands both pointing to the three on the clock to illustrate the ways in which our narrator, Chief Bromden, often gets lost in time. Like on pg. 103, when Chief states, “There’s long spells- three days, years- when you can’t see a thing.” I wanted to show Chiefs loss of time because I think that it is very significant to a question our class has posed a few times in various discussions: how reliable is Chief Bromden’s narration? From the very beginning of the story we are questioning if what we are being told is the truth of what has happened, or it’s just Chief telling us what he believes he saw, early on in the book he addresses this, “It’s still hard for me to have a clear mind thinking on it. But it’s the truth even if it didn’t happen.”(8) This leaves the reader questioning whether or not we can trust Bromden’s narration throughout the rest of this story. On my Monopoly board I scattered different references to the story throughout the classic Monopoly squares. I color coded these squares to group different topics that are related to some of the main characters together. I used the color green on the “Work Farm” and “Casino” squares because both of these squares are relevant to the character, McMurphy. On each corner of the board I included a main reference included throughout the book that has been mentioned more than once. The Nurses Station, the Shock Shop, and the Broom Closet. All of these locations are essential to the facility, and have been mentioned in multiple scenes throughout the story. In the fourth corner I replaced the class Monopoly “Go” square with a “Do NOT Go” square. I chose to include this because a lot of the characters within this story seem to be trapped in the psych ward, with no choice to leave, and no life waiting outside for them even if they did. I chose to include squares that are present within the actual game Monopoly because I wanted to signify our narrator’s constant fight between the real world and the world within his head. It is clear that Bromden is constantly trying to differentiate between the psych ward and his present, and his past memories. This creates a confusing plot and leaves me wondering sometimes if what Bromden is describing actually happened, or if we are just inside of his head. I wanted to create the same kind of confusion on my board which is why I mixed in Baltic and Mediterranean avenues with the Columbia River Dam.

“I wouldn’t do it on my own, Just by the way the nurse is taring at me with her mouth empty of words i can see i’m in for trouble, but I cant stop it. Mcmurphys got hidden wires hooked to itm lifting it slow just to get me out of the fog and into the open where i’m fair game, Hes doint itm wires..” In this scene the reader can see how well Kesey used imagery well with their description of how Bromdon felt, I feel like it puts is in his mind for a second. Though not totally clear, we can tell that Bromdon had raised his hand on his own, but he claims to be under the influence of McMurphy. He says that he pulled him out of the smoke out into the open so it’s fair game which could be a reference to his time in service. After the smoke hides you and keeps you safe, you are out in the open where it’s fair game of life and death. This could be what Kesey Meant. My drawing captures that moment mentally of McMurphy pulling Bromdon out of the smoke with wires attached. Although it isn’t what is happening, I have a theory that Bromdon has Psychosis and is hallucinating their whole life he has. If that theory is true then this hallucination could be connected to the way he sees the staff such as Big Nurse and how she changes shape and morphs into monsters, as well as the smoke that we now know is a trauma response safety thing he has gained from serving. As we read on in the book we are hit with the question of’ if McMurphy even has a mental illness or is he just a conman?’ As the reader sees this, this could raise suspicion of whether what he did in this scene benefited Bromdon or not in general. We can connect with Bromdon because were seeing from his view but we also can connect Bromdon to the handmaid’s tale where we didn’t have a reliable narrator thanks to past traumas. If that’s the case here then what if this mental hospital isn’t the place that Bromdon works but where he is admitted? And the fog is just a hallucinogenic side effect from his medicine due to his psychosis? In addition, if McMurphy is a Conman, then what is his goal, and why does this scene seem to be good for Bromdon but somehow make things worse for him? Past this scene, we see how Big Nurse eyes him down because she wonders how he heard McMurphy and then refers to himself as a “fool Indian” to seem less intriguing than the issue starter, Bromdon. What does this scene of freedom for Bromdon Mean? Is the main question that is the idea behind this drawing

The narrator in this book makes it hard for the reader to believe or understand what he describes, but his perspective of things also made me realize how common it is for people to see the world in completely different ways, which can be hard for others to understand. In Bromden’s case it makes him look delusional and unstable, but I also see why he has such a unique take in life. Bromden’s perception of things and how the world functions is way more complicated than how the average person sees the world, but in his delusions of machinery, I noticed how similar it is to how other people see the world. The machinery aspect is very specific to Bromden because it’s connected to his past and the sort of things he was surrounded by, which is why it makes sense that he sees the world with connections to machines and mechanisms. Being in a ward separated from the world and separated from everything Bromden knew before, I can very easily understand how you start trying to make connections to things you already know and understand, which for Bromden it is machines. One example of this is when he’s describing the Big Nurse, which very frequently includes connections to machines. At the beginning of the book, Bromden describes her as a “tractor” when she’s talking angrily to the black boys. He says, “she really lets herself go and her painted smile twists,..she blows up bigger and bigger, big as a tractor, so big I can smell the machinery inside…”(28). Further into the book he then describes her voice as an “electric saw ripping through pine.”(125). He knows how these machines and sounds make him feel, and it makes sense he uses past feelings or memories he knows and recognizes to describe other things, like the big Nurse. It also helps the reader get a closer look into his feelings towards the Big Nurse, which all seem to be negative. He also sees the whole ward as this machine filled with wires and other electrical things. Sometimes his descriptions of machines are a lot more vivid and dramatic, like in page 76 when he was talking about the hospital at night, which we then found out was a dream. “Not a sound across the hospital - except for a dull, padded rumbling somewhere deep in the guts of the building, a sound that I never noticed before-a lot like the sound you hear when you’re standing late at night on top of a big hydroelectric dam.” (76). He sees the ward as this machine that is organized and controlled, which at first I thought made him an unreliable narrator, but he uses these references to express how he feels about things.

Bromden’s perception of the world and his surroundings is very specific to his character, but I still see a connection between how he chooses to view the world and how me and the people I know choose to see the world. I have a couple friends who do wrestling and even outside of a wrestling environment, they’re always talking about wrestling and making references to wrestling even if no one understands them, which reminds me a little of how Bromden talks about machines. I also noticed something similar with my dad. He loves to mountain bike and when we’re walking around in any setting he talks about how a specific spot could be good for a jump, how he imagines himself biking while we’re walking. People are always making connections to things they do or like to do. Bromden’s on a different level because he uses these connections to machines as one of the only ways he expresses his emotions and feelings towards things, but regardless, I think his machine references are normal because that’s who he really is. He sees the world through his own, unique lens as well as everyone else. People, who have found their passions or a strong connection to something, see the world in their own way. I don’t think my perception of the world is so specific to one thing. I don’t find myself using references to a very specific thing I like and I think that’s because I haven’t found something I’m too passionate about like some of the people I know.

Whenever I read the book One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, I never antagonize the character McMurphy because I relate to him in a way where he resists submitting to the control of authority. Most of the authority figures in my life take advantage of their power, and use it as a way of compelling others around them. Fortunately for myself, I tend to see the true intentions of the judgment, just like McMurphy. He is the newest addition to the Ward, but he is considered an outcast based on the way he has self discipline unlike the others who comply with Nurse Ratched’s jurisdiction. The more I analyze the interactions where McMurphy has tried to unbrainwash the other patients about the nurse, the more I realize that I resist the authority figures in my family if they aren’t my mother.

