"One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" - McMurphy analysis

1) Ken Kesey implies that some of the inmates have machine-like qualities by describing their hands as dead mechanical birds, that they are 'wonders of tiny bones and wires'- they seem to be physically made of bits and pieces of metal. All the patients react in a rather unwelcoming manner, making the reader believe that they are all thinking on the same wavelength, and that they seem to be a group of robots that are programmed …

…tough man. Due to the chief's perception of McMurphy as a strange, but hero-like figure, shaking hands would have been exciting. Bromden has a tendency to exaggerate some characteristics of people, and he perceives McMurphy's hand to "rang with blood and power" Bromden later goes on to say "like he was transmitting his own blood into it", feeling as though just by touching this man who was so unlike him, He begins to change dramatically.