The author of “Slaughterhouse-Five” and other groundbreaking fiction died Wednesday night at the age of 84. Carl Zielinski offers this appreciation of one of the most distinctive and influential voices in postwar American literature.

Carl Zielinski
Gargoyle staff reporter
Posted Thursday, April 12, 2007
Arts

WHEN I FIRST read my dad's 1970s copy of “Cat's Cradle,” I didn't know what to expect. I had heard great things about this Kurt Vonnegut Jr., but all I knew for sure was that he had written “Slaughterhouse-Five.”

However nonexistent my expectations may have been, they were blown away. Whereas before I had never really felt any major connection to a book, I immediately latched onto this tale of world destruction.

From the day I finished that book onward, Vonnegut became the only author that I read (and reread) regularly. While other authors like Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft came and went, I still held fast by Vonnegut.

Despite how utterly ridiculous many of his novels' concepts may be (one grain of modified water can freeze everything on earth!), they really struck a nerve with me.

Vonnegut presents humankind as a completely misguided and confusing race that, given half a chance, will destroy itself and everything else — but will still talk about how magnificent it is.

His characters are a mixed and varied concoction of African doctors, ex-convicts, Americans-turned-Nazi propagandists, failed science fiction authors, insane Pontiac dealers, and skinny car thieves from Cicero, Ill. They have their own desires and specifics, and Vonnegut spends ample time explaining these no matter how irrelevant it may be to the main story.

His unique political voice is another distinguishing mark. I can't name another author who has had the bravery to describe “The Star-Spangled Banner” as “gibberish sprinkled with question marks” or describe the Founding Fathers as aristocrats who wished to show off their useless education — and also as “bum poets.”

Unlike most writers, Vonnegut often relied on completely irrelevant tangents, hand-drawn illustrations, and deus ex machina to move his books forward and resolve conflicts. This, more than anything else, is what got me hooked onto his work.

When he himself appeared as a godlike character in “Breakfast of Champions,” I was completely stunned. The absolute arrogance of the situation slapped me in the face with its sheer brilliance. Who else would have dared to place themselves into one of their own books?

So on Wednesday, April 11, we lost one of the most important modern American authors. So it goes.

Ultimately, however, we shouldn't be saddened by his death. It simply wouldn't seem to be something he would have wanted us to do.

As specified in “Slaughterhouse-Five,” while he may be dead at the moment, he has been alive for plenty of other moments, which we should cherish and remember. So farewell, Kurt. Farewell. Hello. Farewell. Hello.

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— New York Times obituary: Kurt Vonnegut, Counterculture's Novelist, Dies