Nurse Ratched

Nurse Mildred Ratched is the primary antagonist from Ken Kesey's 1962 novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, as well as the 1975 film. A cold, heartless tyrant, Nurse Ratched has become the stereotype of the nurse as a battleaxe. She has also become a popular metaphor for the corrupting influence of power and authority in bureaucracies such as the mental institution in which the novel is set. Nurse Mildred Ratched is the head administrative nurse at the Salem, Oregon State Hospital, a mental institution where she exercises near-absolute power over the patients' access to medications, privileges, and basic necessities such as food and toiletries. She capriciously revokes these privileges whenever a patient displeases her. Her superiors...