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

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Mallory Barkley Ms. Drake English IV 14 April 2023 Watching Elmo has ruined my life: Childhood experiences affecting schizophrenic delusions in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest In the bare and gloomy confines of a mental institution, where the line between sanity and madness blurs, 'One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest' unfolds a gripping narrative that challenges the very nature of the conscious mind. Bromden, one of the main characters of ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’, is a schizophrenic Native American patient in an abusive and debilitating psychiatric hospital. Kesey’s, the author of ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest’, narrative serves as a study of institutional processes and follows the background of Bromden, where the readers are able to …show more content…

The seclusion and isolation Bromden faces initiates his stress response, which then activates his visual episodic memories. Hence, the fog clears once he leaves isolation, representing the end of a delusion. Kesey capitalizes the word “Seclusion” in this quote, representing it as a place rather than a thing, further emphasizing the use of isolation as a way of controlling Bromden. By elaborating on how childhood trauma alters brain functioning, particularly in the realm of visual episodic memory, the readers see the impact of adverse childhood experiences on individuals' cognitive processes and mental well-being. Bromden's character in 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' serves as a representation of the lasting scars inflicted by childhood trauma. His experiences of abuse and isolation shape his perception of reality and influence his interactions within the oppressive environment of the institution. Readers see a distraught moment where Bromden struggles to tell the difference between reality and fantasy. “...with the other hand the worker drives the hook through the tendon back of the heel, and the old guy’s hanging there upside down, his moldy face blown up big, scared, the eyes scummed with mute fear” (Kesey …show more content…

He chooses to include graphic details and phrases, such as “moldy face blown up big”, to evoke feelings of fear in the reader and fully embody the horrific scene. Kesey then describes the features of the old man who is dying, “eyes scummed with mute fear”, to show the readers how vulnerable and powerless the man is to the attacks. Kesey recounts this scene because it acts as an extension of Bromden and his feelings of fear and vulnerability of being in the institution. These delusions are directly tied to Bromden's traumatic childhood memories, as evidenced by the parallel between his hallucination and the real-life persecution his tribe faced when practicing their burial customs. In the criticism, ‘The Vanishing American’, the author shows the clash between Bromden's cultural beliefs and the dominant white society's prejudiced reactions which left a lasting imprint on his psyche, manifesting in his paranoid visions of the oppressive "Combine" that controls the hospital. “Then the body is placed on a platform suspended in the trees within the tribal cemetery. When the white community learns that the Indians disentombed the body, they respond, “Hanging a corpse in a tree! It’s enough to make a person sick”... Besides experiencing persecution because of membership in a minority group.” (Ware 6). Through Bromden's character, Kesey powerfully illustrates how the scars of childhood

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