In response to McMurphy’s unpopular opinion of Nurse Ratched, Harding compares the analogy of everyone in the ward being rabbits controlled by wolves. “‘The rabbits accept their role in the ritual and recognize the wolf as the strong.’” (57). I view the circumstance with my family as the adults putting on the persona as a wolf trying to control the rabbits, but in a sense I’m like McMurphy where I refuse to be a part of that stimulation. A lot of the time, older people in my family will try to give their input or solutions to things pertaining to me when their opinions weren’t asked for. But because they’re adults and hold an authority title over someone my age in the family, I’m expected to listen to them and apply their corrections, but I disagree and have always felt that way. Finishing his point, Harding ends his analogy with “He knows his place. He most certainly doesn’t challenge the wolf to combat.” (57). I break generational curses in my family with it being mandatory to submit to the control of other adults, the same way that McMurphy is breaking the routine of following orders from the nurse at the Ward. In my family, “what the adult says always goes”, no matter the circumstance and if you do otherwise, it equals disrespect.

My mom usually finds all my opinions on the traditional rules valid, and supports me to voice my opinion. She always said “It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it”, towards the controversy of disrespect. I think that the other patients and staff members of the Ward take McMurphy’s honesty as a negative connotation because he doesn’t have someone to differentiate his delivery. There’s this one specific rule in my family that I find absolutely ludacris. If all the seats are taken at an event or gathering, and an adult doesn’t have anywhere to sit, then a younger person has to get up and offer their seat, even if they’re in the comfort of their own home. Personally, I am never doing that, especially not in my own house and I think that McMurphy would say the same. The quote “You mean to tell me that you’re gonna sit back and let some old blue-haired woman talk you into being a rabbit?” (58) reminds me of the time when I refused to give up my chair to a family member, and I received backlash for it. But just like McMurphy said I’m not going to let anyone talk me into being a rabbit.

The term “self discipline” in this case doesn’t go with its usual meaning. Instead it means that we are self-disciplined, as in giving ourselves authority, rather than taking in the orders from those that hold power above us. And by “us”, I mean McMurphy and I. To be quite honest, when adults try to boss me around, or give me orders, and they aren’t my mother, it makes me want to refuse to listen to them even more. For example, recently on Thanksgiving, I overheard one of my family members planning to send all the kids upstairs so they could play adult games. She isn’t even that older than me but she is an adult. So I went into the kitchen and told my mom I wasn’t going upstairs, before she even heard about the plan. But I ended up going upstairs later that night, and I was never even told to. I think the idea of me being controlled or told what to do irritates me. I’m not even one to act up or do something illogical, so when anyone who isn’t my mother tries to correct me, it’s in my nature to resist.

For this Lit Log, I assembled magazine cutouts (entirely Playboy) to represent McMurphy’s view of the Ward— specifically pulling from the conversation he has with Harding on his first day, after the group meeting. McMurphy immediately knows the power he will have over the Ward in the coming weeks, and he seeks to have power everywhere he goes. Even after hearing of the unstoppable force that is Nurse Ratched - he is confident that he can “get her goat”, saying on page 67, “Bug her till she comes apart at those neat little seams, and shows, just one time, she ain’t so unbeatable as you think.” This piece is split up into a few different parts- one is how he learns most of the Chronics came to be the way they are, which is being sent to the Shock Shop. Harding describes this experience to McMurphy on page 62, “Even when you do regain consciousness you are in a state of disorientation for days…Enough of these treatments and a man could turn out like Mr. Ellis you see over there against the wall.” McMurphy is skeptical of these “treatments” that are given to the patients from the shocks to the group therapy, that seems to only humiliate and silence the men in the Ward, as seen in the picture of men with fingers pointing at them, and the sea of wires and electricity that the pictures of men swim in, their mouths covered. One man’s face has turned into a sort of screaming monster while his hair frizzes out from the electricity. A second part is the depiction of Nurse Ratched - her head is huge and she looms over this piece like a big round sun, watching every move at all times. Though she attempts to show a false sense of kindness and security towards McMurphy, he sees right through her faḉade to her foul intentions. Though Harding does depict her as a “mother” of the Ward, on page 54 he says, “Our sweet, smiling, tender angel of mercy, Mother Ratched, a ball-cutter? Why, friend, that’s most unlikely.” As much as they wouldn’t like to admit it, she is their caretaker and without her they would have no one to look after them. The final part to this piece is McMurphy’s idea of himself and Bromden, and how it reflects on Bromden. Though we know McMurphy is large, he is obviously smaller than our main character, who he speaks down to and pities. Being in the Ward so long, Bromden doesn’t realize how small and helpless he feels until he sees the new patient take charge of things so defiantly, especially after being force fed pills earlier that day. McMurphy sees that even a man that large can be suppressed and puppetted, but still does not feel threatened. As shown in the piece, McMurphy is a big, cowboy-like, cigarette-smoking, multi-limbed entity that looms over Bromden as he’s being lowered into a catatonic state. The pills represent the men’s inability to fight back. They cannot beat the Nurse because they cannot beat the treatments.

It was during the football season when I and the coach disagreed on a certain play during the game. I wanted to modify up the play because the offense had a fresh set up that appeared different to me. The coach had called a timeout and told us which plays to run. However, I had provided some comments because I stated that my play would work for this specific team.

Prior to this time, none of the plays she had called had worked. I sucked it up and just did what I was told, informing the rest of the team, and we ran the unsuccessful play, and the team scored a touchdown. I left the field frustrated, but confident that we could perform better. it is, until I heard the instructor say, “If y’all had spread out more, that wouldn’t have happened.”

She had blamed what had happened on us, and I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “I told you sh*t wasn’t going to work, but I still did as I was told!” I should have just followed my instincts.” At that moment, I realized I’d made a mistake. I apologized for the way I addressed her, but I wasn’t sorry for what I said since I was correct. The coaches then had a discussion regarding me, indicating that what I did was disrespectful, but that I wasn’t wrong and that my delivery was just off.But she told one of the head coaches that he had created a monster in her image of me.

McMurphy in the book wanted to watch the baseball World Series game on television and would not accept no for an answer. He went around the ward asking other patients for their thoughts on this, but he didn’t have much influence because they were all afraid of big nurse. Until the last vote, when he inevitably won the majority. Later, the big nurse stated they couldn’t watch it and had to do their chores instead. McMurphy was enraged, “he’s coming across the day room at us.” He becomes bigger and bigger, and his face turns bright red. He reaches into the fog to drag Ruckly to the surface-“

They faced the big nurse one by one, sitting in front of a blank screen and ignoring her yells. “You realize you’ve made a commitment. You are… the staff… under my leadership. Harding shuts off the buffer, leaves it in the hallway, and goes to collect him. A seat near McMurphy.” McMurphy was a threat to her power, therefore she intended to send him to another ward. His mere presence threatens her “perfect” system.

