One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest: Part 1

[[deleted user]]

I'm about 50 pages in and so far I like it well enough, though the narrative voice is a bit hard to follow. Part of that is due to the time that it was written (I'm unfamiliar with some of the terms/slang), and then part of that is due to having the narrative voice be that of a mental patient :) But, I've been able to get the gist of the book so far, and I'm curious to see where this story goes!

[Jenn]

Bookalicious wrote: "I'm about 50 pages in and so far I like it well enough, though the narrative voice is a bit hard to follow. Part of that is due to the time that it was written (I'm unfamiliar with some of the term..."

I'm in part 3 already, but I agree with you that the beginning of the book was hard to follow and that continues to happen in places where it is being narrated. I find it easier to follow when there is more dialogue between the characters. And yes, I think a big part of the reason it's difficult to follow is that the narrator is a mental patient. It took me a while to realize that not everything he described was actually happening (at least I think that's true).

[Trisha]

Hi,
I just started as well. I was really confused by what was going on at first too. I am was not sure if I would continue because I don't like books that start off leaving me confused. But once I got several pages in and other characters were introduced I am starting to like it.

[[deleted user]]

Jenn, at first I thought it was a science fiction book lol. Then I was like 'oh wait...' :D

[[deleted user]]

I didn't have a problem with the narrative voice. Partly because this is my second reading (albeit more than a decade apart) and partly because I love unrealiable narrators and working through the truth myself. I also love Kesey's prose - it's not a popular style nowadays, but it gives me thrill.

I've been trying to use bull goose looney in a normal conversation without mentioning the book or sounding like a looney. It made me chuckle. think I will fail.

[Karen]

I took me a little while to get into this book, but I'm about 75 pages in and I'm really starting to like it. Looking forward to what comes next!

[Cassandra]

Gerg, if you do manage to use "bull goose loony" in a sentence, you will have to tell us how it goes!

[Andy]

Roughly 40% (Kindle version) with the story, and I've a mild response to reader's problems with the initially difficult narrative: narration goes from a observant, however numb, tone that increasingly awakens to new - or long forgotten - thoughts. Whether it's due to the various medications the narrator is taking or a problem with seeing through the fog (more on that later), I don't know, but there is a barrier or impediment that seems to be lifted, which allows for increasingly complex thoughts and clarity from the narrator.

"The Fog," confuses me a bit. Is there an actual fog being pumped into their living spaces and I've failed to realize it? If so, then I really should reread parts of this book away from my work shift (11pm to 7am). However, I wonder if the "fog" isn't a metaphor for the haze of time lost in the institution, a result of the monotony of habit, routine, medication and being reduced to almost nothing by the condescending control of the powers that be.

[Karen]

@john.. That is a great way of thinking of the narration from the beginning! I am also trying to figure out the fog. I'm thinking it is more the haze felt by the patients than an actual fog.

[Cassandra]

The fog confused me a little bit, but this is what I think I've worked out so far:

The narrator doesn't talk about when pills are handed out, except once or twice at the beginning of the book, but naturally in a mental institution like this one, they are getting medicated at least once, maybe twice per day. I'm thinking that the fog is a mental state caused by the pills the narrator is taking, especially because he begins to have more hallucinatory reactions as we read closer to the end of part one. This is possibly because he is getting an increased dose of the medication (because he says she cranked the fog machine up extra high) as McMurphy continues to disrupt things in the ward.

He also mentions that the other patients have a different reaction to the fog (and they really seem not to notice it). The major difference between the narrator and the other patients that are part of the plot is that the narrator is considered by the ward to be a Chronic, while the others are considered Acutes. Maybe there is a special "fog" medicine given just to Chronics? The others Chronics don't seem to be coherent enough to realize or complain.

One thing I am interested in is why he always seems to end up at The Shock Shop door when he gets completely lost in the fog.

That's just my understanding of it so far.

[Brianna Andreda]

I'm late starting this book, trying to catch up on other books I had started and never finished. Coming into this book, I was very confused with exactly what was exactly going on. I'm trying to figure out if the events of which the narrator is speaking of has actually happened the way which he describes it, or if it even happened at all. I haven't quite figured out if the Big Nurse actually gives releases fog onto the ward or if it is a hallucination from the result of taking the medication prescribed to him. My main reason for this is that he describes the fog coming in different times of the day, but mainly it around the time he goes to bed or when he is waking up. Also, he never mentions another patient talking about the fog when the patients were having a conversation with McMurphy about the things that go on there.

McMurphy seems to be an interesting character in the way that the narrator describes him, and he doesn't seem to have the same mental state as any of the other patients.

The rules on the ward seem like they are never suppose to be broken, but on many occassions the narrator describes McMurphy breaking them. He broke one as soon as he got in there being that the Acutes are not suppose to mingle with the Chronics.

So far, I am very hooked to this book.

[Brianna Andreda]

Cassandra wrote: "The fog confused me a little bit, but this is what I think I've worked out so far:

The narrator doesn't talk about when pills are handed out, except once or twice at the beginning of the book, but..."

I also think the fog might be due to medication they have him taking. Also as I am halfway through Part 2, I am starting to think that the narrator may be McMurphy himself and he his condition is so bad to where he is not realizing that it is himself that he is describing as another person. But that may just be because I just got done watching Shutter Island. :)