While scaning e-news today, I came across this article:
[http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20051006/en_usatoday/vonnegutonpoliticspresidentsandlibrarians;_ylt
=Al1dFNZeByBInbQxsV8ORcOs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3ODdxdHBhBHNlYwM5NjQ-]
Let me say, right up front, I am a proud literary whore for all things Vonnegut. I've read everything he's ever written. Few authors fall in to this catagory- Gabriel Garcia Marquez, John Steinbeck, Ray Bradbury, Anne Lamott, and Joseph Campbell are amoung others. Wonderful inspiring writers all, but Kurt Vonnegut holds a special place in my heart.
More below
It started in the 70's when I lived in rural Southern California. I walked into the small public library in town while waiting to pick up my son from elementary school.
It was an autumn afternoon. The old wooden two story building was warm inside and sun was filtering through the tall windows. The kind of filtered sun filled with thousands of particles of book dust floating in the air, and visible through the light. I remember all this, like it was yesterday, because I fell in love there in that tiny light filled library. I picked up a copy of Slaughterhouse Five-the Children's Crusade, and was introduced to Billy Pilgrim, via Vonnegut. That book opened me to sadness, anger, and finally, political activism.
Why, you may ask, was this love at first read? Because Vonnegut made me think! Like all genius artists, by holding familiar things in a new way he made me see it differently. With fresh eyes and new perspective. I was hooked like a high school wall-flower who'd just been introduced to the most charming guy in school. This felt good, and I could see the potential. I wanted to hang out with him. He made me laugh out loud, but he could scare me a little too.
Here is vintage Vonnegut:
Thanks to TV and for the convenience of TV, you can only be one of two kinds of human beings, either a liberal or a conservative.
Kurt Vonnegut, "Cold Turkey", In These Times (magazine)
New knowledge is the most valuable commodity on earth. The more truth we have to work with, the richer we become.
Kurt Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions
Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made sense from things she found in gift shops.
Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five
When it really is time for you to save the world, when you have some power and know your way around, when people can't mock you for looking so young, I suggest that you work for a socialist form of government. Free Enterprise is much too hard on the old and the sick and the shy and the poor and the stupid, and on people nobody likes. They just can't cut the mustard under Free Enterprise. They lack that certain something that Nelson Rockefeller, for instance, so abundantly has. So let's divide up the wealth more fairly than we have divided it up so far. Let's make sure that everybody has enough to eat, and a decent place to live, and medical help when he needs it. Let's stop spending money on weapons, which don't work anyway, thank God, and spend money on each other. It isn't moonbeams to talk of modest plenty for all. They have it in Sweden. We can have it here. Dwight David Eisenhower once pointed out that Sweden, with its many Utopian programs, had a high rate of alcoholism and suicide and youthful unrest. Even so, I would like to see America try socialism. If we start drinking heavily and killing ourselves, and if our children start acting crazy, we can go back to good old Free Enterprise again.
Kurt Vonnegut, Wampeters, Foma & Granfalloons
Ahhhh, it still gets to me, and I am still charmed by this interesting man. Anyone with a numerically interesting birth date of 11/11/22 who has experienced a widely diverse range of experiences has, no doubt, some kind of story to tell.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Vonnegut]
For any of you kossacks who have not read Vonnegut I'd encourage you to turn off your TV (if you own one) and sit down with a Vonnegut novel. The latest from this 82 year old, titled A Man without a Country, is a short collection of articles with a definite progressive political bent. Quotes from the new book are included in the first link article. Vonnegut states in the book he never thought he'd be alive "to see the country run by Bush, Dick, and Colin." He has recently appeared on The Daily Show, and Real Time with Bill Maher. He has been, and currently is, ignored and neglected by a large segment of America, and the MSM. Hi-ho!
Here is his web site:
[http://www.vonnegut.com/]
In closing my love letter, let me say Kurt Vonnegut has enriched my life, changed the way I see things, and provided enlightenment. For that, Mr. Vonnegut, I am in your debt and will always be head-over-heels in love with you.
Kurt, I'd be willing to date Kilgore Trout as a sleazy way to get a back door introduction to you. Or if Jill ever leaves you.....well, Good-bye Blue Monday! I've got a couple cameras too.
I remain yours, happily "fa*ting and tap dancing" my way through life. Thanks for everything.