The difference between the two circumstances is that I and McMurphy had been told to do something, but we did the opposite and believed it was the correct thing to do. I approached the coach because I was tired of obtaining the same results. McMurphy confronted the big nurse because he was fed up with the way she treated patients there. As a result, I believe our situations differ in that aspect, but they are identical in terms of taking control of the issue. And bringing people together to strive for a similar objective, whether it was winning the game in my instance or watching the World Series in his.

I believe that the most they were feeling was probably humiliation, which is why they behaved in that manner; they were embarrassed by the fact that they were challenged in front of others and didn’t know how to respond. So they responded in the only way they knew how: by yelling. This experience really affected me in the sense that I now check my tone before speaking to someone. Because what I’m trying to say to someone is definitely not bad, but it’s just the way it comes out. So, after learning from her and how I communicated to her, I made the necessary changes.

What I think that McMurphy had learned was the fact that he can stand up for what he wants as he had already been doing. But he had also inspired others to do the same… they were scared to go up against a big nurse originally but had learned that if they stick together they’ll be ok. That’s why they think he is such a threat because he threatens to unravel everything that they built. He is bringing people out of the fog and they threaten to move him to keep him quiet but that only just makes the situation worse.

Here we can see Chief Bromden looking through the window of the ward late at night. A grass field dimly lit by moonlight lies on the other side of the window. Across the field, there are scattered digger squirrel holes and pine trees. In the distant sky, there’s a flying v of birds soaring through the moonlight. Chief Bromden can see a dog exploring the dark lonely field. Chief Bromden watches the dog exploring the night saying, “sniffing digger squirrel holes, not with the notion of to go digging for after one but just to get an idea of what they were up to at this hour.” (142) Bromden sees part of himself in the dog as they are both exploring late at night. Bromden himself was “I walked among the guys heaped in long white rows like snowbanks, careful not to bump into somebody, till I came to the wall with the windows.” (141) Bromden is exploring the ward late at night, not with the intention of escaping but simply because he is curious as to what goes on late at night when everyone is asleep. Similarly, the dog is exploring the field, not with the intention of going after a digger squirrel but just because he is curious. As Bromden continues to watch the dog, he sees the dog look up into the sky and after a few moments, Bromden hears the geese too. Bromden notices that the dog “was still standing with his paw up,” (143) long after the geese flew over them. Bromden has been watching the dog enjoy its freedom and yet at the sight of birds, the dog becomes jealous of their ability to fly. The dog stands there watching them fly, wishing he too could fly. At the same time, Bromden leans his head against the window, watching the dog, wishing he too could be free to run in the open field. While the two aren’t in the same position, they share jealousy of what someone else has that they don’t. This shows Kesey’s intent to demonstrate the things everyone takes for granted. The dog has no idea that Bromden is watching and doesn’t realize how lucky he is to begin with. Kesey is demonstrating that the grass will always be greener on the other side, even when some people don’t have any grass at all. While Bromden and the dog are both jealous of other animals’ freedom, they still have polar opposite positions of freedom themselves. When the dog wanders off from home, he still has the option to come and go whenever he pleases whereas Bromden is stuck inside. Bromden is stuck behind the glass window, watching a dog do everything he wishes he could do himself and for that, he envies the dog. Up until this moment, we’ve seen constant similarities between the situation of patients in the ward and animals that are mistreated. For example, Bromden’s description of one of the patients being summoned by the big nurse saying, “he crawled to her like a dog to a whipping.” (86) This situation goes one step further and puts the dog in a position of more power than Bromden and the other patients, adding to his sense of helplessness. He is no longer on the same level as a captive animal, he is now beneath it.

The mental hospital portrayed in the book “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest” presents a tense environment for patients. The ward consists of people labeled acutes, those who seem to have a future beyond the ward, and chronics, those who are permanently “crippled”. A better word to describe the nature of this ward would be “authoritarian”. There are ridiculous rules that nobody questions because of fear of the head nurse except the new patient.

The new patient, McMurphy, comes into the ward strong, immediately having the goal to “run” it. He is soon accepted by the patients but thrown off by their submission to the nurse who runs the ward, Big Nurse. When Mcmurphy inquired about why they fear Big Nurse so much, a patient tells Mcmurphy that they could be threatened with things like “Shock Shop” which is where cruel “electrotherapy” takes place. Or they’ll be given a lobotomy, turning them into a “chronic” forever (62).

I was skeptical about the criticism placed upon the ward at first. I had chalked it up to the staff actually wanting to help the patients and these cruel “treatments” were because science at that time made people believe these treatments were beneficial. But, later on into the book, we see Big Nurse in a staff meeting. In the meeting, they discuss how to make McMurphy look “schizophrenic” or “homosexual” in order to send him up to the disturbed ward where the most “difficult” patients reside to receive lobotomies and electroshock therapy (134). McMurphy technically had done nothing wrong but challenge their authority or intimidate them because of his boldness. At that point I had seen the ward for what it was.

That’s not the only realization I had. I was also forced to think about how similar but different my attitude to authority is. I appreciate order and someone to lead. I do believe that’s necessary for any organized group of people. But, my problem with authority comes from when power is abused, much like McMurphy. McMurphy first speaks up about the abuse the patients experience after the first group therapy session we see. He compares it to a “pecking party” and explains that a pecking party is when “The flock gets sight of a spot of blood on some chicken and they all go to peckin’ at it,” ( ). The patients were encouraged by Big Nurse to berate a single patient during the therapy session. I felt disgusted and sympathetic for the patients after witnessing how they all jump on one patient in order to please Big Nurse.

McMurphy and I are similar in that aspect too. I remember when I first started working and I was learning the ropes of having a job. There was this one manager and if they weren’t having a good day, nobody would be having a good day. They made work unbearable. There was this one thing they would do that would drive me crazy. They’d come to your station and nitpick at anything you were doing, “correcting” things that weren’t wrong, just their preference. Knowing my temper, I tried my hardest to avoid confrontation but they made it extremely difficult with their tyrant-like behavior. Much like Big Nurse who purposefully picked at McMurphy before he started to mess with her (23). My breaking point was a few months into my employment and I had been on the station that involved packaging food. Every few minutes she’d look over my shoulder and tell me something I was doing “wrong”. “You’re not supposed to put that into a box”, “Only bump off one ticket” . After a certain point I snapped a little bit and told her that maybe she was telling me one thing while another manager had told me something else. “Maybe you should get on the same page as your coworkers”. There was a bit more back and forth between us before she finally walked away and we were never put on shift together again.

I was upset because of her and most of my coworkers did not like her because she did the same thing to them. I wanted to get back at her in a way or annoy her enough so that she’d leave me alone but I soon realized that there was no action to take. It simply wouldn’t be smart to gamble with my job which was a great job. I couldn’t do anything about it. Mcmurphy had this same realization after talking with the lifeguard. He had too much to lose to go against authority.

