Ken Kesey

Ken Kesey was born in La Junta, Colorado in 1935.
He grew up in Springfield, Oregon and graduated from the University of Oregon in 1957.
He began writing One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest in 1960 after completing a graduate fellowship in creative writing at Stanford University.
The novel was an immediate commercial and critical success when published two years later.
Kesey was also a counterculture figure and was known for his involvement in the Merry Pranksters, a group of hippies who traveled around the country in a bus named Further.
Kesey died in 2001 at the age of 66.
He is considered one of the most important writers of the 20th century.