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The human condition in literature
When history meets literature
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Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle: Exposing the Folly of Humanity
In an interview published in The Vonnegut Statement, Kurt Vonnegut states that one of his reasons for writing is "to poison minds with humanity. . . to encourage them to make a better world"(107). He uses poison, not in the context of a harmful substance, but as an idea that threatens welfare or happiness. In Cat's Cradle, Vonnegut strives to disturb the complacency of his readers by satirizing humanity and its institutions, such as religion, science, and war, to name a few. If Vonnegut is successful in his endeavor, he may disturb some enough to make them see the folly of what humanity has achieved, and attempt to make some meaningful and positive changes. In some instances, however, Vonnegut hedges his bets by not relying entirely on the perception of humanity, and succumbs to the temptation of plain speaking.
Julian Castle, physician and philanthropist, offers this opinion about his fellow man, "Man is vile, and man makes nothing worth making, knows nothing worth knowing" (116). Yet even with this opinion, Castle removes himself from the civilized world, and serves the mankind for whom he expresses so much contempt by building a hospital in the jungle and tending to the medical needs of the natives. Perhaps in Castle, Vonnegut is attempting to show how one person can make a difference.
Another example of plain speaking is seen in Horlick Minton's address honoring the Hundred Martyrs to Democracy. He states his feeling that rather than the "manly jubilation of patriotic holidays," the day would be better spent "despising what killed them. . . the stupidity and viciousness of all mankind" (170). As Minton himself points out, this is not the type of speech expected of an ambassador. Still, he is compelled to speak what he feels almost as though he has a premonition that his time is short and he may never have another chance to make people see what they are doing to themselves.
It should be remembered that Cat's Cradle was written in a time when the fear of man's stupidity leading to his annihilation was not so far fetched. After all, the Cuban Missile Crisis was still fresh in everyone's minds, the cold war with Soviet Russia was ever present, and bomb shelters were naively considered to be the hope of man's salvation.
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).
Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut is a satire on the state of world affairs in the 1960's. Vonnegut made a commentary in this book on the tendency of humans to be warlike, belligerent, and shortsighted. The main character of the book, the narrator, is certainly not a protagonist, although the modern reader craves a hero in every story and the narrator in this one is the most likely candidate. Through the narrator's eyes, Vonnegut created a story of black humor ending in the destruction of the earth.
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.
Through the portrayal of Felix Hoenniker, Vonnegut satirizes that innocence does not necessarily equal harmlessness. In chapter 7, Newton Hoenniker writes about his father to Jonah, “After the thing went off, after it was a sure thing that America could wipe out a city with just one bomb, a scientist turned to Father and said, ‘Science has now known sin.’ And do you know what Father said? He said, ‘What is sin?’ (13). Felix’s ignorance toward the moral responsibility that accompanied his nuclear weapons research become blatant. Furthermore, Felix’s lack of judiciousness emblematizes his shallowness. Integrating such a concept promptly fills Vonnegut’s intentions of illustrating the destructive nature of innocence. The author elicits that impeccability found in Felix Hoenniker can be deleterious. In order to understand how these circumstances lead to a worldwide disaster by the end of Cat’s Cradle, it is of paramount importance that one conceives Felix as the epitome of a scientist who researches for knowledge with little or no concern for the application of that knowledge. In chapter 33, ...
Meeter, Glenn. "Vonnegut's Formal and Moral Otherworldliness: Cat's Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five," in Jerome Klinkowitz & John Somer (eds.), The Vonnegut Statement. USA: Delacourte Press/ Seymour Lawrence, 1973, 204-220.
Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday were both prominent jazz singer-songwriters during the same time and masters in their own right, but their worlds could not have been further apart. In 1939, while they were both in the midst of experiencing mainstream success, Ella was touring with Ella and her Famous Orchestra and showcasing her perfect pitch and tone to the world while singing songs that would soon become standards to fellow singers and musicians. Billie was singing solo, comfortable with her limited range, and gaining the adoration of audiences nationwide who loved her soulful voice. Both of these historic singers made contributions to the art of jazz, with vocalists and instrumentalists still using elements of their style today. Ella
Kurt Vonnegut’s background had an endless influence upon his writing. In his early years, Vonnegut was a private in the 106th infantry division in World War II. He and five scouts were caught behind enemy lines, and then captured. They were held POWs and were beaten on various occasions. In 1945, they witnessed the fire-bombing of Dresden, Germany. Kept during this time in a slaughterhouse, this is part of the inspiration for Slaughterhouse-five. After being released from the Slaughterhouse, Vonnegut called Dresden “utter destruction” and “carnage unfathomable”. This distressing time in his life led to one of the many themes of Slaughterhouse-five which is that nothing good can come from war and a massacre. This theme is expressed in the story when Billy Pilgrim says “Birds were talking. One bird said to Billy Pilgrim ’Poo-tee-weet?’” After the bombing, the POWs had to gather the bodies for a mass grave and then all the remains were set on fire. Vonnegut and the other prisoners were only there for a few more months, until they were rescued. The lasting effect this awful war caused Vonnegut had significant affect upon his writing; on return to the U.S., he was awarded a purple heart.