I thought about if it was actually possible to go against tyrant authority figures without losing something. McMurphy was appalled at the way these men bowed down to Big Nurse at first. He was even critical of them. I was guilty of criticizing the men within the ward too. But I also didn’t consider the fact that they could literally become the victim of a lobotomy or electrocuted. The stakes are high for them. Mcmurphy felt those stakes rising, he finally felt the threat that day at the pool. After seeing McMurphy finally become docile, I realized that there was little to nothing we could do to challenge authority without losing more than we gain.

There are two types of people: those who sit back and play by the rules, and those who rise up and challenge the rules. Authoritarian methods are often used to control people’s freedom, actions, and maintain order among a population. Most people believe authoritarian techniques will keep people in check because they are afraid of what will happen if they break the rules that hold control over them. However, there will always be people who choose to oppose regimes despite knowing there are implications for disregarding the standards at hand. People will constantly be inclined to have power over those who they deem have a lower authority position than them. There will always be someone somewhere that will go against rules implemented on a particular group because they refuse to have their freedom controlled. These thoughts can eventually spread to those around them that can prove to be worrisome to the oppressors, but sometimes there are people who are only familiar with the option of sitting back, unable to stand up to authority figures and mandatory structures in their lives.

In in book, “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” American novelist Ken Kesey writes about a mental hospital where it doesn’t seem possible for its patients to return to the outside world due to their “craziness” when hope unexpectedly sparks in the patients’ hearts when a new patient arrives with a different aura from what they know and changes the atmosphere around them. The story portrays the ward as a cruel and authoritarian place, where characters such as “Nurse Ratched” (aka, Big Nurse) maintains her persistent authority by overpowering the patients emotionally and psychologically, leaving the ward dead and quiet. Throughout the book, we constantly hear about: Chief Bromden, one of the ward’s longest patients who pretends to be deaf and dumb and the narrator, and Randle Patrick McMurphy, a new patient who fakes having a mental disorder believing the ward would be a better place and encourages the other patients to question the environment and authority they face, characters that are the main focus of the novel and lead the readers to question what is the real approach one should take when in an oppressed society.

On multiple occasions, Kesey writes about the ways McMurphy opposes the rules and guidelines set mainly by Nurse Ratched, showing how troublesome he can be in the course of disrupting the quiet and dead ward she built. However, at the same time, Bromden shows concern and worry when he notices McMurphy is getting in Nurse Ratched’s head.

When McMurphy proposes their TV time be switched to see the world series, he falls angry towards the other patients not voting because they were “…acting too cagey–too chicken shit, he called it” because no one said a thing (103). Billy, another patient, said “…I just don’t think a vote wu-wu-would do any good” and others agree (107). McMurphy doesn’t let this get to him. Their conversation switches to what McMurphy would do to get out of the ward and says “..I guess I could knock the mesh outta one of these windows with a chair…” (107) but Cheswick, another patient, told him “…we were given a demonstration about these screens. A technician picked up a chair…and beat the screen till the chair was no more…Didn’t hardly dent the screen” (108).

McMurphy kept changing the objects with what he would use to break the windows, one after the other when the other patients kept telling him they wouldn’t work, until he brought up “that big control panel…” (108). The patients didn’t believe he could move it because it was extremely heavy. But when McMurphy tried to move the control panel, Bromden narrates, “…for just a second, when we hear the cement grind at our feet, we think…he might do it” (110). He wasn’t successful at making it move a great deal. McMurphy then starts to leave but then “…stops at the door and looks back at everybody…” and says, “But I tried, though…I sure as hell did that much…” (110). The other patients were left in thought.

At the next meeting, McMurphy brings up the suggestion to be revoted on. When ready to vote, the patient’s hands went up, “first one, then another…right down the line…raising not just for watching TV, but against the Big Nurse, against her trying to send McMurphy to Disturbed” (121). McMurphy got the majority of the votes by getting Bromden to raise his hand too. When the time came to watch TV, he and the other patients sat in front of the TV despite Nurse Ratched getting worked up wanting the patients to “…Stop this. Stop!” (125). Bromden states that McMurphy “…knows there’s no better way in the world to aggravate somebody who’s trying to make it hard for you than by acting like you’re not bothered” (103). McMurphy revealed how authoritarian regimes could be challenged through a patient who recognized the unhealthy control other patients’ were under that weren’t helping them get better, and making an impact with his actions.

When considering authority figures and mandatory structures of my life, this was a moment from the novel I resonated with. Throughout my life I’ve constantly seen how people stand up for what they believe in, and though it doesn’t include standing up for others, I consider this to be a similar situation. Reading how McMurphy is aware of the oppressive structure in the ward while making several attempts to convince the patient’s to realize the unjust environment they’re living in and go against it, convinces me that at times people need to challenge the rules that prevent them from being themselves. In contrast, Bromden continuously claims that this oppression can make a negative impact on them. He states, “That’s what McMurphy can’t understand, us wanting to be safe. He keeps trying to drag us out of the fog, out in the open where we’d be easy to get at,” and is something I can understand (112). I’m not one to stand up to authority figures from the fear of making situations worse.

Requests I’ve made apart from wanting to do various activities in the past have been denied multiple times, that I’ve come to be comfortable with not asking or contradicting anything asked of me. I felt that asking for something, even though I already knew the answer was useless. People say one never knows if their parents or whomever they might address for reconsideration there’s a possibility they can change their mind. However, when receiving the same responses and the same reactions when I wanted something more or something to change, I grew tired of asking and eventually decided it was easier to follow the rules and not question anything.

When faced with authoritarian environments and demands, there are multiple ways to go against them. In the long run, we should consider how we go about those situations and consider if they are worth going against. There will be moments when it’s better to comply than to rebel when giving thought to what truly affects us and how much. Even so, we must not be blind to those who try to control us or others just because they believe they can. In the ward, Bromden was one of the many patients that didn’t dare to go against Nurse Ratched because of the implications she had bestowed on them. What they needed to liven up was someone like McMurphy who stood up for what was wrong and wasn’t afraid of going against anybody who seeks to control those they deem don’t have much effect over them.

It’s disappointing to know how cruel people can be towards others who don’t give them a reason to be. People that have had difficult experiences and been rejected time over time will learn and adapt the act of accepting anything they are presented with without question. Even so, there are also other people who won’t allow themselves to be blind to the unjust rules and implications they are expected to meet just to make someone else satisfied. At times, there will be people who will help others they see being taken advantage of, but we cannot expect for someone to always appear and help us with our problems. We should learn how to realize when we are being controlled and find ways to prevent that from happening, but who said it would be easy?

