Rough Draft ‘2BRO2B’
Many people in this world today have done things they thought were great ideas but then immediately regretted it. This thought is the message Kurt Vonnegut tries to tell us in his stories. He is trying to tell us to think before we do something and think of all the possible outcomes of the event. Kurt Vonnegut uses contrast and symbolism in the story ‘2BRO2B’ to develop the theme good things can have unforeseen consequences.
One of the elements that help support the theme is symbolism. Symbolism is used many times in the story ‘2BRO2B’. For example, the garden of life mural is a symbol of the world these people live in today. Nurses were turning the soil, planting seeds, spraying bugs, and spreading fertilizer. In other words, they were the care takers of life. And the people in purple were pulling weeds, cutting down plants, raked leaves, and carrying trash to the burners. In other words, they were the care takers of death. Another example was the foul drop cloth which symbolized what the painter
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thought of this life. He thought that this life was dirty and unclean just like the drop cloth was dirty and unclean. Both of these are very symbolic to the story because they both talk about their views of life vs. death. The other element that supports this theme is contrasting.
Contrasting is used multiple times in ‘2BRO2B’ to show different point of views or ideas of the people in this utopia. For example, how the painter views the world vs. how the doctor views the world. The painter views the world as this wretched place were no person should ever have to live. While, the doctor sees the world as this great place where everything is in order and you don’t have to worry about anything. Another example would be how for someone to live, someone else has to die. This is a crazy contrast because you are basically giving a life to get a life. It makes no sense to me, I would not want to have to realize that when I was born, my parents would have had to find a person to kill. What child would want that guilty feeling weighing them down all the time. Both of these things are contrasting elements in the story for they both contrast different opinions in their
world. In conclusion, symbolism and contrasting elements are used in the story ‘2BRO2B’ to come up with the theme good decisions can have bad consequences. These elements help us to better understand this story and all that happens in it. This theme tells us very helpful advice for everyday life and that you should look ahead before you leap.
Vonnegut deals a lot with fantasy in his book, Cat's Cradle. From the beginning, he talks about the religion that he follows: Bokonism. This is not a real religion, however he has rules, songs, scriptures, and opinions of a person that practices this fantasy religion. Within his description of this religion however is black humor as well. I think that by him making up this whole religion and an entire island of people who follow it, is in a way mocking today's religion and the way that people are dedicated to their beliefs.
Kurt Vonnegut, a modern American writer, composed stories about fictional situations that occurred in futuristic versions of today’s world. His stories included violence, both upon oneself and one another, and characters who sought out revenge. In “2BR02B” and “Harrison Bergeron”, Vonnegut conveys physical violence most likely experienced while a prisoner of World War 2, as a way to show how war brings pain and destruction.
For a novel to be considered a Great American Novel, it must contain a theme that is uniquely American, a hero that is the essence of a great American, or relevance to the American people. Others argue, however, that the Great American Novel may never exist. They say that America and her image are constantly changing and therefore, there will never be a novel that can represent the country in its entirety. In his novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut writes about war and its destructiveness. Vonnegut tells the story of Billy Pilgrim, an unlikely hero, mentally scarred by World War Two. Kurt Vonnegut explains how war is so devastating it can ruin a person forever. These are topics that are reoccurring in American history and have a relevance to the American people thus making Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five a Great American Novel.
Relationships and Interdependence in the Works of Kurt Vonnegut While on the surface Kurt Vonnegut's works appear to singularly contain the pessimistic views of an aging, black humorist, his underlying meanings reveal a much more sympathetic and hopeful glimpse of humanity that lends itself to eventual societal improvement. As part of Vonnegut's strategy for enhanced communal welfare, the satirist details in the course of his works potential artificial family groups to connect the masses and alleviate the lonely.
Contrast is used to demonstrate how two completely opposite matters work together to find one answer. From the text, “Not all scientific investigators can deal comfortably with uncertainty, and those who can may not be creative enough to understand and design the experiments that will illuminate a subject.” Different traits are a necessity for different pieces of experimentation which some scientists lack whether it is creativity, confidence, or patience. This rhetorical strategy also helps indicate all of the different characteristics that scientists need to be creative and effective in their studies. Barry insists, “To be a scientist requires not only intelligence and curiosity, but passion, patience, creativity, self-sufficiency, and courage.” All of these different qualities have to come together; although, they are very contrasting traits. Numerous qualities are required to be a successful scientist; although all together they establish the effective character of a scientist.
I think one thing that Vonnegut is trying to show us is that man too easily accepts things as valid without questioning. Refering to this, Newt, another character, says, "No wonder kids grow up crazy. A cat's cradle is nothing but a bunch of X's between somebody's hands, and little kids look and look and look at all those X's…No damn cat, and no damn cradle" (114).
