Unboxed spoiler for Breakfast of Champions follows, so please forgive the whitespace.
At the end of Breakfast of Champions, the Creator of the Universe explains to Kilgore Trout that he is setting all of his characters free (and that Trout is the only one being told). I recall Vonnegut issuing a press release to the same effect when the book was published. One of those characters was Abstract Expressionist artist Rabo Karabekian.
Yet fourteen years later, Vonnegut published Bluebeard (which I found delightful, btw), starring the very same Rabo Karabekian, right down to his painting style.
Did Vonnegut ever explain why he chose to reassert control over Rabo’s life, in its last years?
Anyone have a handle on how much Vonnegut is appreciated these days? When I was first reading his stuff decades ago he was held in pretty high esteem if I recall correctly. I’m wondering if he is still read/appreciated by the masses, or even a single mass. I don’t seem to see references to him that much anymore.
His stuff experienced a bit of a revival when he died in 2007. Slaughterhouse Five often appears on high school reading lists, and occasionally Cat’s Cradle will as well.
Vonnegut is probably my favorite modern author and I try to get anyone I suspect has the right ‘temperament’ for it to read it. So Vonnegut is still popular with this single mass.
Slaughterhouse 5 seems to be the most widely recommended as a starter. Or at least it’s the one to most likely appear on the high school literature lists. I often think this is largely because it’s a war novel. I think The Sirens of Titan is a much better starter, if the idea is to try to turn a person on to KV Jr.
He was just such an awesome writer. Who else could be so grimly cynical while making you howl, and I mean howl (at least if you’re me) through tears with laughter like that? Poor Billy Pilgrim. Poor Unk. And of course- Poor old Kilgore Trout.
I’m so sad that he’s gone. I watch this from time to time, which makes me feel better and worse all at once: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atABhlMLYvU
A Die Hard KV Jr Fan,
Vonnegut was horribly uneven, I think, and which novels of his one likes depends entirely on how old one is when they are read.
At this point in my life, I find most of his earlier novels (and some of his later–I’m looking at you, Galapagos) unreadable, and I liked them very much back in the days when he was a fad. Breakfast of Champions pretty much ended that phase for me. (“This is not a book to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.”)
But, as with the OP, I still find Bluebeard to be worth reading. And Player Piano, and a couple of others.
All that said, I don’t think Vonnegut will be more than a minor footnote a hundred years from now.