In “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest” by Ken Kesey, a new patient named McMurphy strolls into a mental hospital and throws everything into chaos. The highly controlled hospital environment strains as McMurphy constantly challenges it, fighting the authority figures of the book and trying to convince the rest of the patients to join him. As the patients have started to question their role in this authoritarian environment, I’ve started to question my role with authority in my life. I’ve always been a very “easy” child. An obedient child, you could say. My mom jokes she used to tell me to take a nap and I’d say “okay, how long would you like for me to nap mother?”. I’ve always gotten good grades, I’ve never really acted out, and I didn’t have any major problems with authority. I’m very much like my dad in that way- I stay in my box because it’s comfortable and I know how to be “good” in that environment. When I disagree with an authority figure, I either resign myself to it or stew in silence. I’m kind of like the Acutes of this novel, where I can hide behind excuses the authority figures have given me or try to justify what they say. “‘I’m pretty used to seeing that six-o’clock news.” one Acute says, “And if switching times would really mess up the schedule as bad as Miss Ratchet says-” (104). The justification of authoritative rule stops any change from happening because you accept that rule. I don’t justify authority on such an extreme scale, but as I’ve gone through the novel I realize I do it more than I thought. I am more like the Acutes than I want to admit.

My brother is the complete opposite. He is always breaking the rules, trying to see how much he can get away with. He’s more of a “difficult” child, and my mom and him are always at odds, which is funny given how similar they are. He is definitely more of a McMurphy figure, which always annoyed me when we were younger- couldn’t he grow up, stop fighting all the time, stop taking all the attention in the household? It wasn’t until this year that I’ve really begun question my role as an “easy” child.

I went to dinner with my family a month ago, and my mom said to me and my brother- “You know, there’s things I would change about both of you.” I was curious- what would she change about this easy child I was? “You’re in the box too much,” she told me. “I wish you would break the rules a little more, I wish you would fight more for what you think is right, or challenge people instead of just accepting their rule.” I didn’t really know what to say to that. My brother of course got excited when he heard this, saying, “Oh yeah! I’ll break the rules” My mom laughed and said, “No you need to go back IN the box”.

I think about what she said to me a lot, and I’ve started to realize that maybe I do have a problem with authority. Not in the way that I always fight it, but in the way that I don’t. Too often I just go with the rules because those are the rules, and I trust authority figures just because they are authority figures. When I disagree with something, I like to avoid conflict, like the Acutes. My brother is always challenging those rules and authority figures, always fighting. For a while I saw that as bad, but now I’ve begun to admire him. At least he speaks up for what he thinks is right.

It’s strange that we are so opposite, that my family is split like this, but I think in many ways it makes us challenge each other. Having opposites in the household encourages us all to grow towards a more middle ground, helps us get away from our extremes and find both “easy” and “difficult” within us. This is similar to the ward environment of the novel, where none of the chaos would have occurred had it not been for McMurphy. The ward needed someone who goes up to people and challenges them to change. As the novel unfolds, even the Acutes have begun to fight, rallying behind McMurphy’s voice: “‘Yeah, yeah, is that what you mean?” Their challenge is starting small, simply speaking up, but they are gaining momentum. They are pulled out of their comfort zone, out of the boxes they all have been hiding in. Like the Acutes, I am trying to find my own challenging voice. I am starting small and slowly I am figuring it out. While I still haven’t exactly found my voice yet, I’m trying more and more, and am hopeful that one day I won’t need a voice to rally behind, one day I’ll be enough to step outside the box on my own.

Pages 120-123

The last day of the World Series. Imma bring up a vote again. I swear these rules will be the death of me.

“So remember that vote we had a day or so back — about the TV time? Well, today’s Friday and I thought I might just bring it up again, just to see if anybody else has picked up a little guts.”

The Big Nurse speaks to the group with a monotone voice and a smile on her face, as she always does. “Mr. McMurphy, the purpose of this meeting is therapy, group therapy, and I’m not certain these petty grievances —” Group therapy? More like group torture.

“Yeah, yeah, the hell with that, we’ve heard it before. Me and some of the rest of the guys decided —”

The damn nurse interrupts me, her voice a tad bit more annoyed.

“One moment, Mr. McMurphy, let me pose a question to the group: do any of you feel that Mr. McMurphy is perhaps imposing his personal desires on some of you too much? I’ve been thinking you might be happier if he were moved to a different ward.”

Damn. I’ve been here for less than a week and they already want to get rid of me? Is it so wrong to speak my fucking mind here?

Then I hear, “Let him vote, why dontcha? Why ya want to ship him to Disturbed just for bringing up a vote? What’s so wrong with changing time?”

Finally, someone has some sense.

There is nothing wrong with starting a vote.

What is so wrong with changing the fucking time?

Wait, what is Disturbed?

“Why, Mr. Scanlon, as I recall, you refused to eat for three days until we allowed you to turn the set on at six instead of six-thirty.” The Nurse responds. Ah, the time has been changed before, so it can be done again.

I tap out for a minute. The Big Nurse and the Scanlon guy are talking, but who the hell knows what they’re talking about?

At last, I hear, “A vote is now before the group. Will a show of hands be adequate, Mr. McMurphy, or are you going to insist on a secret ballot?” What a pain in the ass. I don’t want no fucking secret ballot.

“I want to see the hands. I want to see the hands that don’t go up too.” C’mon people, wake up.

“Everyone in favor of changing the television time to the afternoon, raise his hand.” As soon as the Nurse finishes her sentence, I shoot my hand up, and watch the rest of the Acutes raise theirs. The room is tense. Everyone, the patients and the staff, are stunned. The nurse is carefully watching everyone, counting the votes.

“I count only twenty, Mr. McMurphy.” She says, her face calm, but I sense smugness.

“Twenty? Well, why not? Twenty is all of us there—” I stop. There aren’t twenty of us. There’s forty of us. It’s a fucking tie!

“Now hold on just a goddamned minute, lady—” I say, as calmly as possible, my fists opening and closing.

I don’t remember what happens next. My heart is pounding in my ears and my face and neck are hot with fury.

I stand up.

“Wait! Wait a minute, let me talk to those old guys.”

I hear the nurse say something, but at this point, her voice sounds like the soft squeak of a mouse. I walk towards some random ass Chronic and ask him, “What about you buddy? You want to watch the World Series? Baseball? Baseball games? Just raise that hand up there—” Man interrupts me, saying, “Ffffffffuck da wife.”

Asking him is useless. Asking all of these Chronics is fucking useless. Why can’t they see that we just need one more vote to give us the upper hand? Wait. I missed someone.

“Chief, you’re our last bet.”

I hear the creak of the chairs as the nurses and doctors stand up, but I’m watching Chief, feeling all the eyes on me and him as everyone pauses in anticipation.

Finally, after a beat, his hand slowly lifts up. Chief did it. He fucking did it.

“Twenty-one! The Chief’s vote makes it twenty-one! And by god if that ain’t majority I’ll eat my hat!” I’m shaking with excitement. I hear someone else say, “Yippee.”

“The meeting was closed.” The nurse says, her smile still there. But everyone can tell she’s about to explode with fury.

STYLISTIC CHOICES:

I chose to narrate McMurphy because he is arrogant, manipulative, and rebellious. Unlike the current narrator, Bromden, who is more of a bystander and gets all of his information objectively, but McMurphy is in the center of the events happening in the ward. He notices the oppression and decides to do something about it. Written from McMurphy’s perspective, what he was thinking and saying would be a lot more colorful and interesting for the reader. In this narrative, I tried to imitate his emotions and behaviors as best as I could by incorporating dialogue from the book and using that as a springboard for the narrative.

