Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. dies at age 84 ...

[Ganchrow]

So it goes.

"I am, incidentally, Honorary President of the American Humanist Association, having succeeded the late, great science fiction writer Isaac Asimov in that totally functionless capacity. We had a memorial service for Isaac a few years back, and I spoke and said at one point, "Isaac is up in heaven now." It was the funniest thing I could have said to an audience of humanists. I rolled them in the aisles. It was several minutes before order could be restored. And if I should ever die, God forbid, I hope you will say, "Kurt is up in heaven now." That's my favorite joke."

-- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., A Man Without a Country (2005)

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Kurt is up in heaven now.

[moses millsap]

Rip

[Mudcat]

Well he's up in Heaven now.

(Just to clarify, Kurt was a gentle religious skeptic who would get a laugh from that statement in the absurdist way it is intended.)

[To further clarify, I started typing this before Ganchrow added everything after "So it goes," to his post. Thanks for looking up that quote. I am sure it is in another of Kurt's books too. Timequake or Fates Worse Than Death, I think.]

He was my favorite writer of all time. I have all of his novels/plays/short-stories/non-fiction on my bookshelves and have read them all. Some of them, several times. I feel like I knew him.

I suppose the consensus pick for his best would be Slaughterhouse 5, although I lean towards Breakfast of Champions. Slightly more off-the-beaten-track recommendation: Timequake.

Saw him speak in Toronto about 12 years ago too. A very entertaining evening.

It's no big surprise that the end has come. He loved his Pall Malls his whole life and was looking very feeble last I saw him a couple years ago. And he had already declared that he had said all he had to say and was through with writing. So there are really no loose ends on that front.

Thanks for everything Kurt.

[Tchocky]

I still have yet to read anything by Vonnegut. Tell me I'm not alone.

[Willie Bee]

So it goes.

No three words have probably better summed up any man's life and work. Excellent little piece on NPR driving in early this morning. Condolences to his family and friends.

[Ganchrow]

I still have yet to read anything by Vonnegut. Tell me I'm not alone.

I'm sure you're not.

You could get started with these two Vonnegut short stories:

• Harrison Bergeron
• Long Walk to Forever

[Mudcat]

I still have yet to read anything by Vonnegut. Tell me I'm not alone.

It is an odd thing to talk about literature in this day and age. The very concept seems so heavy. All I would say about Vonnegut is that his is some of the most accessible, fun writing you could ever hope to find. Reading Vonnegut is not like a chore assigned by a hopelessly stuffy high school teacher. It's like talking to a bright, imaginative, outspoken friend.

a little more on the subject

[bigboydan]

Rip

[Ganchrow]

One more:

Requiem for a Dreamer
By Kurt Vonnegut

Editor's note: What follows is a conversation between Kurt Vonnegut and out-of-print science fiction writer Kilgore Trout. It was to be their last. Trout committed suicide by drinking Drano at midnight on October 15 in Cohoes, New York, after a female psychic using tarot cards predicted that the environmental calamity George W. Bush would once again be elected president of the most powerful nation on the planet by a five-to-four decision of the Supreme Court, which included "100 per-cent of the black vote."

TROUT: I've never voted in my whole damn life. I didn't want to be complicit. But is it time I did?

KV: The planet's immune system is obviously trying to get rid of us, and high time! But sure, go vote for somebody. What the hell.

TROUT: Everybody's so ignorant.

KV: The overwhelming popularity of President Bush, in spite of everything, finally shows us what the American people, whom we have so sentimentalized for so long, a la Norman Rockwell, really are, thanks to TV and purposely lousy public schools: ignorant. Count on it!

TROUT: You ever meet anybody who was really smart?

KV: Only one: Saul Steinberg, the graphic artist who's dead now. Everybody I know is dead now, present company excepted. I could ask Saul anything, and six seconds would pass, and then he would give me a perfect answer. He growled a perfect answer. He was born in Rumania, and, according to him, he was born into a house where "the geese peeked in the windows."

TROUT: Like what kind of questions?

KV: I said, "Saul, what should I think about Picasso?" Six seconds went by, and then he growled, "God put him on Earth to show us what it's like to be really rich." I said, "Saul, I'm a novelist, and many of my friends are novelists, but I can't help feeling that some of them are in a very different business from mine, even though I like their books a lot. What would make me feel that way?" Six seconds went by, and then he growled, "It is very simple: There are two kinds of artists, and one is not superior to the other. But one kind responds to the history of his or her art so far, and the other responds to life itself."

