One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey

Author:Ken Kesey [Kesey, Ken]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-05-27T18:06:13+00:00

"I feel, Doctor, that three and four and sometimes five packages of cigarettes a day are entirely too many for a man to smoke. That is what seemed to be happening last week-after Mr. McMurphy's arrival-and that is why I thought it might be best to impound the cartons the men purchased at the canteen and allow each man only one pack a day."

McMurphy leaned forward and whispered loudly to Cheswick, "Hear tell her next decision is about trips to the can; not only does a guy have to take his seven buddies into the latrine with him but he's also limited to two trips a day, to be taken when she says so."

And leaned back in his chair and laughed so hard that nobody else could say anything for nearly a minute.

McMurphy was getting a lot of kick out of all the ruckus he was raising, and I think was a little surprised that he wasn't getting a lot of pressure from the staff too, especially surprised that the Big Nurse wasn't having any more to say to him than she was. "I thought the old buzzard was tougher than this," he said to Harding after one meeting. "Maybe all she needed to straighten her out was a good bringdown. The thing is"-he frowned-"she acts like she still holds all the cards up that white sleeve of hers."

He went on getting a kick out of it till about Wednesday of the next week. Then he learned why the Big Nurse was so sure of her hand. Wednesday's the day they pack everybody up who hasn't got some kind of rot and move to the swimming [147] pool, whether we want to go or not. When the fog was on the ward I used to hide in it to get out of going. The pool always scared me; I was always afraid I'd step in over my head and drown, be sucked off down the drain and clean out to sea. I used to be real brave around water when I was a kid on the Columbia; I'd walk the scaffolding around the falls with all the other men, scrambling around with water roaring green and white all around me and the mist making rainbows, without even any hobnails like the men wore. But when I saw my Papa start getting scared of things, I got scared too, got so I couldn't even stand a shallow pool.

We came out of the locker room and the pool was pitching and splashing and full of naked men; whooping and yelling bounced off the high ceiling the way it always does in indoor swimming pools. The black boys herded us into it. The water was a nice warm temperature but I didn't want to get away from the side (the black boys walk along the edge with long bamboo poles to shove you away from the side if you try to grab on) so I stayed close to McMurphy on account of I knew they wouldn't try to make him go into deep water if he didn't want to.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.