Throughout the story, the author Ken Kessy, through Bromden’s extraordinary detailed narrative descriptions, emphasizes the communicative power of the character McMurphy. For instance, the identity of McMurphy’s speech is presented and analyzed under absolute and aggressive values. By doing so, it’s clear that with the way he’s communicating, he’s able to describe his ideas so fundamentally that his ideology is portrayed clearly for anyone that wishes to understand and follow him. Saying something bizarre in the beginning, almost comically, then changing the dynamic swiftly into a moment of explanation, guiding the reader to view him positively. This way of expressing himself expands further from McMurphy himself, and onto the political leaders of today.

First, it is important to identify the sections of the story that emphasize this type of communication by McMurphy. One such section, a memorable one at that, occurs during McMurphy and Harding’s feud between their views of the Big Nurse, happening after the group therapy ‘pecking party.’ (51) on Chapter 5 where McMurphy would describe the Big Nurse as a ‘ball-cutter.’ (53) This was an incredibly odd response, puzzling both the readers and Harding. It seemed to be irrelevant to the argument at hand, but then McMurphy would go on to explain it: “…people who try to make you weak… And the best way to do this, to get you to knuckle under, is to weaken you by gettin’ you where it hurts the worst.” (54) This explanation transitions that irrelevancy to relevance, allowing the readers, me included, to view the original bizarre statement as a comical solution to Harding’s inability to express how he really felt about the Big Nurse. And, considering that this is a ward with a majority, if not primarily, men, it makes his message that much clearer to the people of the ward.

Furthermore, by Chapter 6, as McMurphy’s character becomes more known to the narrator Bromden, Bromden would then characterize McMurphy to a ‘bull’ when it comes to his unwillingness to succumb to the Big Nurses measures of control, especially with the idea of fog: “(They haven’t really fogged the place full force all day today, not since McMurphy came in. I bet he’d yell like a bull if they fogged it.)” (69) This bull-like way of confronting problems, never falling back on his words, makes characters like Cheswick fall head over heels for him. Following his every idea whether it be to use the space of the therapeutic discussion area for a different purpose or to add baseball to the TV channel. And, it’s not only Cheswick, his clear following would be clear during the voting results of whether or not the ward should add baseball to the TV channel.

During Chapter 15, McMurphy was able to bring over twenty votes out of forty patients to plead his case of baseball. And, apparently, there happened to be a rule stating that to change a ward policy, you need a majority vote. Since, it wasn’t necessarily a majority, but a half and half, it would be Bromden who would go on to shift the scale in McMurphy’s favor. At first, Bromden was convinced that McMurphy made him raise his hand for a vote forcefully, but soon, he would push aside that thought, claiming the following: “No. That’s not the truth. I lifted it myself.” (123) With all that being said, even though McMurphy expresses his thoughts in a, at first glance, seemingly provocative and negative way, he is still able to bring so many people together, and to his side, much like our politicians today.

A primary example of such a politician is Donald Trump, our 45th president. Our 45th president has an extensive list of quotes that are outrageous, but it’s also true to mention that these quotes may have raised awareness for the individuals included in such outrageous claims. For instance, when it comes to instances of racism, he said the following on a telephone interview with Fox and Friends: “…I am the least racist,…” [1] Sure, he may be the least racist, racist person. Since when it comes to racism nowadays, those who hide their intentions through a false mask. Those who hide their racism through innocence and act as if they are not what they are, are in fact more racist. In addition to that, when it comes to the issue of the border, and trying to ‘build a wall,’ it provided awareness for people who were illegal immigrants. I managed to hear a lot of stories during the event of such a controversial message. So, when it comes to Trump’s relation with McMurphy, they’re both very strict in their messages, talking with absolute and aggressive terms. One more agreeable than the other, of course, but they are able to garner support through such provocative language.

However, there is a reason all of this works so well. People use such provocative language to set a trap. It’s to get a reaction they know you’ll have, and then they take you on a journey to tell you that the reaction you had was wrong, and you should have a different reaction. That’s how I felt as I read the whole book. I originally thought that McMurphy would come out as an enormously unagreeable character who had nothing but evil in his every action, but that was not true. And, it was also true that I fell in the trap of thinking that, so that once that was not true, my immediate reaction was to view him positively. So, in that regard, by reading this book, although it may be a bit overthinking on my part, I’ve learned to be more aware of those intentions, especially when it comes to putting my hands into future political atmosphere’s as I come of age.

[1] - Gass, Nick. “The 15 Most Offensive Things That Have Come out of Trump’s Mouth.” POLITICO, POLITICO, 9 Dec. 2015, www.politico.eu/article/15-most-offensive-things-trump-campaign-feminism-migration-racism/.

Let me tell you a story about my first con. Yessir, it was a real doozy. It all started in high school when I played the game “King of Mao.” Whoo-me when I tell ya this was one for the books. I even put money on the line, “If you win, you can have my lunch money, but if I win, I get your lunch money.” It was a deal! Chi’chingg, the sound of money in my head. I knew I was going to win this game. I handed them all six cards; there were four of us. I was the dealer of the game, of course, so that meant that I made the rules as we went along. These bozos had no idea that I was about to con them. The rest of the deck was put in the middle of the table, and one card was put face up on the table. I started. The first card that was on the table was 8 of hearts, so I slapped my damn 8 of hearts right on top. Next was Bobbie’s turn; he fiddled with his cards. Come’on, damnn, he taking forever; this must mean his ass don’t have anything. He has the worst goddamn poker face. He yells goddamit, I pull a card from the stack on the table and hand it to him. You’re not supposed to speak during the game. I say to myself, I got one fool so far! Then Max was next. I let him place his 8 of diamonds, and I didn’t give him an extra card; I decided to let him slide this time. Now it’s time for Daniel to go, and he puts down a raggedy 3 of diamonds. I could tell he was excited that he had a card. So I decided to ruin that excitement by waiting until he put down his card. I looked at him with an expression that suggested that he forgot to say something, and he didn’t say it, so I gave him an extra card. He thought he was off the hook because he had a card! You thought wrong, buddy. “Hey, why are you giving me this?” he says. Because you didn’t say have a good day to me. What, since when was that a rule, he said? But I didn’t answer him, and he’s a fool, I said in the back of my head with a smirk on my face. Now it’s my turn again, and I slammed down my 5 of diamonds. Then, there’s a pause in the game. We are all waiting for Bobbie to go, so I give him another card; the hell with that; he tak’in all day like we got that type of time. “I’m not taking that card,” he said; ohh, you sure as hell will. You took too damn long to go when it was your turn. “Okay, I see how this game will play out,” Bobbie says. Thirty minutes had passed, and only one card was left on the table from the extra card pile. Now it’s Daniel’s turn. As he goes to put down his card, my hand is up, holding that last card on the table. With a devious smile on my face, I gave him the last card. He didn’t even question why he just accepted the fact that he just lost. I told them to count their cards, and Max had the most, so I told him that he lost the game. Time for ya to pay up, Booyah. I took all his money. The true con always wins, and that’s just the way it is. Well, well, well, this was my first con, and when I tell ya, it felt Goddamn good, it felt Godddamn good!

