One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest 1962, by Ken Kesey
This is one of the rare cases when a book did not impress me as the film did. And that does not happen often.
After I saw the film, which shattered me and left me speechless for days, I rushed to the library (“rushed” is a too strong way to put it, however) and took the book.
It is because the fact that Chief Bromden could hear and speak was clear from the very beginning, whileas the film used that as a smasher; or is it because the splendid face acting of Jack Nickolson and Brad Dourif (in the part of Billy) was not there, I do not know, but the pages were somehow colourless and the story did not catch me as the film had done.
So, the novel was OK. After all it had the same great characters and told the same overwhelming story. It just did not leave me in the same breathless horror the film did. Or, maybe, my extraordinary state had simply expired, leaving space to some milder sensation. That could very probably be it.
© 2012 Mariya Koleva
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