Download or read book The Writer s Crusade written by Tom Roston and published by Abrams. This book was released on 2021-11-09 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of Kurt Vonnegut and Slaughterhouse-Five, an enduring masterpiece on trauma and memory Kurt Vonnegut was twenty years old when he enlisted in the United States Army. Less than two years later, he was captured by the Germans in the single deadliest US engagement of the war, the Battle of the Bulge. He was taken to a POW camp, then transferred to a work camp near Dresden, and held in a slaughterhouse called Schlachthof Fünf where he survived the horrific firebombing that killed thousands and destroyed the city. To the millions of fans of Vonnegut’s great novel Slaughterhouse-Five, these details are familiar. They’re told by the book’s author/narrator, and experienced by his enduring character Billy Pilgrim, a war veteran who “has come unstuck in time.” Writing during the tumultuous days of the Vietnam conflict, with the novel, Vonnegut had, after more than two decades of struggle, taken trauma and created a work of art, one that still resonates today. In The Writer’s Crusade, author Tom Roston examines the connection between Vonnegut’s life and Slaughterhouse-Five. Did Vonnegut suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder? Did Billy Pilgrim? Roston probes Vonnegut’s work, his personal history, and discarded drafts of the novel, as well as original interviews with the writer’s family, friends, scholars, psychologists, and other novelists including Karl Marlantes, Kevin Powers, and Tim O’Brien. The Writer’s Crusade is a literary and biographical journey that asks fundamental questions about trauma, creativity, and the power of storytelling.
Download or read book Slaughterhouse Five written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by Dial Press Trade Paperback. This book was released on 1999-01-12 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kurt Vonnegut’s masterpiece, Slaughterhouse-Five is “a desperate, painfully honest attempt to confront the monstrous crimes of the twentieth century” (Time). Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world’s great antiwar books. Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber’s son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming “unstuck in time.” An instant bestseller, Slaughterhouse-Five made Kurt Vonnegut a cult hero in American literature, a reputation that only strengthened over time, despite his being banned and censored by some libraries and schools for content and language. But it was precisely those elements of Vonnegut’s writing—the political edginess, the genre-bending inventiveness, the frank violence, the transgressive wit—that have inspired generations of readers not just to look differently at the world around them but to find the confidence to say something about it. Authors as wide-ranging as Norman Mailer, John Irving, Michael Crichton, Tim O’Brien, Margaret Atwood, Elizabeth Strout, David Sedaris, Jennifer Egan, and J. K. Rowling have all found inspiration in Vonnegut’s words. Jonathan Safran Foer has described Vonnegut as “the kind of writer who made people—young people especially—want to write.” George Saunders has declared Vonnegut to be “the great, urgent, passionate American writer of our century, who offers us . . . a model of the kind of compassionate thinking that might yet save us from ourselves.” More than fifty years after its initial publication at the height of the Vietnam War, Vonnegut’s portrayal of political disillusionment, PTSD, and postwar anxiety feels as relevant, darkly humorous, and profoundly affecting as ever, an enduring beacon through our own era’s uncertainties.
Download or read book Stop Living on Autopilot written by Antonio Neves and published by Rodale Books. This book was released on 2021-01-19 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A raw and inspiring how-to guide that will help you recommit to your life, find your drive, and take action to stay bold, honest, and accountable for lasting happiness. “If it’s time to make a bold and courageous shift in your life, Stop Living on Autopilot is the guide you need.”—Marie Forleo, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Everything Is Figureoutable Take stock of your life: Based on your last 30 days of work (or marriage, or parenting), would your company rehire you? Would your partner immediately recommit to you? Would your children want you to continue to be their parent? The easy answer is, “Absolutely!” But it's probably not the honest answer. Your life might read like a success story, and your parents and friends might even think you have it all figured out, but you have a secret: You've stopped caring about much of anything. You feel out of place in your own life. You'd rather binge-watch Netflix than think about what's next. You're living on autopilot. You have two choices: Experience a slow self-destruction, or commit to a course correction. The good news is, it's never too late to find your drive again. Popular speaker and success coach Antonio Neves is here to offer hard-won lessons and remind you that you do have a say—that you can reboot your life and find fulfillment right where you are. You don't have to quit your job or move to Bali to follow your passion. You do, however, need to shift your perspective and commit to living courageously, replacing passivity with boldness. Stop Living on Autopilot will guide you to confront hard truths about where you are and how you got there, inviting compassion, honesty, and accountability. There's no better time than now to reevaluate your life and lay a stronger foundationfor your next 30 days. Step by step, you can become an active player in your own life and rediscover what makes you great.