Slaughterhouse Five is not a book that should be glanced over and discarded away like a dirty rag. Slaughterhouse Five is a book that should be carefully analyzed and be seen as an inspiration to further improve the well-being of mankind. Vonnegut makes it clear that an easy way to improve mankind is to see war not as a place where legends are born, but rather, an event to be avoided. Intelligent readers and critics alike should recognize Vonnegut’s work and see to it that they make an effort to understand the complexities behind the human condition that lead us to war.
Misery loves company and in Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener", Bartleby exhibits traits of depression and catatonic schizophrenia as defined in the DSM-IV; however the narrator's other employees also show symptoms of catatonia either influenced by Bartleby or by Melville's own mental state. The theme of mental disorder is prominent throughout the text and a close analysis of specific passages in concordance with the DSM-IV will first reveal how Bartleby exemplifies these mental disorders and secondly show to what extent the entire story serves to personify them.
Entitled "The First Lady of Song," Ella Fitzgerald was the most famous female jazz singer in the United States for about more than half a century. In her life time, she won more than 10 Grammy Awards, and also earned the title “The First Lady of Song.”Her voice was flexible, wide-ranging, prefect and ageless. She could sing sultry ballads, jazz, blue, and imitate every several instruments. She worked with all the jazz musicians, like Duke Ellington,Frank Sinatra, Dizzy Gillespie and even Benny Goodman. She performed at top places all over the world. Her audiences were as diverse as her vocal rangeand they all loved her.
Helen Keller has had an influence on society by becoming a role model for the deaf and blind. When she was 19 months she came down with an illness called “scarlet fever”. As a result of the illness, Helen Keller became blind and deaf, leaving her not able to see and hear. Many people didn’t believe in Helen Keller being able to learn, but she ended up proving everyone wrong. Later on in her life with the help of her teacher Anne Sullivan, Helen learned to read, write and speak. Helen Keller once said “While they were saying it couldn’t be done, it was done” (Keller). Helen was born June 27, 1880 from a family of southern landowners with two older sisters in Tuscumbia Alabama. Kate and Arthur Keller found a young woman at the Perkins Institution to teach Helen how to communicate. A month later after Anne Sullivan’s arrival, she had already taught Helen at the age of six the word water and that words have a meaning. Once Helen learned to communicate with others by using ...
Holiday's deprived history proves she had learned how to survive extreme poverty, race prejudice and the injustice of black ghetto life by the time she was a young teen. swing: Since Holiday had very little schooling and no formal musical training, her extraordinary creative gifts were intuitive in the first place. She developed her singing in New York speakeasies and Harlem nightclubs such as Pods' and Jerry's Log Cabin, the Yeah ...
Billie Holiday was an African-American and she was born in April, 7, 1915 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She had no formal music education when she was step into the stage of the club platform to sing. She had an amazing voice and several producers appreciated her talents and promoted her to become a recognition jazz singer. Her addiction of drugs and alcohol ultimately damaged her liver and heart. She was pledged to guilty in court when the police found a possession of an illegal substance in her New York City apartment. She passed away in the hospital near the Upper East Side due to liver failure.
Billie Holiday’s childhood and early life proved to be just about as interesting and crime-ridden as her life during her singing career. Holiday, her given name being Eleanora Fagan, was born with music in her blood by her alleged birth father, Clarence Holiday, a musician in Baltimore, Maryland. Her mother, Sadie Fagan, was a single woman who was chased out of Baltimore because of her being pregnant with a child and not being married and to do maintenance at Philadelphia General Hospital “where she waited on patients and scru...
Furthermore, Poe’s plot development added much of the effect of shocking insanity to “The Black Cat.” To dream up such an intricate plot of perverseness, alcoholism, murders, fire, revival, and punishment is quite amazing. This story has almost any plot element you can imagine a horror story containing. Who could have guessed, at the beginning of the story, that narrator had killed his wife? The course of events in “The Black Cat’s” plot is shockingly insane by itself! Moreover, the words in “The Black Cat” were precisely chosen to contribute to Poe’s effect of shocking insanity. As the narrator pens these he creates a splendidly morbid picture of the plot. Perfectly selected, sometimes rare, and often dark, his words create just the atmosphere that he desired in the story.