Kurt Vonnegut dies at 84

Mr. Brightside · Apr 12, 2007

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/books/04/12/obit.vonnegut.ap/index.html

Novelist Kurt Vonnegut dies at 84

NEW YORK (AP) -- Kurt Vonnegut, the satirical novelist who captured the absurdity of war and questioned the advances of science in darkly humorous works such as "Slaughterhouse-Five" and "Cat's Cradle," died Wednesday. He was 84.

Vonnegut, who often marveled that he had lived so long despite his lifelong smoking habit, had suffered brain injuries after a fall at his Manhattan home weeks ago, said his wife, photographer Jill Krementz.

The author of at least 19 novels, many of them best-sellers, as well as dozens of short stories, essays and plays, Vonnegut relished the role of a social critic. He lectured regularly, exhorting audiences to think for themselves and delighting in barbed commentary against the institutions he felt were dehumanizing people.

"I will say anything to be funny, often in the most horrible situations," Vonnegut, whose watery, heavy-lidded eyes and unruly hair made him seem to be in existential pain, once told a gathering of psychiatrists.

A self-described religious skeptic and freethinking humanist, Vonnegut used protagonists such as Billy Pilgrim and Eliot Rosewater as transparent vehicles for his points of view. He also filled his novels with satirical commentary and even drawings that were only loosely connected to the plot. In "Slaughterhouse-Five," he drew a headstone with the epitaph: "Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt."

But much in his life was traumatic, and left him in pain.

A meat locker labeled slaughterhouse-five

Despite his commercial success, Vonnegut battled depression throughout his life, and in 1984, he attempted suicide with pills and alcohol, joking later about how he botched the job.

His mother had succeeded in killing herself just before he left for Germany during World War II, where he was quickly taken prisoner during the Battle of the Bulge. He was being held in Dresden when Allied bombs created a firestorm that killed an estimated 135,000 people in the city.

"The firebombing of Dresden explains absolutely nothing about why I write what I write and am what I am," Vonnegut wrote in "Fates Worse Than Death," his 1991 autobiography of sorts.

But he spent 23 years struggling to write about the ordeal, which he survived by huddling with other POWs inside an underground meat locker labeled slaughterhouse-five.

The novel, in which Pvt. Pilgrim is transported from Dresden by time-traveling aliens from the planet Tralfamadore, was published at the height of the Vietnam War, and solidified his reputation as an iconoclast.

"He was sort of like nobody else," said Gore Vidal, who noted that he, Vonnegut and Norman Mailer were among the last writers around who served in World War II.

"He was imaginative; our generation of writers didn't go in for imagination very much. Literary realism was the general style. Those of us who came out of the war in the 1940s made sort of the official American prose, and it was often a bit on the dull side. Kurt was never dull."

A novelist -- and car salesman

Vonnegut was born on Nov. 11, 1922, in Indianapolis, a "fourth-generation German-American religious skeptic Freethinker," and studied chemistry at Cornell University before joining the Army.

When he returned, he reported for Chicago's City News Bureau, then did public relations for General Electric, a job he loathed. He wrote his first novel, "Player Piano," in 1951, followed by "The Sirens of Titan," "Canary in a Cat House" and "Mother Night," making ends meet by selling Saabs on Cape Cod.

Critics ignored him at first, then denigrated his deliberately bizarre stories and disjointed plots as haphazardly written science fiction. But his novels became cult classics, especially "Cat's Cradle" in 1963, in which scientists create "ice-nine," a crystal that turns water solid and destroys the earth.

Many of his novels were best-sellers. Some also were banned and burned for suspected obscenity. Vonnegut took on censorship as an active member of the PEN writers' aid group and the American Civil Liberties Union. The American Humanist Association, which promotes individual freedom, rational thought and scientific skepticism, made him its honorary president.

His characters tended to be miserable anti-heroes with little control over their fate. Pilgrim was an ungainly, lonely goof. The hero of "God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater" was a sniveling, obese volunteer fireman.

Vonnegut said the villains in his books were never individuals, but culture, society and history, which he said were making a mess of the planet.

"We probably could have saved ourselves, but we were too damned lazy to try very hard ... and too damn cheap," he once suggested carving into a wall on the Grand Canyon, as a message for flying-saucer creatures.

He retired from novel writing in his later years but continued to publish short articles. He had a best-seller in 2005 with "A Man Without a Country," a collection of his nonfiction, including jabs at the Bush administration ("upper-crust C-students who know no history or geography") and the uncertain future of the planet.

He called the book's success "a nice glass of champagne at the end of a life."

Vonnegut, who had homes in Manhattan and the Hamptons in New York, adopted his sister's three young children after she died. He also had three children of his own with his first wife, Ann Cox, and later adopted a daughter, Lily, with his second wife, the noted photographer Krementz.

Vonnegut once said that of all the ways to die, he'd prefer to go out in an airplane crash on the peak of Mount Kilimanjaro. He often joked about the difficulties of old age.

"When Hemingway killed himself he put a period at the end of his life; old age is more like a semicolon," Vonnegut told The Associated Press in 2005.