Download or read book Slaughterhouse five written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by . This book was released on 1969 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Billy Pilgrim returns home from the Second World War only to be kidnapped by aliens from the planet Tralfamadore, who teach him that time is an eternal present.
Download or read book Slapstick or Lonesome No More written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by Dial Press Trade Paperback. This book was released on 1999-05-11 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Some of the best and most moving Vonnegut.”—San Francisco Chronicle Slapstick presents an apocalyptic vision as seen through the eyes of the current King of Manhattan (and last President of the United States), a wickedly irreverent look at the all-too-possible results of today’s follies. But even the end of life-as-we-know-it is transformed by Kurt Vonnegut’s pen into hilarious farce—a final slapstick that may be the Almighty’s joke on us all. “Both funny and sad . . . just about perfect.”—Los Angeles Times “Imaginative and hilarious . . . a brilliant vision of our wrecked, wacked-out future.”—Hartford Courant
Download or read book Kurt Vonnegut written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by Delacorte Press. This book was released on 2012-10-30 with total page 464 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Newsweek/The Daily Beast • The Huffington Post • Kansas City Star • Time Out New York • Kirkus Reviews This extraordinary collection of personal correspondence has all the hallmarks of Kurt Vonnegut’s fiction. Written over a sixty-year period, these letters, the vast majority of them never before published, are funny, moving, and full of the same uncanny wisdom that has endeared his work to readers worldwide. Included in this comprehensive volume: the letter a twenty-two-year-old Vonnegut wrote home immediately upon being freed from a German POW camp, recounting the ghastly firebombing of Dresden that would be the subject of his masterpiece Slaughterhouse-Five; wry dispatches from Vonnegut’s years as a struggling writer slowly finding an audience and then dealing with sudden international fame in middle age; righteously angry letters of protest to local school boards that tried to ban his work; intimate remembrances penned to high school classmates, fellow veterans, friends, and family; and letters of commiseration and encouragement to such contemporaries as Gail Godwin, Günter Grass, and Bernard Malamud. Vonnegut’s unmediated observations on science, art, and commerce prove to be just as inventive as any found in his novels—from a crackpot scheme for manufacturing “atomic” bow ties to a tongue-in-cheek proposal that publishers be allowed to trade authors like baseball players. (“Knopf, for example, might give John Updike’s contract to Simon and Schuster, and receive Joan Didion’s contract in return.”) Taken together, these letters add considerable depth to our understanding of this one-of-a-kind literary icon, in both his public and private lives. Each letter brims with the mordant humor and openhearted humanism upon which he built his legend. And virtually every page contains a quotable nugget that will make its way into the permanent Vonnegut lexicon. • On a job he had as a young man: “Hell is running an elevator throughout eternity in a building with only six floors.” • To a relative who calls him a “great literary figure”: “I am an American fad—of a slightly higher order than the hula hoop.” • To his daughter Nanny: “Most letters from a parent contain a parent’s own lost dreams disguised as good advice.” • To Norman Mailer: “I am cuter than you are.” Sometimes biting and ironical, sometimes achingly sweet, and always alive with the unique point of view that made him the true cultural heir to Mark Twain, these letters comprise the autobiography Kurt Vonnegut never wrote. Praise for Kurt Vonnegut: Letters “Splendidly assembled . . . familiar, funny, cranky . . . chronicling [Vonnegut’s] life in real time.”—Kurt Andersen, The New York Times Book Review “[This collection is] by turns hilarious, heartbreaking and mundane. . . . Vonnegut himself is a near-perfect example of the same flawed, wonderful humanity that he loved and despaired over his entire life.”—NPR “Congenial, whimsical and often insightful missives . . . one of [Vonnegut’s] very best.”—Newsday “These letters display all the hallmarks of Vonnegut’s fiction—smart, hilarious and heartbreaking.”—The New York Times Book Review
Download or read book Summary and Analysis of Slaughterhouse Five written by Worth Books and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2017-02-07 with total page 43 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: So much to read, so little time? This brief overview of Slaughterhouse-Five tells you what you need to know—before or after you read Kurt Vonnegut’s book. Crafted and edited with care, Worth Books set the standard for quality and give you the tools you need to be a well-informed reader. This short summary and analysis of Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut includes: Historical context Chapter-by-chapter summaries Analysis of the main characters Themes and symbols Important quotes Fascinating trivia Glossary of terms Supporting material to enhance your understanding of the original work About Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut: Kurt Vonnegut’s New York Times–bestselling novel is one of the twentieth century’s great anti-war novels. It tells the story of Billy Pilgrim, an American soldier in World War II, who survives the firebombing of Dresden. More than a satire of the effects of war, Slaughterhouse-Five is journey through space and time, challenging our perceptions of humanity, free will, and the universe itself. The summary and analysis in this ebook are intended to complement your reading experience and bring you closer to a great work of fiction.
