Examples Of Asylum In One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

Asylums are known to help people get better…or so we thought. In the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey we learn the other side of asylums. In the novel we get to learn the overpowering and damaging effect asylums have on patients. The first asylum, specifically for mentally ill people, was created in 1814. They were created because it was believed that institutionalizing mentally ill people was the correct form of treatment. As the amount of asylums increased, more people needed to be institutionalized there. There were many treatments used to “cure” patients. For example, lobotomy was one of the most common treatments. A lobotomy involves dividing the nerve connections between the frontal lobe and other regions of the brain

He was moved from a prison to a mental institution to get evaluated for his erratic behavior. He shocks the patients when he enters the asylum because of his confidence and loud laughter. He soon realizes that the head nurse, Nurse Ratched, has a very strict schedule. The narrator distinctly states, “During the meeting a few days before he asks if it wouldn’t be okay if they did the cleaning work at night, during TV time, and watched the games during the afternoon. The nurse tells him no, which is about what he expected” (Kesey 118). McMurphy thought that he could change the asylum's schedule to watch the ball game. During his time at the asylum he learns that his wants and desires don’t come first. McMahan acknowledges in her essay, “A ratchet is a mechanism that engages the teeth of a wheel permitting motion in one direction only.” Nurse Ratched sticks to her schedule and never goes out of line. Patients are punished if attempted to change the way the ward is

He then gets aggravated and has a frenzy, he says “The hell with the schedule. You can get back to the bloody schedule next week, when the Series is over. What do you say, buddies? Let’s take a vote on watching the TV during the afternoon instead of at night. All those in favor?”(Kesey 118). Although he attempts to get the other patients to turn on Nurse Ratched, she still overpowers him. McMurphy refuses to follow the asylum's strict rules which causes tension between him and Nurse Ratched. Robert C. Evans alludes to this in his essay and states, “He also loves to gamble, and, partly to win a bet, he immediately begins to antagonize Nurse Ratched, also known as "the Big Nurse" among the men. Using a combination of humor and insolence, McMurphy continuously defies Ratched in ways both large and small, often making her lose both her temper and her composure.” His personality makes it hard for him to let Nurse Ratched get her way. In the ward, most patients aren’t like McMurphy; he's loud, bold, and has no filter. Other Patients are scared of Nurse Ratched, while he refuses to obey