I said, "Saul, are you gifted?" Six seconds went by, and then he growled, "No. But what we respond to in any work of art is the artist's struggle against his or her limitations."

TROUT: OK.

KV: You seem unimpressed.

TROUT: I said, "OK."

KV: You said it so emptily.

TROUT: Sorry. You know me: Always running on empty.

KV: Somebody else smart? OK, try this: After the Second World War I enrolled in the graduate division of the Anthropology Department of the University of Chicago, the most conceited university in the country. And in a seminar for about eight of us, half of us vets on the GI Bill of Rights, my favorite professor, in fact my thesis advisor, put this Socratic question to us: "What is it an artist does?"

TROUT: Hold on: What makes Chicago so conceited?

KV: That it isn't Harvard.

TROUT: Got it: That it isn't high society.

KV: Bingo. Anyway, I'm sure we all came up with smart-ass answers, since a graduate seminar in any subject is a form of improv theater. But the only answer I remember is the one he gave: "An artist says, 'I can't do anything about the chaos in the universe or my country, or even in my own miserable life, but I can at least make this piece of paper or canvas, or blob of clay or chunk of marble, exactly what it should be.'"

TROUT: OK.

KV: Did you forget to take your Viagra today?

TROUT: Very funny. But what he said an artist does is what I do every time I brush my teeth or tie my shoes. You thought this guy was smart? He's an asshole.

KV: Look, when you put a piece of paper in your typewriter, don't you try to make it exactly what it should be?

TROUT: No, I just effing write.

KV: What are you effing writing now?

TROUT: It's about how the future has as much to do with the present as the past does. Giraffes can only have come from the future. There's no way evolution in the past would have let something that defenseless and impractical live for 15 minutes.

KV: If you say so.

TROUT: Try this: The First World War was caused by the second one. Otherwise the first one makes no sense, wasn't about anything. And all Picasso had to do was paint pictures that were already hanging in museums in the future.

KV: OK.

TROUT: Just trying to be Einstein. You never know. But hey, the two people you said were so smart were both men. Women say smart things, too. I went walking with a woman the other day, if you can believe it, and I stopped to retie my shoes, and she said, "Every time I go for a walk with a man he always has to stop to retie his shoes. Why won't men tie double knots? A fear of commitment?" How's that for anthropology, the science of man? I'll bet they didn't teach you about men and shoelaces at Chicago.

KV: That isn't anthropology. That's sociology.

TROUT: What's the difference? I've often wondered.

KV: A sociologist is paid by the Sociology Department. An anthropologist is paid by the Anthropology Department.

TROUT: Glad to have that cleared up.

KV: Knowledge is power.

TROUT: Well, I'm off. Ciao, adios and aloha.

KV: Whither bound?

TROUT: Back to Cohoes for an AA meeting.

KV: But you're not an alcoholic.

TROUT: It's the only place I can pick up women. They have their defenses down. "Hello, I'm Kilgore Trout and I'm an alcoholic." And I've met this babe named Flamingo who is a professional psychic. She's going to tell me our country's fortune. Who'll win the next election.

KV: OK

TROUT: Take care.

KV: You too.

(2004)

[trustbutverify]

Cat's Cradle. Another man of reason gone. we're running out.

[Willie Bee]

Hey Ganch, I've never read any of his short stories, and am guessing that you would suggest I go pick up his Welcome to the Monkey House collection. Any others you might toss out there for someone who only read a couple of Vonnegut's novels along the way (S-5 and Cradle)?

[MrX]

As someone who read every Vonnegut novel, I've always had a soft spot for The Sirens of Titan. It's some wickedly funny science fiction.

[Ganchrow]

Hey Ganch, I've never read any of his short stories, and am guessing that you would suggest I go pick up his Welcome to the Monkey House collection. Any others you might toss out there for someone who only read a couple of Vonnegut's novels along the way (S-5 and Cradle)?

It's so hard for me to say, as I like all his novels in different ways.

Maybe check out Sirens of Titan, which is the second novel he authored (after the somewhat underwhelming Player Piano). As Douglas Adams wrote about, "Sirens of Titan is just one of those books – you read it through the first time and you think it's very loosely, casually written. You think the fact that everything suddenly makes such good sense at the end is almost accidental. And then you read it a few more times, simultaneously finding out more about writing yourself, and you realise what an absolute tour de force it was, making something as beautifully honed as that appear so casual."

[Ganchrow]

Hey Ganch, I've never read any of his short stories, and am guessing that you would suggest I go pick up his Welcome to the Monkey House collection. Any others you might toss out there for someone who only read a couple of Vonnegut's novels along the way (S-5 and Cradle)?