Vonnegut's writing style throughout the novel is very flip, light, and sarcastic. The narrator's observations and the events occurring during the novel reflect a dark view of humanity which can only be mocked by humor. At the beginning of the novel the narrator is researching for a book he is writing. The book was to be about the day the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and the lives of the people who created the bomb. The narrator travels through the plot of the story, with characters flying in and out, in almost a daze. He is involved in events which are helplessly beyond his control, but which are inevitably leading to a destination at the end.
Kurt Vonnegut’s fictional novel “Cat’s Cradle”, indirectly explores issues that parallels into topics such as religion, scientific/technological advancements, political power and much more. Vonnegut’s novel is narrated by a character named Jonah (John). He, Jonah, sets out to write an anthropological book based off of what key people were doing on the day that the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. Throughout Vonnegut’s novel it can clearly represents how a writer can become a very destructive person to society. As for this novel, it shows through the uses of parallels that a writer can become a very destructive person to society, these parallels are reflects to real world issues throughout his novel to show this claim, that a writer too can be a destructive person to society.
Imagine a society where owning books is illegal, and the penalty for their possession—to watch them combust into ashes. Ray Bradbury’s novel, Fahrenheit 451, illustrates just such a society. Bradbury wrote his science fiction in 1951 depicting a society of modern age with technology abundant in this day and age—even though such technology was unheard of in his day. Electronics such as headphones, wall-sized television sets, and automatic doors were all a significant part of Bradbury’s description of humanity. Human life styles were also predicted; the book described incredibly fast transportation, people spending countless hours watching television and listening to music, and the minimal interaction people had with one another. Comparing those traits with today’s world, many similarities emerge. Due to handheld devices, communication has transitioned to texting instead of face-to-face conversations. As customary of countless dystopian novels, Fahrenheit 451 conveys numerous correlations between society today and the fictional society within the book.
Kurt Vonnegut's apocalyptic novel, Cat's Cradle, might well be called an intricate network of paradox and irony. It is with such irony and paradox that Vonnegut himself describes his work as "poisoning minds with humanity...to encourage them to make a better world" (The Vonnegut Statement 107). In Cat's Cradle, Vonnegut does not tie his co-mingled plots into easy to digest bites as the short chapter structure of his story implies. Rather, he implores his reader to resolve the paradoxes and ironies of Cat's Cradle by simply allowing them to exist. By drawing our attention to the paradoxical nature of life, Vonnegut releases the reader from the necessity of creating meaning into a realm of infinite possibility. It appears that Vonnegut sees the impulse toward making a better world as fundamental to the human spirit; that when the obstacle of meaning is removed the reader, he supposes, will naturally improve the world.
Vonnegut and Jackson, through the use of well written short stories, have managed to address concerning issues in today’s societies. Through the use of Harrison Bergeron Kurt Vonnegut was able to address the growing issue of equality, this is a very important issue as many people in modern societies view the idea of equality to be incredible. Shirley Jackson through The Lottery addressed the concerning issue of societies blindly following religions and traditions due to superstitions and the unwillingness to change. These dystopian texts demonstrate the inevitable outcome these problems will eventually cause.
One of the best, most valuable aspects of reading multiple works by the same author is getting to know the author as a person. People don't identify with Gregor Samsa; they identify with Kafka. Witness the love exhibited by the many fans of Hemingway, a love for both the texts and the drama of the man. It's like that for me with Kurt Vonnegut, but it strikes me that he pulls it off in an entirely different way.
Throughout his career, Kurt Vonnegut has used writing as a tool to convey penetrating messages and ominous warnings about our society. He skillfully combines vivid imagery with a distinctly satirical and anecdotal style to explore complex issues such as religion and war. Two of his most well known, and most gripping, novels that embody this subtle talent are Cat's Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five. Both books represent Vonnegut’s genius for manipulating fiction to reveal glaring, disturbing and occasionally redemptive truths about human nature. On the surface, Cat’s Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five are dramatically different novels, each with its own characters, symbols, and plot. However, a close examination reveals that both contain common themes and ideas. Examining and comparing the two novels and their presentation of different themes provides a unique insight into both the novels and the author – allowing the reader to gain a fuller understanding of Vonnegut’s true meaning.
Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle I believe that Vonnegut uses Cat's Cradle as an allegorical tale about what will happen to the world if we are not careful with technology that has the ability to end life on this planet. He points out one of the qualities of humanity: that people make mistakes, thus poisoning our minds and encouraging a better world. One of the obvious ways that Vonnegut uses this book to "encourage a better world" would be by showing that the end of the world may come from an accidental release of technology. At the time when this book was written, nuclear war seemed to be almost a certainty.
In the book Fahrenheit 451 the theme is a society/world that revolves around being basically brain washed or programmed because of the lack of people not thinking for themselves concerning the loss of knowledge, and imagination from books that don't exist to them. In such stories as the Kurt Vonnegut's "You have insulted me letter" also involving censorship to better society from vulgarity and from certain aspects of life that could be seen as disruptive to day to day society which leads to censorship of language and books. Both stories deal with censorship and by that society is destructed in a certain way by the loss of knowledge from books.