Artist Statement: When choosing to write from the point of view of McMurphy, I wanted to show all his Greed, manipulative ways, and competitiveness. These attributes stuck out to me and intrigued me to explore more closely. Throughout the book, he speaks very passionately, uses a lot of profanity, thinks that everything is a competition and needs a vote, is cocky, playful, and wants to win at everything. What better way to show all of his traits than him being a mastered con man? This also further adds a significant part of the book: characterization and how different characters appear to the readers. His specific talking style and background appeal to readers and help create a dynamic tone to his story. The specific moment from the book I wanted to build on was on page 72 when McMurphy states, “The secret of being a top-notch con man is being able to know what the mark wants, and how to make him think he’s getting it.” Furthermore, I wanted to use this as an opportunity to explore his character further and find ways to extend that outside the book. Being a dynamic character includes many aspects of culture and language, which I wanted to utilize in writing this scene.

It’s been about a year or two now since I’ve felt as though I have had little to no control over my personality. It’s hard to describe because it’s hard to notice it myself until I sit down and think about it and realize I’m nothing like I was the other day. But every week or so, or sometimes randomly halfway throughout the day it feels like I’m given a random “amount” of introversion/extroversion. There were days when it first started at Beeber where I wanted to talk to everyone in my class and then other days where I didn’t want to talk to anybody. And other than that, basically all of my personality traits are never consistent with every now and then they have a drastic change. We don’t really see a character (at least yet) in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest that has a sort of “multiple personality disorder” (even if I wouldn’t really define myself to have it) but the closest I could think of is every characters shift in extroversion/introversion when affected by Mcmurphy.

Mcmurphy over a couple of weeks, made almost the entirety of the ward more extroverted and made the community more involved with each other from day 1. And then later one when he hears that he might not be able to leave when promised, his entire personality shifts to being quiet and collected, not wanting to break any rules. Cheswick was being rowdy and asked McMurphy for backup; instead of jumping in (or leading the charge) like he would usually do, Bromden described that “all he got was silence.” (Kesey 133). Even though McMurphy’s came from a direct cause, the sudden shift of personality is something that connected with me. His personality shift from loud to quiet felt uncontrolled and sudden. But when this did happen, it made me wonder more about if my different “personalities” come from some cause. Because prior to reading this (and seeing other similar examples) I was fairly certain that it was random on how I was feeling. When looking into it I found a lot of extreme answers like Alzheimer’s or brain tumors that I’m fairly certain I don’t have but what stuck out to me was anxiety. I’ve had anxiety problems ever since I was little and it’s been a while since I’ve really been affected by it. But connecting it to the book, Bromden is very fitting of the description (plus more) of having anxiety. Even though we’re not supposed to be diagnosing the characters, I think Bromden is more fit for paranoid schizophrenia, but they’re similar as they both are almost a form of panic attack. We “concluded” in our group discussion that the fog in the ward could be Bromden’s schizophrenia taking over whenever he is worried. We assumed this because as soon as Nurse Ratched lost control of the patients, it’s said that “There’s no more fog any place” and it was removed when “we let McMurphy lure us out of the fog.” (Kesey 115). And although it may be a weird connection, if I put myself in Bromden’s shoes, basing it off of my life, McMurphy would be like my mother. When I was younger I had 2 main sources of my anxiety: being left alone and getting on airplanes. My experiences and Bromden’s were both put at bay by what is called exposure therapy; which is basically a technique to get rid of a fear by being exposed to it. For me, my mother would take me on planes more often and purposefully make stops at stores so that I could beat my anxiety over time. With Bromden, Mcmurphy would “pull him out of the fog” to stand up against Nurse Ratched. Granted anxiety always comes back, as we see the fog returning when McMurphy stops standing against Big Nurse, but there’s no preventing that.

Reading about Bromden’s mental illness really made me grateful for my mother and how she would be willing to help me, no matter how difficult it would be. Bromden didn’t really have an outlet and when he finally got one, it only lasted a few days. It also gave me a realistic comparison for a representation of my anxiety, that being the fog. Of course it would be different for me because I wasn’t in a mental institution but the way the book looks at it is very accurate. I think if my anxiety ever does come back in a major way, Bromdens’ situation reminded me of a proper way to look at it and a proper solution.

The staff at the ward depicted in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, especially Nurse Ratched, have a great deal of power over the patients, controlling everything they do. The narrator, Bromden, constantly mentions the extreme power that Nurse Ratched, AKA the Big Nurse, wields over the entire ward. “The Big Nurse tends to get real put out if something keeps her outfit from running like a smooth, accurate, precision-made machine.” (25) Although I’ve never experienced anything like the Combine, I definitely have felt overly restricted at times in my life, particularly in school environments (having to ask someone if you’re allowed to go to the bathroom feels really wrong if you think about it, especially if they say no). In many situations that are restrictive over some people, there are always others who don’t even notice. This idea is represented well in the book.

Although “they’ve made life look very pleasant with paint and decorations and chrome bathroom fixtures,” the Combine is not as pleasant for patients as it seems to outsiders. (111) I thought it was ironic that the public relations man followed this up by saying, “A man that would want to run away from a place as nice as this, why, there’d be something wrong with him,” because it’s a mental institution, and each one of the men there has “something wrong with him.” Naturally, when an able-bodied and strong-willed patient arrived at the ward named McMurphy, he made it his mission to rebel against the staff and rally the other patients to join him. The way McMurphy acts in the face of a controlled environment is how I’d like to think I’d act, but I’m more of a non-confrontational person and I wouldn’t stand up to the authority figures in the ward anywhere near as much as he does.

The first instance of McMurphy’s plans to rebel took the form of a bet with the other Acutes. “‘Any of you sharpies here willing to take my five bucks that says that I can get the best of that woman- before the week’s up- without her getting the best of me? One week, and if I don’t have her to where she don’t know whether to shit or go blind, the bet is yours.’” (66) I’ve certainly tried to get under someone’s skin before, but never someone who had that level of power over me. I thought his bet was a little crazy at first, but after all, McMurphy is a gambler, and he didn’t have anything better to do with his time. As it turned out, he succeeded in ruffling the nurse’s feathers so much that some of the other patients joined him once they saw how much fun he was having upsetting her. When they tried to watch the World Series game on TV and the nurse shut it off, they all watched a blank TV screen just to push her buttons. “‘You men- Stop this. Stop!’” (125) This reminds me of something my sister and I would have done when we were little to make our mom mad if she’d done something we deemed unfair.

