Narration, metaphors, images and symbols in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's NestIn 1962, when One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (The Nest) was published, America Fu the beginning of the decade that would be characterized by turbulence. Involvement in Vietnam was on the rise, civil rights marches were taking place in the South, and a new era of sexual promiscuity and drug use was coming into full swing. Young Americans formed a subgroup in American society that historians called the “counterculture.” The Nest is a product of the time in which it was written. It is anti-authoritarian and tells the story of one man's rebellion against the establishment. Kesey used the metaphor to make a social commentary on America in the 1960s. In this article I will address three issues that seem to emerge from the novel. First; it is the choice Kesey made in deciding to write the novel using first-person narration. The second part of this article will be an analysis of some of the metaphors Kesey used to describe America in the 1960s. Finally I will talk about some of the religious images that Kesey incorporated into the novel. For Nest's reader, the most familiar character in the story would be Chief "Broom" Bromden, a half-Indian, paranoid schizophrenic who has been in the institution since World War II (about 15 years). He spends his days dwelling in the clouded mind produced by his mental illness. This disease is characterized by audio and visual hallucinations. He constantly refers to the "fog", the "combine" and the "machine". Bromden lives in a world inhabited by people who have been implanted with machines. In the first part of the novel we read nothing but the ravings of a madman. The novel opens......middle of paper......illan Company of Canada Limited, 1962. Klein, Maxwell. The images and metaphors of the flower children. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1988.Kunz, Don. Mechanistic and totemistic symbolization in Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. A casebook on One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. Ed. George J. Searles. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. 1989. Pratt, John Clark. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. New York: The Viking Press. 1973.Semino, Elena, and Swindlehurst, Kate. Metaphor and mental style in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. Northern Light (online publication) Spring 1996. Author unknown. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. (online publication)>