Narrative, metaphors, images and symbols in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's NestIn 1962, when One Flew Over a Cuckoo's Nest (The Nest), was published, America It was the start of a decade that would be characterized by unrest. Involvement in Vietnam was growing, civil rights marches were taking place across the South, and a new era of sexual promiscuity and drug use was about to come into effect. 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 sixties. In this article, I will address three issues that seem to emerge from the novel. First of all; is the choice Kesey made in his decision 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 sixties. Finally, I will talk about some of the religious imagery that Kesey put into the novel. To the Nest reader, the most familiar character in the story would be Chief "Broom" Bromden, a half-Indian paranoid schizophrenic, who has been with the institution since World War II (about 15 years). He spends his days living in the foggy mind his mental illness has created. 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 had machines implanted into them. In the first part of the novel, we only read the ravings of a madman. The novel opens...... middle of paper...... Illan Company of Canada Limited, 1962. Klein, Maxwell. The images and metaphors of 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 of them flew over a cuckoo's nest. New York: The Viking Press. 1973. Semino, Elena and Swindlehurst, Kate. Metaphor and style of mind in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey. Northern Light (online publication) Spring 1996. Author unknown. Ken Kesey's flew over the cuckoo's nest. (put online)>