Wrt Welcome to the Monkey Mouse, three of my favorites in the collection are "Tom Edison's Shaggy Dog", "Unready to Wear", and the titular "Welcome to the Monkey Mouse". Great stuff.

[Mudcat]

Hey Ganch, I've never read any of his short stories, and am guessing that you would suggest I go pick up his Welcome to the Monkey House collection. Any others you might toss out there for someone who only read a couple of Vonnegut's novels along the way (S-5 and Cradle)?

I know you weren't asking me but I am hopelessly opinionated on certain subjects including this. Vonnegut's short stories have value but are not his best work. I honestly think he would have agreed with me on that. I'm pretty sure he said as much when he released Bagombo Snuff Box. Those were short stories from very early in his career - the just-getting-started days - that were not dug up and released until 1999.

As I have made clear, I love Vonnegut - but some of the stuff in Snuff Box is embarassingly bad. (As I say, I'm pretty sure Vonnegut admitted as much although I haven't looked up the quote. Hey, haven't we all done some embarassingly bad work in our younger days?) Anyway, Welcome to the Monkey House is a better collection but for Vonnegut fiction, I really lean towards his novels. Particularly these IMO:

Slaughterhouse 5
Breakfast of Champions
Mother Night
Jailbird

If anyone wanted to debate this by naming something else, I'm sure I would only nod my head and say, "Yep, that is great too."

FWIW, the first three of those were also made into movies. I find them all respectable adaptations. I know Vonnegut approved of the movie, Slaughterhouse 5. He commented that, along with his friend the the late Joe Heller who liked the movie adaptation of Catch-22, he was a rare author who found the movie adaptation of his work satisfactory.

IMO, the non-fiction of Vonnegut is under-appreciated. I mentioned Timequake (which is, I dunno, 75% non-fiction, 25% fiction ???), I also recommend other collections of essays, Fates Worse Than Death, Palm Sunday and Wampeters, Foma and Granfalloons.

[LVHerbie]

No three words have probably better summed up any man's life and work. Excellent little piece on NPR driving in early this morning. Condolences to his family and friends.

Heard it on Fresh Air on NPR tonight... Good piece...

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9567370

[Willie Bee]

I also recommend other collections of essays, Fates Worse Than Death, Palm Sunday and Wampeters, Foma and Granfalloons.

Thanks, Mud

[Ganchrow]

Slaughterhouse 5
Breakfast of Champions
Mother Night
Jailbird

If anyone wanted to debate this by naming something else, I'm sure I would only nod my head and say, "Yep, that is great too."

FWIW, the first three of those were also made into movies. I find them all respectable adaptations. I know Vonnegut approved of the movie, Slaughterhouse 5. He commented that, along with his friend the the late Joe Heller who liked the movie adaptation of Catch-22, he was a rare author who found the movie adaptation of his work satisfactory.

I'll agree that Slaughterhouse 5 was a well-done movie. Mother Night was OK, but I was certainly rather disappointed by Breakfast of Champions.

Apparently Jerry Garcia and KVj had been collaborating on a movie version of Sirens of Titan. At this point it may be a bit of a wait ...

[Mudcat]

I'll agree that Slaughterhouse 5 was a well-done movie. Mother Night was OK, but I was certainly rather disappointed by Breakfast of Champions.

I have heard others say the same about Breakfast of Champions. In fact I'm struggling to remember anyone agreeing with me on that one. Well I recall that my date enjoyed it - but she always had a tendency to agree with me. She was very susceptible to having things rub off on her.

I dunno, I enjoyed the movie. Maybe I was in a strange mood and oddly, artificially receptive at the time. I think I went into it determined to like it. Maybe I need to see it again.

Or maybe I need to avoid seeing it again and hang on to the illusion.

I actually somehow own a VHS of Mother Night. This is only notable because I'm not a guy to collect movies. I own exactly 2. The other - and I'm equally unable to explain how I came to own it - is the 1950's version of Show Boat. Great old movie.

As I'm thinking more carefully now, I recall they changed the ending to Mother Night. Vonnegut is always more about the journey than the destination but still, that seems not good. I'll have to take another look at it in the next few days. Show Boat too, come to think of it.

In any case, the book Breakfast of Champions is a masterpiece (as much as any work where the author attempts to draw his own asshole can be considered a masterpiece.)

Is it appropriate in a thread such as this to attempt to recreate Kurt's asshole? I think it is. Would Kurt approve? I feel sure he would. Not sure how this will work out but I'll give it my best shot:

*