Download or read book Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut Book Analysis written by Bright Summaries and published by BrightSummaries.com. This book was released on 2019-03-28 with total page 24 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Unlock the more straightforward side of Slaughterhouse-Five with this concise and insightful summary and analysis! This engaging summary presents an analysis of Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, which tells the story of Billy Pilgrim, who suffers from a very unusual condition: he time-travels back and forth throughout his own life. In his youth, Billy is one of the few survivors of the bombing of Dresden during the Second World War, but he learns to overcome the lingering trauma of this experience when he is kidnapped by aliens known as Tralfamadorians and adopts their fatalistic worldview: that death, like everything else, is inevitable. Billy then decides to devote his life to spreading this doctrine. This satirical novel about the deep psychological scars left by the trauma of war was heavily inspired by Vonnegut’s own experiences as a prisoner of war in Nazi Germany, and is considered one of the most significant anti-war novels of the 20th century. Find out everything you need to know about Slaughterhouse-Five in a fraction of the time! This in-depth and informative reading guide brings you: • A complete plot summary • Character studies • Key themes and symbols • Questions for further reflection Why choose BrightSummaries.com? Available in print and digital format, our publications are designed to accompany you on your reading journey. The clear and concise style makes for easy understanding, providing the perfect opportunity to improve your literary knowledge in no time. See the very best of literature in a whole new light with BrightSummaries.com!
Download or read book And So It Goes written by Charles J. Shields and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2011-11-08 with total page 529 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book for 2011 A Washington Post Notable Nonfiction Book for 2011 The first authoritative biography of Kurt Vonnegut Jr., a writer who changed the conversation of American literature. In 2006, Charles Shields reached out to Kurt Vonnegut in a letter, asking for his endorsement for a planned biography. The first response was no ("A most respectful demurring by me for the excellent writer Charles J. Shields, who offered to be my biographer"). Unwilling to take no for an answer, propelled by a passion for his subject, and already deep into his research, Shields wrote again and this time, to his delight, the answer came back: "O.K." For the next year—a year that ended up being Vonnegut's last—Shields had access to Vonnegut and his letters. And So It Goes is the culmination of five years of research and writing—the first-ever biography of the life of Kurt Vonnegut. Vonnegut resonates with readers of all generations from the baby boomers who grew up with him to high-school and college students who are discovering his work for the first time. Vonnegut's concise collection of personal essays, Man Without a Country, published in 2006, spent fifteen weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and has sold more than 300,000 copies to date. The twenty-first century has seen interest in and scholarship about Vonnegut's works grow even stronger, and this is the first book to examine in full the life of one of the most influential iconoclasts of his time.
Download or read book Timequake written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by Penguin. This book was released on 1998-08-01 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book from the acclaimed author of Slaughterhouse-Five, Breakfast of Champions, and Cat's Cradle. At 2:27pm on February 13th of the year 2001, the Universe suffered a crisis in self-confidence. Should it go on expanding indefinitely? What was the point? There's been a timequake. And everyone—even you—must live the decade between February 17, 1991 and February 17, 2001 over again. The trick is that we all have to do exactly the same things as we did the first time—minute by minute, hour by hour, year by year, betting on the wrong horse again, marrying the wrong person again. Why? You'll have to ask the old science fiction writer, Kilgore Trout. This was all his idea.
Download or read book Slaughterhouse five by Kurt Vonnegut written by Leonard Mustazza and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Collects critical essays on Kurt Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse-Five," including selections by Kevin Alexander Boon, C. Barry Chabot, Leonard Mustazza, and others; and includes a chronology of the life of the author.
