metaphorical perceptual truths behind that literal unreliability reinforce the
reliability of his evaluations of her. This effect contributes substantially to rhe-
torical readers’ sympathy for the Chief and to their desire that his situation—
and that of his fellow patients—will improve.
These effects in turn contribute significantly to the larger affective and eth-
ical effects that arise from and influence the textual dynamics. The Chief tells
his narratee about McMurphy’s power to disrupt the Nurse’s efficient manipu-
lation of the patients and control of the ward, but the Chief also reports that
McMurphy comes to realize that, as someone who has been committed to the
hospital, continuing to exercise his power means running the risk of never
being able to leave. The implied Kesey also makes it clear that the best hope
for the patients to improve and be able to function on their own is to have
McMurphy continue his disruptions and thereby show them that they are
not as powerless as they believe. Thus, the implied Kesey puts his rhetorical
readers in the unusual position of desiring the sympathetic protagonist to
make choices that are likely to lead to his downfall. Rhetorical readers’ bond-
ing with the Chief is crucial to the effectiveness of these dynamics: the more
sympathetic the audience feels toward him, the more they desire McMurphy
to stay on his destructive course, even as they register the risks he takes. And
the more the implied Kesey evokes that desire in his audience, the more he
commits to satisfying it.
Similarly, the Chief ’s actions at the end of the narrative, after McMurphy
has thoroughly exposed Nurse Ratched as a fallible, manipulative woman and
has been lobotomized for his efforts, are crucial to the effectiveness of the
novel’s ending. The Chief exercises both his own judgments and his newly
recovered physical strength, first, to mercifully end McMurphy’s life, and sec-
ond, to triumphantly break out of the hospital. Just as significantly, the Chief ’s
narration of these events is without paranoia and utterly reliable: “I was only
sure of one thing: he wouldn’t have left something like that sit there in the day
room with his name tacked on it for twenty or thirty years so the Big Nurse
could use it as an example of what can happen if you buck the system” (270).
The bonding unreliability, in other words, gives way to bonding reliability as
Kesey brings his progression to its bittersweet endpoint.
Furthermore, this analysis provides a useful ground upon which rhetori-
cal readers can assess Kesey’s communications and the ethical positions they
ask the authorial audience to occupy. To what extent is the implied Kesey’s
choice of Nurse Ratched as the representative—indeed, the embodiment—of
the Combine a sign of his own unthinking misogyny? To what extent does
such misogyny—or unthinking sexism—influence his representation of gen-
der, including his ideas of masculinity and femininity, throughout the novel?
104 • CHAPTER 5