Fallingwater, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.
This week is a sprint to the end of Cat’s Cradle, in which I’m sure that everyone will live happily ever after.
The Rabo Karabekian Memorial Deathmarch: Week 3
by bill | Sep 19, 2016 | The Rabo Karabekian Memorial Deathmarch | 13 comments
If by happily every after, you mean killed, then yes.
Writing in 1963, Vonnegut tells us of what the Ice-nine is a metaphor: “Something better than the hydrogen bomb,” that meaning better at ending life as we know it. The ultimate destroyer will be some kind of technology. Maybe Ted Kaczynski was a prophet (as well as a killer)?
Having been immersed in “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” lately, I’ve been really struck by the extent to which Vonnegut influenced Douglas Adams. For instance, the threat of a philosopher’s strike in HG has to be a nod to Chapter 103 of Cat’s Cradle. And of course the Hitchhiker’s Guide picks up precisely where CC leaves off — with the end of the Earth. A sort of spiritual sequel?
The Bokononist last rites are absolutely spot-on. I’d like to have them read at my funeral. I’ve told the wife, but I’ll tell you too, in case any of you are there.
Struck by how much reading this book felt like a direct conversation with Kurt. It’s not that it’s a puppet show. It’s more that it’s like an old time regaling where you see the storyteller front and center. Glad to be back in vonnegut’s company after so many years. On to the next one!
I think Annie said it all last week when she quoted Bokonon’s definition of maturity. To me, this book tells us that life itself “is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exits, unless laughter can be said to remedy anything.” I want to find something here about human connection, but the only connected people we see are the ambassador and his wife and the Hoosiers, and there’s not much comfort there. I do remember the early 60’s, when we all thought the end of the world (or at least of ourselves) might be very near, and after Dresden and Hiroshima (not to mention the rest of human history), I can see why one might rail at the stupidity of mankind and believe that gallows humor was the only appropriate response.
It occurs to me that there’s a great deal of overlap between Cat’s Cradle and Dr. Strangelove, released one year later. Black comedies about the end of the world. I wonder what a collaboration between Vonnegut and Kubrick would have been like…probably a lot like Dr. Strangelove, to be honest.
I inadvertently finished the book last week and gave my take on it. Sorry. Raring to go to the next volume.
Chillingly relevant today. The humor helps, but barely in the end.
All I could think as I approached the end of the book was: I bet Trump’s kids each have some ice nine stored away.
As far as comedy goes, my favorite bit was this exchange in Chapter 104 between the narrator and Philip Castle, regarding the people of San Lorenzo:
“There’s only one aspect of progress that really excites them.”
“What’s that?”
“The electric guitar.”
I excused myself and rejoined the Crosbys.
..which, I dunno if that was Vonnegut explicitly commenting on the burgeoning counterculture, but if he wasn’t then he was rather prescient. It was next gen bread and circuses!
The electric guitar reference struck me too. Had San Lorenzo survived a few more years, there would have been a lot of Bokononist reggae.
Also, in the course of my research, I came across the following missive from KV to Ambrosia — an otherwise completely awful band who somehow managed to summon greatness in their Vonnegut collaboration:
Dear Ambrosia,
I thank you for your holiday greetings. I was at my daughter’s house last night, and the radio was on. By God if the DJ didn’t play our song, and say it was number ten in New York, and say how good you guys are in general. You can imagine the pleasure that gave me. Luck has played an enormous part in my life. Those who know pop music keep telling me how lucky I am to be tied in with you.
And I myself am crazy about our song, of course, but what do I know and why wouldn’t I be?
This much I have always known, anyway; Music is the only art that’s really worth a damn. I envy you guys.
Cheers
Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
I found myself thinking about the science behind it all, like what would it take to stop a water-based instantly lethal pathogen? Should I stock up on plastic shields because that would be the only thing protecting me? How did they manage to not touch any of the ice-nine that was everywhere and avoid accidentally killing themselves?
I also thought a lot about ideas and tropes that were so ok for the 1960s and not now. Like monogamy and gender stereotyping:
“I don’t want you to do it with anybody but me from now on,” I declared. Tears filled her eyes. She adored her promiscuity; was angered that I should try to make her feel shame. “I make people happy. Love is good, not bad.”
Though counterbalanced with one of the funniest post-sex interactions ever:
“Returning to my own bed, gnashing my teeth, I supposed that she honestly had no idea what love-making was all about. But then she said to me, gently, “It would be a very sad to have a little baby now. Don’t you agree?”
“Yes,” I agreed murkily.
“Well, that’s the way little babies are made, in case you didn’t know.”
It seems peculiar that true end of this saga is implied rather than told. When Bokonon hands the narrator the piece of paper with the last sentence for his “Books”, it contains a prescription for the narrator’s suicide. It solves the quandary about what magnificent symbol he should have in his hand to plant on top of Mount McCabe, which the narrator had described to Newt on the previous page.
So we know how our story’s author will die without having to witness the awful act. Finally, at the very end, KV spares us one gruesome moment. How considerate! And exactly as it should have been.
It occurred to me today how miraculous it is that, 53 years after “Cat’s Cradle” and 52 after “Dr. Strangelove,” against all odds we’re still here. Did these prophecies of doom in any way help us avoid it? No way to say, of course.
Nowadays it seems more likely that we’ll go out not with a bang — nuclear war or ice-nine — but with a whimper, like the proverbial frog in a pot of water as the temperature slowly rises.
Where are the great black comedies about climate change?