"My father, like Hemingway, was a gun nut and was very unhappy late in life. But he was proud of not committing suicide. And I'll do the same, so as not to set a bad example for my children."
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percicles · Apr 12, 2007

Damn Shame.

Clutch · Apr 12, 2007

Rest in Peace... very sad to hear how he passed on. I always loved his appearance in "Back to School":

And another thing, Vonnegut. I'm gonna stop payment on the check... What's that? **** me? Hey Kurt, do you read lips? **** you! Next time, I'll call Robert Ludlum.

finalsbound · Apr 12, 2007

Oh wow. Breakfast of Champions and Timequake are by far 2 of my favorite books ever. Vonnegut was talented, poignant, and hilarious. He will be missed. Amazing author.

edit: i forgot about slaughterhouse five! some incredible literature!

weakfromtoday · Apr 12, 2007

R.I.P.

The Sirens of Titan and Cat's Cradle are two of my favorite books.

Xenochimera · Apr 12, 2007

wow sad, one of the best authors ever to grace the earth.

peleincubus · Apr 12, 2007

that sucks i have only read slaughter house and cat's cradle.

ill have to check out the others listed.

: (

TBar · Apr 12, 2007

RIP Kurt Vonnegut....

What fun to read his books! My favorites:

Sirens of Titan
Cat's Cradle
Mother Night
Breakfast of Champions
Galapagos
Dead Eye Dick

I always wondered if he wrote "Venus on the Half Shell".......

I took a class at UT Austin-Vonnegut Survey. I did not know who Vonnegut was at the time- I really had a crush on the Teaching Asst. She introduced us to his work and other work attributed to him. It was so much fun!

I was taking technical courses at the time- all engineering related- Calculus/ Soil Hydraulics/ Soil Mechanics/ Spatial Statistics-all very dry.

Two friends I made in the class and I would drink coffee at Les Amis on 24th Street @ San Antonio (?) and discuss the books we were reading.

I remember a class all engineering students had to take at the time- using the punch cards in a huge mainframe DEC 10 computer( programs something called Cobalt and Binary?). It was tedious. I was reading player piano and felt like the revolution should start right in that class. It would have been a revolt caused by irrelevance.

Thank you Kurt Vonnegut- and thanks to Ms. Betty (probably never would have read Vonnegut)the TA who looked so good in those blue jeans!

Dubious · Apr 12, 2007

I don't know if it's a blessing or a curse, but Kurt Vonnegut probably has had the most influence of anyone in my personal outlook on life. It's a little unsettling to live with the randomness of a religious skeptic, the disappointment of a humanist and the disaffection of absurdity but, you have no choice. You live with whatever reality that exists inside your head.

So it goes.

Rest in oblivion Mr. Vonnegut!.

mc mark · Apr 12, 2007

An American Treasure!

RIP Mr. Vonnegut

FranchiseBlade · Apr 12, 2007

A sad day indeed. A Breakfast of Champions, and Slaughterhouse Five were two of my favorites of all time.

RIP

basso · Apr 12, 2007

i wrote this elsewhere and i think i got slammed for it, but after reading breakfast of champions, i finally "got" gulliver's travels. slaughterhouse, cat's, galapagos, and deadeye dick were all great books too.

Joe Joe · Apr 12, 2007

RIP

Slaughterhouse Five was an excellent book.

Zion · Apr 12, 2007

+

R.I.P

Sishir Chang · Apr 12, 2007

RIP

"When Hemingway killed himself he put a period at the end of his life; old age is more like a semicolon," Vonnegut told The Associated Press in 2005.

"My father, like Hemingway, was a gun nut and was very unhappy late in life. But he was proud of not committing suicide. And I'll do the same, so as not to set a bad example for my children."
Click to expand...

At least it looks like Vonnegut had already come to terms with his mortality and done so with humor and grace.

mc mark · Apr 12, 2007

Sishir Chang said:

RIP

At least it looks like Vonnegut had already come to terms with his mortality and done so with humor and grace.
Click to expand...

Well that is after he did try to commit suicide once in his life.

Rocketman95 · Apr 12, 2007

So it goes...

pradaxpimp · Apr 12, 2007

one of my favorite writers.

Peace

ico4498 · Apr 12, 2007

RIP

I enjoyed your work.

Oski2005 · Apr 12, 2007

A year and a half ago Vonnegut was on the Daily Show. I went back and watched the clip and I remembered that at the end, he wanted to read a list of "Liberal crap I never want to hear again," but they ran out of time so they posted it online. The page seems to be missing now, but somebody posted it in the comments yesterday and it seems to jive with some other blog posts I found.

LIBERAL CRAP I NEVER WANT TO HEAR AGAIN

* Give us this day our daily bread. Oh sure.
* Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Nobody better trespass against me. I'll tell you that.
* Blessed are the meek.
* Blessed are the merciful. You mean we can't use torture?
* Blessed are the peacemakers. Jane Fonda?
* Love your enemies - Arabs?
* Ye cannot serve God and Mammon. The hell I can't! Look at the Reverend Pat Robertson. And he is as happy as a pig in ****.

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