Sacrifice In One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both their own and the enemies ~Napoleon. In the book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey, McMurphy, a medical ward patient, dominates a battle of superiority with a very controlling woman named Nurse Ratchet. However in a surprising twist of events, Nurse Ratchet manages to beat McMurphy after he attacks her. Some may argue that McMurphy won the battle because of the state of the ward that he had left it in, however this allowed her to restart her empire at the ward and be able to finish McMurphy once and for all.

To start, some may argue that Mcmurphy was victorious in this battle against Nurse Ratched because he won the most battles.

However this scene allowed her to have an excuse to make McMurphy hers once and for all. “Doctors and nurses prying those heavy red fingers out of the white flesh of her throat as if they were her neck bones, jerking him backward off her with a loud heave of breath (319).” Although the nurse was put into a weak state this did not mean she lost the battle, this only allowed her to get stronger and make sure McMurphy goes down. It took her a week to get out of medical so she could return to the ward. She had lost control of the ward since McMurphy's incident because she was in bad condition but everyone also knew that McMurphy had beat her. What they didn't know was that she had plans for McMurphy that would put her on top once and for all. “ I didn’t want to leave yet, because she seemed to be too sure; she seemed to be waiting for one more round, and I wanted to there in case it came off. And one morning, after McMurphy been gone three weeks, she made her last play.” A gurney had been wheeled in and the chart at the bottom read “MCMURPHY, RANDLE P. POST-OPERATIVE”. And below that it had said “LOBOTOMY.” That was the nurses final play. She had defeated McMurphy once and for all. If the operation had failed, he would end up a vegetable in the ward for the remained of his life. If it had worked, the nurse would be able to control him easily without any problem. When chief ended McMurphy's life when he was on the gurney, nurses battle was over. She can now recover and be able to put the ward back into shape because of all the troublesome patients are gone. That being said, the fight may had been close but McMurphy's actions gave reason for nurse to schedule a lobotomy which would result in his