One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest #3

Nurse Ratched is a character that encounters no changes whatsoever throughout the book. She begins as a scheming, manipulative agent of the Combine and remains so at the novel's conclusion. Her depiction resembles the villains of comic books and fairy tales, but it is a scary thought that some people do share her beliefs and characteristics. Much of Ratched's character is apparent in her name. McMurphy pronounces it "Rat-shed" earlier in the novel, indicating that she possesses rodent-like qualities of working quietly, quickly, and to the disadvantage of her victims. The reader is reminded that rats were the carriers of the Black Plague during the Middle Ages, and Ratched infects the hospital's orderlies, student nurses, public relations personnel, and patients with her irrational desire for order. I think the name Ratched is a pun of the word “ratchet”. Ratched is both a verb and a noun for a device that uses a twisting motion to tighten bolts into place. It fits her character because Ratched manipulates the patients and twists them to spy on one another and expose each other’s weaknesses in group-sessions. It is strange that Kessey decides to name her in comparison to a tool because like a ratchet, a gear in the Combine, she is herself mechanically enmeshed. Chief describes Ratched by saying; she "tends to get real put out if something keeps her outfit from running like a smooth, accurate, precision-made machine. The slightest thing messy or out of kilter or in the way ties her into a little white knot of tight-smiled fury." Chief goes on to describe her as resembling a doll on the outside, but mechanized and steel underneath. Her expressions are always "calculated and mechanical." In some ways, she strives to be masculine and have complete control over these men. She succeeds because she makes them believe they are little boys and that she has endless power over them. She also hides her gender from the world by obscuring her large breasts as much as possible behind the sterility of a white nurse's uniform. It’s a shame that McMurphy had to die in the end, because he was the only hope for the hospital. He did show Nurse Ratched’s weak side though before he died. I think she feels that she won, but in reality he died as a martyr and will be remembered by all in that hospital.