Kurt Vonnegut, Hamlet and Brave New World

Good evening.

It has been a fabulously interesting week in the literature world.

Kurt V died a couple of weeks ago. In contemplating his works and hence his life, and attitude, I came across an interview on the ABC with his neighbour, the author of 'The World According to Garp" (and other books) John Irving. John said (amongst other things, and if you are interested, go to "Life Matters" and download the podcast - well worth it from a humanist perspective) that

"Kurt told me he thought he would die of cigarettes, he smoked heavily for a long time. Indeed sometimes he used to call over to visit me early in the morning. I would go out to get the paper at 6.30am and find Kurt on the doorstep having a cigarette. I asked him how long he had been there 'not long' he would reply. I'd ask him in for coffee and toast, and chat over things and then he would go home.

My kids would come in and say 'did you know how long he was out there?' - no, I didn't, and they would add 'there are 28 cigarette butts near the door'."

Anyway, Kurt told John that he expected to die from cigarettes. John said that in fact this turned out to be true, but not as had been expected. On the night of the incident that lead directly to his death, Kurt had gone outside his house on the front steps leading down to the 'pavement' to have a smoke. He fell over backwards and cracked his head. He didn't ever recover from that collision - head with concrete.

So I re-read "Slaughterhouse 5". I hadn't realised that it would all be forgotten, I recalled what it was supposed to be about, but had no recollection of the story or detail. As I started to read it, I recognised the style "and so it goes" etc. and recalled having found it difficult 30 years ago to read on through these repetitive paragraph endings. But this time, after a little open mindedness, I found these pithy invitations to accept that there was nothing new in the exposition of human nature as set out by Vonnegut, in the world.... and so it goes.

I had forgotten that the name of the novel was from the fact that where he had survived the Dresden fire-bombing was in the fifth porcine slaughterhouse in a series of them. The thick cement walls prevented the fire entering and sapping the oxygen (great word that "oxygen").

I had forgotten that he cites that over 150,000 people died in that bombing; more than twice the number dead in Hiroshima (but as I'm alerted, many died early in generations to come, or suffered disability).

I found the omnibus collection of Vonnegut's stories on my bookshelf, waiting patiently for reading. $4.10 it cost in Myer on the discount rack in 1980 or so. Alongside the same Hienemann collection with Graham Greene. See, you don't need to pay up big for a good story.

Hamlet: what chance event put me onto reading that in the Cambridge student edition! Each R page has an explanation on the L. For an ordinary reader like me, it brings the story to life. Answering the question posed: "Hamlet knows that it is that he must do, he is just unable to do it" - lead to considering it in the existential nature of Vonnegut's life; both seemed uncertain that they would ever find the purpose to life. Both considered and were surrounded by suicide.

I concluded that Hamlet wasn't just "unable" to do what he "knew he must do", he was paralysed from executing well thought out and considered actions, but was able to undertake immediate actions to the same effect. For example, he was able to kill Polonius without consideration once he found him (unknown as being him at the time) hiding in the curtains in Hamlet's mother's chamber. But he was still unable to kill Claudius in revenge of his regicide of King Hamlet, our Hamlet's father (and other 'sins').

An imperfect analogy is the man easily able to buy a new TV, DVD etc for $x K at the weekend homewares shop, on the spur of the moment, but unable to justify or act to do so with due consideration at any other time. If this were not so, would not those shops shut, and let us bang the doors in at more businesslike hours?

How do we link "Brave New World"?

I'm wrestling with a description given to this recently in a statement spoken to me: "I'm having difficulty reading it, I'm not used to science fiction".

Aldous Huxley has created the concept of Brave New World from his novel. Like 'Catch 22' (Joseph Heller, who also lived nearby Kurt Vonnegut), now many are saying that something is 'Orwellian' or 'Catch 22' or an example of 'Brave New World' society, without harkening back to the creation of the relevant phrase.

Finally, I'm reminded of one of my favourite Australian fiction authors, Peter Corris, who recently wrote in the newspaper about discarding his personal library. He said he found many books he had read years ago, decided he wasn't likely to read them again, couldn't remember what they were about when he scanned them, so sold them in a garage sale. He was moving to a smaller house.

Brave New World?