In its unsettling mixture of comic and nightmarish elements Sailor Song is most closely related to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1962; see separate entry).

Kesey's experimentation with shifting points of view continues the narrative innovations found in Sometimes a Great Notion (1964; see separate entry). The individualistic Ike Sallas fits the mold of the frontier hero that Kesey used in characterizing both Randle Patrick McMurphy in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Hank Stamper in Sometimes a Great Notion.