Chapter 3

Posting this for Cecilia Tripoli because she can't set up an account: Showing the narrator's pessimistic outlook on viewing the patients as broken machinery, non-human: "What the Chronics are -- or most of us -- are machines with flaws inside that can't be repaired, flaws born in, or flaws beat in ... " (19). "Chronics don't move around much, and the Acutes say they'd just as leave stay over on their own side ... they don't like to be reminded that here's what could happen to them someday" (21). This shows there is a divide between the patients in the hospital, the desire to be superior and create groups and teams, exhibiting human nature. The narrator thinks of the humans as machines, but as he shakes McMurphy's hand, he notes: "I remember the fingers were thick and strong closing over mine, and my hand commenced to feel peculiar and went to swelling up out there on my stick of an arm, like he was transmitting his own blood into it. It rang with blood and power" (27).

Mine: "They spy on each other. Sometimes one man says something about himself that he didn't aim to let slip, and one of his buddies at the table where he said it ... writes down the piece of information he heard -- of therapeutic interest to the whole ward, is what the Big Nurse says the book is for..." (19). This observation shows the manipulative and controlling attitude of the Big Nurse. She uses medical reasons as a way to control and keep track of all the patients. Also, she's slowly turning the patients against each other. If the patients are all divided and wary of each other, there will never be a united challenge against her power in the hospital. Big Nurse says to McMurry, "I'm sorry to interrupt you and mr.Bromden, but you do understand: everyone ... must follow the rules" (28). Big Nurse sees McMurry as a threat to her power already and is clearly warning him with this statement. She can tell that he is different from all the other patients and has the ability to usurp her control. "But there are some of us Chronics that the staff made a couple of mistakes on years back, some of us who were Acutes when we came in, and got changed over." (19). This statement shows how carelessly patients are treated in this hospitals. Some patients, when they were first admitted, had hopes of being cured and returning to the outside world. However, due to errors made by the staff, the patients were completely ruined and thus became "Chronics," or patients who stayed in the hospital forever.