One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest: Summary and Psychological Influence

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest takes place in a mental institution in the Pacific Northwest. Chief Bromden, or Chief Broom, narrates the novel. Chief is large half-Indian who has been on the ward for 10 years and has led everyone to believe he is deaf and dumb. We immediately discover his paranoia, and learn he also suffers from hallucinations, including the Combine (a government-like assembly that controls society) and a mysterious fog that fills the ward. The institution is dominated by Nurse Ratched (Big Nurse), a cold, precise woman with calculated gestures and a calm, mechanical manner. When the novel opens, a new patient, Randall Patrick McMurphy, arrives at the ward. He is a self-professed 'gambling fool' who has just come from a work farm at Pendleton. He introduces himself to the other men on the ward, including Dale Harding, president of the patient's council, and Billy Bibbit, a patient who stutters and appears very young. Both of these men are members of the Acutes, a division of patients consisting of those who can be cured, rather than the Chronics who cannot be. Nurse Ratched immediately sizes McMurphy up and arrives at the decision that he is a trouble maker and a manipulator.

During the first group meeting, it is revealed that McMurphy has been convicted of statutory rape and that is why he was at the work farm. As the meeting continues, McMurphy witnesses the tearing to pieces of the patients by fellow patients, led by Nurse Ratched. This disgust him and he lets the patients know- calling them chickens. The patients admit to their fear of the Big Nurse. Being the gambling man he is, McMurphy then makes a wager with them that he can get Nurse Ratched to “crack” within the first week.

And so the battle begins. McMurphy taunts the Big Nurse and her staff whenever he finds a chance. Much to everyone’s surprise, though, McMurphy is not sent to the Disturbed Ward, but Nurse Ratched keeps him on her ward, hoping to prove to the other patients that he is merely a coward. But during a trip to the pool, McMurphy discovers that because he has been admitted to the ward, it is the Big Nurse who decides if and when he can leave. He is at Nurse Ratched’s mercy. This compels him to obey the Nurse and give up his taunts, in hopes of ever being released.

When getting chest X-rays to check for TB in another part of the hospital, McMurphy learns about the 'shock shop,' where uncontrollable patients are administered electroshock therapy, and also learns about lobotomies. He confronts Harding and the other patients about why they didn't tell him that Nurse Ratched controls whether or not he leaves, but they claim that they forgot he was committed; with a few exceptions, all of them entered the hospital voluntary. McMurphy cannot even begin to conceive that these men would choose to live in the hospital, but Billy tells him that they are too weak to leave, and this is becoming more and more clear to McMurphy.

For a fun trip, McMurphy plans a fishing outing with some whores. The men sign up, and much to the dismay of Nurse Ratched, they are actually able to go. The men come back from the trip rejuvenated and feeling like men again, rather than mental patients. Upon their arrival back, the Big Nurse orders them to take a special shower incase they picked up anything at sea. It is at this time that several of the black aids harass one of the patients, George Sorenson. McMurphy defends him, and gets in a fight with them. Chief Bromden joins in when the black boys gang up on McMurphy, and both are taken away to the Disturbed Ward.

Both Chief Bromden and McMurphy are given electroshock treatments. Within a week of the treatments, Chief Bromden complies with Nurse Ratched’s demand of an apology, and is returned to the ward, but McMurphy refuses. He is continued to be given shock treatments, but appears unaffected. Still, Nurse Ratched decides to bring him back to the ward so that the patients might see that he is weakened. On the contrary, McMurphy’s status has only been strengthened