One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was a truly tragic book. Stories of mental wards aren't typically happy, and this one did have bright spots, but it was altogether very sad. Chief Bromden, the narrator, tells the story of McMurphy, a man who gets himself admitted to an insane asylum to avoid a work camp. Through McMurphy's antics, it is revealed that the hospital is not designed to make the patients better. In fact, it often makes them much worse.

McMurphy draws many of his fellow inmates out of their antisocial neuroses. He arranges a fishing trip, which for some is their first outing in twenty years. He defies the controlling nurses, and, as retribution, is subjected to shock treatment and then a lobotomy. This surgery renders him a vegetable, and so Bromden smothers him out of compasssion.

The mercy killing at the end was fairly disturbing, but mostly understandable considering the men and their situation. Much of the inmates' inabilities to function stemmed from a sort of desexing, as Kesey repeatedly pointed out. They were forced to rescind any form of masculinity they may have retained. They were left men in name only, with no power or virility, unable to assert themselves and so unable to live sanely.

McMurphy served as a sort of sacrifice for these men, losing his life in an attempt to restore such to them. I found the story riveting, and I was in suspense until the end. It was excellent, but again, so tragic.