I just finished my very first experience with Kurt Vonnegut, Cat's Cradle. Wow, what a mind trip!
It was a series of outrageous characters and scenes, all revolving around two central concepts: Bokonon, a newly formed religion, and Ice-9, a chemical element that freezes water on contact. The combination of the two proving to be quite a "situation" (hoping not to give too much away).
First of all, the book just kind of floats along, or so I thought it did. Like it had no plot, but not in a bad way. Like a drunken bar story. The chapters are short, not really chapters at all, but scenes, and flow one into the next from beginning to end.
It was different. And refreshingly deep. It was published in 1963, in a time when it was still fashionable to think. I don't think our current culture, the new millenium bunch, likes to get too deep too often. And that's a shame. Reality TV, Britney Spears, Entertainment Tonight... nope, that just doesn't do it for me.
So then, this is what they call satire. I like it. How crazy that I've lived almost 24 years on this planet and not encountered any. Animal Farm, we were supposed to read in seventh or eighth grade, but I think I skipped that one, or read the Cliffs Notes to it, or something.
But really, this is some good stuff, about stupid people, and the stupid things we do, and the stupid things we make, and how we're all stupidly itching to kill ourselves out of greed, and fame, and the naivety to follow blindly.
I remember once, telling a manager I used to work for that I wanted to be a writer. He said, "Write satire."
Yes, I think we should.
Laura Rae Amos
www.peaceandjellybeans.com
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