Kurt Vonnegut

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I too have read most of KV's books but it has been many years. I first read Breakfast of Champions after a friend threw a copy at me and said "you gotta read this guy." He was right. Reading your comments takes me back many years to a time when I spent hours being entertained and challenged by KV. Its tempting to re-read them but I'm wondering what I might learn about how my perspective has changed in twenty plus years...
Anyway the question about Kilgore Trout... KV wrote a book using the name of Kilgore Trout. The book is called "Venus on the Half Shell". There may be others. There is a whole list of them on the "Other Books by KV page. It is about the Space Wanderer, a man without a planet who has gained immortality from an elixir drunk during a sexual interlude with an alien queen in heat....

>>By Legend7   (Tuesday, 16 Dec 2003 02:37)



Hmmm. I am a Space Wanderer, and I have drunk elixirs during sexual interludes with alien queens, but still find myself burdened with mortality. Thanks for the heads-up on Venus on the Half Shell.

>>By Seward3   (Tuesday, 16 Dec 2003 07:48)



Another oldie chimes in. All I remember is the sarcasm I liked at the time. I remember the planet where everyone was in prison, all the outsiders were in. Totalitarianism defeated. Reminds me of this reality: - http://www.aussiereviews.com/article1277.html p.s. Botticelli's Venus is the best painting I have seen.

>>By flamencoprof   (Wednesday, 17 Dec 2003 10:06)



pps
ZpoonZ stardust by neil gaiman can somebody reccomend me something else? If your'e still about, try A. A. Aattanasio (he/she's not just a scam to get top of the list)

>>By flamencoprof   (Wednesday, 17 Dec 2003 10:12)



Typo, that's Attanasio, not so many "a"s

>>By flamencoprof   (Wednesday, 17 Dec 2003 10:15)



Read almost al of them...but awhiile ago.

Funny story - at music camp at age 15, and was playing footsey with some cute guy. I said "bokomaru beats sex" - and he got it!

by the way, which town in upstate NY did he say was the armpit of the universe? I think I
m living there.

>>By elysealice   (Friday, 19 Dec 2003 17:17)



player piano is my favorite novel by him. i love it and think it dwarfs others in the genre (especially Brave New World, Ugh! I hated that book), but it seems all the english teachers I have had, and people I know, prefer it to Player Piano(or haven't read it) in the Dystopian genre. Kurt Vonnegut is definitely in my top three, and Player Piano in my top 5, along with Mother Night.

>>By jacquestrap   (Wednesday, 18 Aug 2004 11:55)



I just like Vonnegut. His humour, his sarcasm, his ideas. Some years ago i was hooked by "cat's cradel", and still on. The wicked and enigmatic style makes me smile - sometimes it can be dangerous espacially in the metro.:))) if the guys got it wrong. :)
People read Vonnegut.
NATY

>>By trilian   (Friday, 8 Oct 2004 10:43)



every time i read another story by kurt vonnegut i'm completely blown away. . .

the sirens of titan. . .is one of my favorite books. . .it's gorgeous. . .and makes me cry everytime i read it. . .

even vonnegut's short stories amaze me. . .he is unmatched. . .in my humble opinion. . .

if you like vonnegut check out this short story of his. . .'harrison bergeron'. . .

http://instruct.westvalley.edu/lafave/hb.html

>>By drowninginflame   (Monday, 8 Nov 2004 19:04)



i want to read a book from him, but i really don't know which is the best... or what are the books about... can someone tell me?

>>By Nicholas   (Friday, 12 Nov 2004 20:48)



Kurt Vonnegut is easily one of my favorite authors. You really cannot miss with any of his many books, almost all of them will make you want to go out and buy his whole body of work! Some of my favorites:::
1. Cats Cradle - I recommend this all the time to my friends, my copy is now well worked over from usage. Hilarious, poignant..will make you laugh, think, laugh, think....
2. The Sirens of Titan - Another great book, cant miss...very weird
3. Breakfast of Champions (Goodbye Blue Monday!!) - Maybe start here, its the first one I read and look how I turned out!! Yay!!

Look for good old Kilgore Trout, Mr. Rosewater, and others to show up in alot of his books!

>>By Fluke   (Sunday, 5 Dec 2004 01:39)



I read Slaughterhouse 5 in high school when i should have been reading some boring novel in Lit class. Brilliant writer, love the black humour

>>By partyman   (Sunday, 5 Dec 2004 12:11)



the first time i read KV's is in Indonesian translated time quake. The book seems easy to read but i knew i missed something. The second time i bought "cat's craddle" from a secondhand bookstore..in a pitiful condition..without a cover. Since it written in english, i was a bit confious 'bout the satire and sarcasm in it. It gave me an awareness of how americans deal with atomic bomb in a different way. Wish i know what had happened :)

>>By ilen   (Wednesday, 6 Jul 2005 07:26)



personally i perfer bluebeard and slaughterhouse-five. Breakfast of champions really wasnt vonneguts best work he could have done a better job with it.

>>By Billy Pilgrim   (Thursday, 4 Aug 2005 03:12)



I loved reading this discussion. Kurt Vonnegut is legendary and has hit me hard with every book of his I've read, including Slaughterhouse-5, Cat's Cradle, Sirens of Titan, and most recently Breakfast of Champions. What a bad ass.

>>By Spencer   (Monday, 21 Sep 2009 04:29)



When I read Slaughterhouse I was changed. I started reading and reading. It really reawakened my love for it. Then I read Welcome to the Monkey House and it became my favorite work of his. So many awesome, exciting, strange stories. It is great. Breakfast of Champions I thought was all right. It wasn't bad by any means but probably my least favorite. Cat's Cradle...HOLY FCUK! it was amazing. I was on the edge of my seat on every page. I read it faster than any other book I have ever picked up. Kurt V is one of those guys that can change you, like O'Brien too, just they hit you so deep in your being. Humanity shown it's own beauty through it's oddity.

>>By IAMnotMAN   (Friday, 25 Sep 2009 22:53)



The only book I read by ol' Kurt is Galapagos. I thought it was pretty good, and I just loved the ending. I must say, Kurt's my hero!

>>By Mizzi   (Tuesday, 1 Dec 2009 15:13)



I was there.
KV was requried reading for my generation, most of whom are now accountants or retired and living in Florida.
He lectured at my college in NY. It's a good discussion. I was dissappointed by some of his later work after he was turned into a commercial product by the ever coopting capitalists. I'm not a literary critic, but it's all in my head. The idea is to take great literature seriously and change your life. Certainly in KV's work absurdity is an important theme. Read the papers lately? Otherwise you may end up as an accountant or something else stupid like a college professor.
One of the big problems today is that young people have no sincere role models, but so it goes.

>>By lojoe   (Thursday, 24 Dec 2009 14:09)



So does anyone writing in the 21st century remind anyone of KV? I'm out of touch and looking for new authors

>>By Aeshna   (Saturday, 21 Sep 2013 05:23)



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