The men never would’ve been trying to watch that World Series game in the first place if it wasn’t for McMurphy’s passion and his demand for not one but two votes to move TV hours to the time the games would be on. It hadn’t been easy, but he’d “inspired” enough people to vote his way that he finally got a majority vote. “‘One of you guys, for cryin’ out loud! This is where you get the edge, don’t you see that? We have to do this- or we’re whipped!’” (123) The edge McMurphy spoke of means the upper hand on the staff, especially the big nurse. He’d already caused a scene bringing the matter to a vote once, nevermind twice, and his failure to get a majority vote either time wouldn’t bode well for his future in the ward. Luckily for him, Bromden’s vote made 21 votes and he got his adjusted TV time. Unfortunately, the nurse was angry at him and turned the TV off, so it was all for nothing. This voting scene, especially the first one, reminded me of all the times I’ve been in the minority vote for something I wanted. I usually just go along with it and don’t make a big deal out of not getting my way, but this makes me think that I should push harder for something if I feel really passionate about it.

Finally, one area where I do see a similarity between me and McMurphy is our stubbornness. When asked by Frederickson, a fellow patient, how he’d bust out of the ward, McMurphy replied “Well, I guess I could knock the mesh outa one of these windows with a chair when and if I took a notion…” (107) and when told a chair wouldn’t do the job, he attempted to pick up an impossibly heavy control panel. He tried so hard to lift it that “There’s blood on the levers where he tore his hands.” (110) I’m guilty of committing way too hard to stay true to my word or make myself look good. I don’t think I’ve physically injured myself because of it, but I’ll go pretty far out of my way in hopes of proving a point.

In One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey wrestles with authority and how humans choose to respond to it. The reader is introduced to Randle McMurphy, a diagnosed “psychopath” who changes the dynamic in the psych ward of the hospital. The ward is led by Big Nurse Ratched, a controlling authority figure for the patients. She asserts her dominance by manipulating the patients with fear, and controlling everything in the ward to her liking. The narrator, Bromden, feels that she “is able to set the wall clock at whatever speed she wants…” (68). Another patient says that Big Nurse is one of those “people who try to make you weak so they can get you to toe the line, to follow their rules, to live like they want you to. And the best way to do this … is to weaken you by gettin’ you where it hurts the worst” (54). Big Nurse clearly has a hold on her patients. Until McMurphy comes into the picture.

McMurphy knows her game, or at least he thinks he does. He is determined to defeat her at her own manipulation game. He first tries this by trying to just voice his annoyance, specifically about how loud the radio plays when they are in the day room. He complains multiple times throughout the evening, but eventually gets to bed.

The next morning, he is up and about before 6:45, which is strictly against ward rules, and he is singing, loud enough to wake up Bromden at least. He surprises Big Nurse with his partial nudity, and she is completely caught off-guard by his singing. He has her so worked up that she starts yelling at her employees, a rare occurrence. McMurphy has taken his anger with the constant radio noise, and flipped it on its head to use as leverage. He is taking what Big Nurse has told him and using it against her to get ahead.

I chose this moment from the text because I have used a very similar tactic to get what I wanted. In 4th grade at Greene Street Friends School, gym class was the best class. Unlike middle school P.E, gym class was another word for fun games and challenges with your class. We played kickball, jumped off of springboards, did relay races, and much more. In 4th grade, one of our units was yoga. In comparison, yoga sucked. Many of my classmates agreed.

Greene Street, being a quaker school, taught us about peaceful protesting, and encouraged us to do so if we felt something was unjust. Memorably, we learned about the many sit-ins that happened during the civil rights movement in the 1960s. My classmates and I decided to apply this knowledge to our yoga unit.

We organized a protest and originally got almost half the class behind it. When it came time, we, instead of following our instructor’s directions and movements, sat silently on our mats, criss-cross applesauce. Granted, this protest was completely unsuccessful, and we actually got in pretty big trouble for doing it. And, of course, protesting against yoga is never something I would do now, in fact I quite enjoy a relaxing yoga session. But I stand by our actions, and I would 100% do it again if we were protesting something else. We were exercising our constitutional rights as Americans to peacefully protest, and we were using what the school had taught us to our advantage.

I relate to McMurphy in many ways, and I don’t think that makes me crazy. Although our circumstances were different, we both used disobedience as a way to try to get what we wanted. He truly gave them a taste of their own medicine (no pun intended). And maybe this tactic doesn’t always work in all circumstances. Maybe it ultimately won’t work for McMurphy just as it didn’t work for my classmates and me. But whoever is the target of the “protest” cannot deny that it’s at least a very clever strategy.

Aside from the clever-ness of our 4th grade scheme, there was also a certain innocence that McMurphy lacks. McMurphy’s final goal is to get under Big Nurse’s skin, he doesn’t necessarily care about the bonuses that might come with that. My classmates and I just hated doing yoga when we could be playing games. We weren’t consciously using our newfound knowledge of peaceful protest against the gym teacher, we simply wanted a little more say in what we were learning. And that’s what McMurphy and I have in common, when put in a controlled environment, all we really want is a bit of that control.

My artwork focuses on multiple quotes from the same scene of when all of the ward patients rise up against Big Nurse by watching TV instead of doing their chores. This scene was such an obviously pivotal moment for the entire group so it made sense to emphasize this moment. I also chose to focus on the perspective of my artwork because of the importance of Bromden’s perspective throughout the book. I drew the scene from the point of view of Bromden’s thoughts, “If somebody’d of come in and took a look…they’d of thought the whole bunch was crazy as loons.” (126) Therefore, the artwork is looking at the scene from behind, looking on as a spectator would. To achieve the proper representation of this quote I drew every person in the ward, including Big Nurse, wearing their “greens” (89), which were given only to the patients at the hospital. This represents the onlooker seeing everyone in the room as crazy, not just the patients.

The next element of my drawing focuses on the fog and how it reacts to Bromden’s and the ward mates’ new-found defiance of the system. I did this by taking some artistic liberties, I drew a pair of brooms sweeping up, sweeping the fog away from the ward patients. As you can see the brooms are being operated by two pairs of red hands, which are a reference to Bromden and his fellow patients awakening, which was brought about by McMurphy’s “red hand” (121). Along with the theme of the defiance of the system, I drew all of the characters in the book with their backs facing Big Nurse, representing the bottom of page 125, “we’re all sitting there lined up in front of that blanked out TV set…and she’s ranting and screaming behind us.” I represented the insurgence by also making the TV the focal point of the drawing, not the huge screaming Big Nurse. I think it perfectly describes their rejection of leadership and Big Nurse.

The third and final theme of my artwork is power in numbers. As you look at the artwork, Big Nurse seems to be the biggest scariest subject. However, I drew her so that even as she is so much bigger than an average person, she takes up the same amount, if not less, of space as the ward patients. This highlights moments in the book like the failure to achieve a majority for vote for the TV, “ ‘Forty patients, and only twenty voted. You must have a majority to change the ward policy. I’m afraid the vote is closed.’ ”(123) and the subsequent achievement of the majority “ ‘The Chief’s vote makes it twenty-one! And by God if that ain’t a majority I’ll eat my hat!’ ”(124). This emphasizes that Big Nurse can be defeated by the power of the people in the ward. Also pertaining to this quote I drew all of the people who are watching Tv raising their hands to represent the final vote that spurred their defiance.