Download or read book Mother Night written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by Dial Press. This book was released on 2009-08-11 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Vonnegut is George Orwell, Dr. Caligari and Flash Gordon compounded into one writer . . . a zany but moral mad scientist.”—Time Mother Night is a daring challenge to our moral sense. American Howard W. Campbell, Jr., a spy during World War II, is now on trial in Israel as a Nazi war criminal. But is he really guilty? In this brilliant book rife with true gallows humor, Vonnegut turns black and white into a chilling shade of gray with a verdict that will haunt us all. “A great artist.”—Cincinnati Enquirer “A shaking up in the kaleidoscope of laughter . . . Reading Vonnegut is addictive!”—Commonweal
Download or read book Breakfast of Champions written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by Dial Press. This book was released on 2009-09-23 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Marvelous . . . [Vonnegut] wheels out all the complaints about America and makes them seem fresh, funny, outrageous, hateful and lovable.”—The New York Times In Breakfast of Champions, one of Kurt Vonnegut’s most beloved characters, the aging writer Kilgore Trout, finds to his horror that a Midwest car dealer is taking his fiction as truth. What follows is murderously funny satire, as Vonnegut looks at war, sex, racism, success, politics, and pollution in America and reminds us how to see the truth. “Free-wheeling, wild and great . . . uniquely Vonnegut.”—Publishers Weekly
Download or read book The Goats written by Brock Cole and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR). This book was released on 2010-06-22 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Harmless camp pranks can quickly spiral out of control, but they also provide a perfect opportunity for two social outcasts to overcome and triumph. A boy and a girl are stripped and marooned on a small island for the night. They are the "goats." The kids at camp think it's a great joke, just a harmless old tradition. But the goats don't see it that way. Instead of trying to get back to camp, they decide to call home. But no one can come and get them. So they're on their own, wandering through a small town trying to find clothing, food, and shelter, all while avoiding suspicious adults—especially the police. The boy and the girl find they rather like life on their own. If their parents ever do show up to rescue them, the boy and the girl might be long gone. . . . The Goats is a 1987 New York Times Book Review Notable Children's Book of the Year.
Download or read book Portraits and Ashes written by John Pistelli and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2017-06-24 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Julia is an aspiring painter without money or direction, haunted by a strange family history. Mark is a successful architect who suddenly finds himself unemployed with a baby on the way. Alice is a well-known artist and museum curator disgraced when her last exhibit proved fatal. Running from their failures, this trio is drawn toward a strange new cult that seeks to obliterate the individual-and which may be the creation of a mysterious and dangerous avant-garde artist. John Pistelli unforgettably portrays three people desperate to lead meaningful lives as they confront the bizarre new institutions of a fraying America. A suspenseful and poetic novel in the visionary tradition of Don DeLillo, David Mitchell, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Jos� Saramago, PORTRAITS AND ASHES is a scorching picture of our troubled age.
Download or read book The Quarantine of St Sebastian House written by John Pistelli and published by . This book was released on 2020-05-13 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A global pandemic has America under quarantine. In a run-down apartment building, with nowhere to go and nothing to do, five people-a philosopher, an academic, a filmmaker, a sculptor, and a philanthropist-come together, at first only for the pleasure of company. But then they find themselves in a ferocious debate about the obsessions that drive their lives and a ruthless quest to discover the secrets that brought them together. Their passions and betrayals play out against the dangerous backdrop of a state-enforced lockdown and a disease that can strike anyone at any time. The eventually explosive conflicts among these poor artists, underfed intellectuals, and desperate fanatics pose urgent questions of art and inequality, health and freedom, faith and power, love and death. The Quarantine of St. Sebastian House is at once a Platonic dialogue, a poem in prose, and a suspenseful story of mystery and romance: a fresh narrative for a new era.
Download or read book Cat s Cradle written by Kurt Vonnegut and published by Dial Press. This book was released on 2009-11-04 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A free-wheeling vehicle . . . an unforgettable ride!”—The New York Times Cat’s Cradle is Kurt Vonnegut’s satirical commentary on modern man and his madness. An apocalyptic tale of this planet’s ultimate fate, it features a midget as the protagonist, a complete, original theology created by a calypso singer, and a vision of the future that is at once blackly fatalistic and hilariously funny. A book that left an indelible mark on an entire generation of readers, Cat’s Cradle is one of the twentieth century’s most important works—and Vonnegut at his very best. “[Vonnegut is] an unimitative and inimitable social satirist.”—Harper’s Magazine “Our finest black-humorist . . . We laugh in self-defense.”—Atlantic Monthly
