After reading One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey, the reader is left contemplating social and personal aspects of life, similar to the thoughts felt after reading The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger. The novel thoroughly covers heavy and intense situations and ideals as it navigates through a melancholy story for the reader to ponder. One could argue that the story, taking place in a psychiatric ward, could have been written as an outlet for Kesey’s cultural critiques. As One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest illustrates, sanity is a relative term.

In the beginning of the novel, Harding makes the case that the members of the ward are all rabbits in a world of wolves. He explains his comparison of Nurse Ratched and other members of society to wolves and his peers to rabbits by saying “In defense, the rabbit becomes sly and frightened and elusive and he digs holes and hides when the wolf is about. And he endures, he goes on. He knows his place. He most certainly doesn’t challenge the wolf to combat. Now, would that be wise?” (Kesey 57). Harding demonstrates this belief when he says that “[t]his world … belongs to the strong, my friend! The ritual of our existence is based on the strong getting stronger by devouring the weak” (57). Harding’s idea that the rabbits are in the ward because they refuse to accept their rabbithood angers Nurse Ratched. The logic behind the idea that the wolves are sane in forcing the peaceful rabbits to submit to their inferiority is fallacious. This demonstrates the idea that the nurses and aides are the truly insane people, and the ward-members are sane. One could make an argument that the roles of the people involved in the ward are reversed. McMurphy offers a concurring opinion when he says he has “been surprised how sane [the other] guys all are. As near as [he] can tell [they’re] not any crazier than the average asshole on the street” (58).

Another demonstration of the insanity of the people running the ward is the electric shock therapy that they force upon their patients. As punishment for the members, they would be subjected to excruciatingly painful electric shocks that were believed to cure their insanity. But, considering that several of the members of the ward had died as a result of it, it seems that it was less therapeutic and more sadistic. Harding, a member of the ward, indicates this when he describes the therapy as “brain burning” (161). When McMurphy is ready to receive the therapy, he compares himself to a peaceful martyr by asking “Anointest my head with conductant. Do I get a crown of thorns?” (244). This comparison of himself to Jesus demonstrates how the electro-shock therapy was undeserved, and inhumane. Medieval methods of torture have no correlation with making people regain their sanity.

Later in the novel, Nurse Ratched instigates Billy Bibbit, another member of the ward, and causes him to kill himself. Throughout the entire novel Billy stutters whenever he talks. He stutters because he had a terrible upbringing, and a domineering mother. When McMurphy cures Billy’s stutter temporarily by helping him to regain his confidence, Nurse Ratched drives Billy’s stutter back by threatening to bring his mother back into the equation. “He swallowed and waited for her to say something, but she wouldn’t; her skill, her fantastic mechanical power flooded back into her, analyzing the situation and reporting to her that all she had to do was keep quiet” (272). In doing so, Nurse Ratched provokes Billy to kill himself. Because she could not accept her loss of intimidating power over Billy, she drove him back to violent tendencies. If not for her, Billy may have become a changed man, but she forced Billy to accept his role as a rabbit. He was in the ward to cure his believed insanity, but Nurse Ratched felt compelled to wage psychological warfare against him.

This instance, and many others, demonstrate that the nurse and other workers at the ward are sadists. The members would be much more controlled if Nurse Ratched and the aides were not constantly inflicting emotional or physical pain on them. Ratched retains her control over the patients by dividing and conquering them at group therapy meetings. McMurphy describes this as being a pecking party, and explains that it can “wipe out the whole flock in a matter of a few hours” (51). Nurse Ratched seems to enjoy the pain she inflicts on the patients. In the end, McMurphy is given a lobotomy and turned in to a vegetable as punishment for strangling Nurse Ratched because she provoked Billy. The Nurse causes most of the patients’ instances of insanity, and she enjoys it.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest may leave the reader pondering what constitutes insanity, and considering that insanity is dependent on perspective. After considering the relationships between the people in the ward and the people managing the ward, it is hard to distinguish who is sane and who is insane. Throughout the novel it seems as though McMurphy helps the patients to cope with themselves while Nurse Ratched seems to hurt them psychologically. The patients’ peaceful attitudes and the sadistic natures of the Nurse and aides demonstrate the relativity of sanity.