Cuckoos & Kool-Aid

[thisnewday]

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the novel by Ken Kesey, was first published in 1962, the year I graduated from high school. A half dozen years after that, I saw it in the hands of one of the kids at the Syracuse Free School, where I was the Coordinating Teacher.

But I'd never read the book myself, even though I'd known of Kesey and his Merry Pranksters from the Tom Wolfe book, Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, which I had read. And had also seen in the hands of kids at the Free School and at the Henrie Farm where I lived for a couple of summers.

I'd also seen a cinematic rendering of Kesey and the Pranksters in Julie Taymor's Across the Universe, which I'd watched with my grandson. He's a fan of the Beatles and the soundtrack features 34 of their songs in the first-ever authorized use of their music outside of their own productions.

Anyway, having landed several strawberry fields away from where I started (See what I did there?), I heard from the grandson, in one of our nightly texts, that he'd just watched the movie adaptation of One Flew Over with Jack Nicholson and was really impressed with it.

I responded by boring him with insights like those offered above but also said that I'd get the movie and the book and let him know what I thought. Which I'm sure will be of equally little interest to him. But, you know, that's a grandparent's job. To bore the children of our children with acquired wisdom.

And now the book has arrived and I am reading it. I had also ordered Acid Test for, you know, old times sake and that arrived with it. The movie is apparently shipping separately, but that's OK because I'd intended to read the book first.

The story, if you're not familiar with it, takes place in an insane asylum--hence the title--and it is, well, horrific. Not the sort of thing that I usually read to help steady pulse and lower blood pressure for my morning readings.

So, I dunno, maybe I'm gonna have to keep a little Kool-Aid on the night stand to, you know, steady things up a bit.

Just kidding. I got off that bus years ago with no intention of making the return trip.

Because, as the other T. Wolfe said, "You Can't Go Home Again..."

LPK
Dreamwidth
10.21.2020

Comments

[rosegardenfae]

I thought about rewatching "Cuckoo..." since it's on Netflix right now. Haven't yet. Those are such great old books. ENJOY. You could always throw in "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" or "Stranger in a Strange Land" while you're tripping backwards in time. (Lol see what I did there.)

I love it when one of the grandkids reads and relishes a book that changed my life.

[thisnewday]

I may actually still have a copy of "Zen and the Art" but have never read "Stranger." And yes, I see what you did there, ROFLMAO!

"Zen and the Art" is one of the first books I shared with my friend and mentor, BT, at the Toyota garage where I went to work after leaving "The Farm."

We'd sit on our respective work benches, his across the shop and down the aisle from mine, reading our books at lunchtime...

[rosegardenfae]

Re:( what I did there): I learned from da master. :<)

"We'd sit...lunchtime." The visual of you and BT gives me warm fuzzies. Thanks bro.

[thisnewday]

Hahaha and, yeah, I have a lot of fond memories of BT...

[rosegardenfae]

I think it was Paul Simon who said, "preserve your memories, they're all that's left you." I'm happy you have some good ones.

Me too!!

[halfmoon_mollie1]

millions of years ago, it seems, Syracuse Stage (back in the Arthur Storch days) did One Flew Over...it played for two weeks and they brought it back at the end of the season and it played another two weeks. I will admit that Jack Nicholson was amazing in the movie but (let me insert that I was an usher and got to see the play several times) I loved the play. Of course I love live theatre. Later on "One Flew Over" was assigned reading in English 101 at OCC and I was so much older than the student who took the class with me, we came at it from different directions. I read Zen....probably about 10 years ago.

[thisnewday]

That's amazing! I always kind of envied you your job up on the hill just, you know being in that environment, that sense of being where so much was happening.

And, yes, live theater, I wish I'd availed myself of that opportunity because I did live just up "the other hill." I do fervently hope that one day, along with so many other things, we get that back.

I'm also thinking that, as I re-read some of these books from my own quite distant past, I may be doing so with very different eyes. I seem to be doing a lot of that, these days, the re-visualization through the eyes of experience.

At least I hope that's what I'm doing. Otherwise this has all been a great waste...

[halfmoon_mollie1]

with me, it's music. Willlie Nelson remade 'Yesterday, When I Was Young', which was a hit when I was in my late teens, by Roy Clark. (written by Charles Aznevour...) I heard the Willie Nelson version one Sunday afternoon (On Common Threads) and it made me cry.

[thisnewday]

Yeah, for a long time I had to be careful about what music I listened to because it was such a potent trigger.

Perhaps it still is and I'm just not as aware of it because, as I've aged, I've found it necessary to close myself off from so many such things to the point where I'm really not aware of them any more.

Earlier in my life, I would've thought, Oh, such a sad thing, to have to do that.

But now, especially given the toxicity of so much of our social, political, and cultural discourse, I've accepted it as a matter of survival...

[smokingboot]

Oh, I remember that book, read it in my early teens. And even then I knew, there is a point when Murphy knows he's going to his ruin, long after he should have run and kept running.

But Chief Broom was the star for me.

[thisnewday]

I've just started the book, but I can see how the Chief would hold that place for you.

I also received the DVD of the movie adaptation in the mail yesterday and, even though I'd said I was going to finish the book first, I opened it and put it on my coffee table thinking I might do "dinner and a movie" last night.

However, I resisted the temptation--I did have dinner but didn't watch the movie, lol--and now it sits on the coffee table like that open box of chocolates that you know you shouldn't touch...

[rosegardenfae]

Love the Chief too!!

[mallorys_camera]

I actually loathe Cuckoo's Nest because of its general misogyny. In particular, I find the character of McMurtry absolutely revolting.

The same misogyny can be found in Sometimes a Great Notion, of course, but it's an accurate portrait of life in that Oregon logging region, so I was more inclined to accept it.

There were many things to love about the 60s/70s counterculture, but for me, as a woman, there were many things to hate as well, and Kesey as a persona (for me) embodies everything there was to hate. For what it's worth, I hate Kerouac, too. 😀

Obviously, mileage varies. 😀

[thisnewday]

Yes, I've been experiencing something like culture shock as I've gone back to some of the books and music that I've thought I liked in the past.

In the case of "One Flew Over," though, it jumped right out at me BECAUSE I'd never experienced the book in any context except the present.

Besides the misogyny, there's a healthy dose of racism as well but it's not THE central theme or a main driver of the plot in the way that McMurphy's misogyny is.

Having lived through the social, political, and cultural turmoil of the 60s/70s, I'm just glad that we've never had to deal with anyone like a McMurphy in real life.

Oh, wait...