One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest Characters

Chief Bromden • Narrator • Pretends to be mute and deaf seemingly to protect from pain • (note: Some critics claim he is schizophrenic which is problematic because it reduces his brilliance and humor with the condensation that the novel calls into question). • Heis the first trickster and fool. • Tricksters are uncanny and able to fool those around them while fooling themselves. As Faggen says, “Bromden has been fooling everyone around him into thinking he’s deaf and dumb. But he has also trapped himself and perhaps the only way to reclaim himself may be through a form of the very violence that helped him a “Vanishing American”- perhaps the final act of the book. • Massive in size (“as big as a God damn tree trunk”) • Part Indian • Exists at times in a “fog”. • Seems to suffer from domineering female figure as indicated by childhood stories

Fog and Combine • Fog • might represent Chief’s incoherence and inability to assert himself. • When he joins the men to protest the nurse, the fog disappears. • But once he trades in “fog” he loses personal safety for privilege of human choice and has to live with that choice. • Combine • threatens to extinct and reduce humans to one unified type of individual to further its own corporate interest. • It cuts and clears whatever is in its path. • Perhaps Bromden is the one the machine can’t get- he is the “reluctant and somewhat broken component of the this machinery and its goals” (xv) • Makes it clear to readers that the ultimate enemy is the combine

Randle P. McMurphy • Vulgar, clever, witty, unpredictable, challenges authority. • He is the classic trickster. • Like Chief, he fakes his madness (as a means to not have to work) • While some argue he is heroic… he is amoral, wild and has the sexual violence thing on his plate • Man of the earth • Instigates change in the ward and as a result becomes a demagogue • Gives the men at the war what they want which in turn to seems to give him more power • Most inmates see him as “genius”; however few notice his own vulnerability (only Chief can see cues of his fear and vulnerability) • Teaches inmates to be sane (Chief, Billy, and Harding) • Could be argued he changes ward (however, at what cost) • Wild antics cost him the substances of his personality

Big Nurse/Nurse Ratched • Controlling, likes/demands order, lacks compassionate/sympathetic characteristics • Symbol of bureaucracy and authority/ minion of the combine who makes sure it runs efficiently and effectively • Strict, closed-minded • Unfeeling, cold-hearted (in fact, the angrier she becomes the more machine-like she becomes • Attempts to deny sexuality (hides her femininity) (“no compact or lipstick or woman stuff”); sexlessness makes her inhuman • Controls those normally her superiors (Dr. Spivey) • Wants to keep McMurphy indefinitely to “help” him, while other doctors want to release him as he is not crazy • Executes power by ordering electroshock therapy to crush McMurphy and lobotomy to ultimately crush his personality- perhaps likened to the “chick” that castrates the men

Billy Bibbit • Pathetic, weak • Stutters • Adult (31-years old) but treated like child • Impressionable/vulnerable • Easily intimated by Nurse Ratched • Afraid of mother (oedipal complex) • McMurphy helps him find way to overcome sexual oppression; as a result, Nurse Ratched acts as a catalyst to his fear of his mother. He then kills himself.

Cheswick • Looks for someone to back up his ideas • Talk; no action

Mrs. Bibbit • Billy’s mother • Uses power by preventing Billy to become functioning adult, which leads to his suicide • Threatens son to keep young, innocent (thinks he’s too young and she’s too young to have a son old enough to be with a woman) • Instills fear of disappointment, displeasure in Billy

Vera Harding • Instills fear over him • Insecurity over homosexuality • Makes Dale feel inadequate

Conflict • All choices represent loss. • Novel questions what it means to be a free in a world governed by the combine

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest