Kurt Vonnegut, one of the best selling satirical novelists died after suffering brain injuries due to a fall at his Manhattan house some weeks ago. Kurt as an author was basically a social critic and he enjoyed his role. He had authored almost nineteen novels and a lot of short stories, plays and essays. He described himself as a religious skeptic and freethinking humanist. His novels carried his point of views through his protagonists. He is known for his satirical commentary in his novels.
However, Kurt’s life had not been easy despite his commercial success. He battled depression most of his life. In 1984 he attempted suicide. Vonnegut was born on Nov. 11, 1922, in Indianapolis and studied chemistry at Cornell University before joining the Army. His mother killed herself just before he left for Germany during World War Two. He was taken a prisoner during the Battle of the Bulge. He was held in Dresden, where he witnessed the bombing and its aftermaths. The bombing reduced the city to ashes. Vonnegut was one of just seven prisoners of war in Dresden to survive. He survived the bombing in an underground meatpacking cellar known as Slaughterhouse Five. This experience of his forms the core of one of his best and highly acclaimed work Slaughterhouse-Five. War and destruction remains the theme of most of his novels. Slaughterhouse-Five was also turned into a movie in 1972.
He wrote his first novel, “Player Piano,” in 1951 which was followed by “The Sirens of Titan,” “Canary in a Cat House” and “Mother Night’. His stories were first termed as bizarre by critics. But his novels, especially “Cat’s Cradle” in 1963, were on the way to become classics. However, his novels also faced charges and bans for suspected obscenity. Vonnegut was also the honorary president of The American Humanist Association. From the last few years he took to short articles instead of novels. His collection of non fiction, “A Man Without a Country,” in 2005 was a best seller. Vonnegut was working as a senior editor and columnist at “In These Times’ from some years. Vonnegut is survived by his sister’s three young children, whom he adopted after she died, three children from his first wife, Ann Cox, and an adopted daughter, Lily, with his second wife, the noted photographer Jill Krementz.
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