Kurt Vonnegut - Cats Cradle
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Cats Cradle is Kurt Vonneguts satirical commentary on modern man and his madness. An apocalyptic tale of this planets ultimate fate, it features a midget as the protagonist, a complete, original theology created by a calypso singer, and a vision of the future that is at once blackly fatalistic and hilariously funny. A book that left an indelible mark on an entire generation of readers, Cats Cradle is one of the twentieth centurys most important worksand Vonnegut at his very best.
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CAT'S CRADLE by Kurt Vonnegut
First published in 1963
For Kenneth Littauer,a man of gallantry and taste.Nothing in this book is true."Live by the foma* that makes you brave and kind and healthy and happy." --The Books of Bokonon. 1:5 *Harmless untruthscontents
1. The Day the World Ended2. Nice, Nice, Very Nice3. Folly4. A Tentative Tangling of Tendrils5. Letter from a Pie-med6. Bug Fights7. The Illustrious Hoenikkers8. Newt's Thing with Zinka9. Vice-president in Charge of Volcanoes10. Secret Agent X-911. Protein12. End of the World Delight13. The Jumping-off Place14. When Automobiles Had Cut-glass Vases15. Merry Christmas16. Back to Kindergarten17. The Girl Pool18. The Most Valuable Commodity on Earth19. No More Mud20. Ice-nine21. The Marines March On22. Member of the Yellow Press23. The Last Batch of Brownies24. What a Wampeter Is25. The Main Thing About Dr. Hoenikker26. What God Is27. Men from Mars28. Mayonnaise29. Gone, but Not Forgotten30. Only Sleeping31. Another Breed32. Dynamite Money33. An Ungrateful Man34. Vin-dit35. Hobby Shop36. Meow37. A Modem Major General38. Barracuda Capital of the World39. Fata Morgana40. House of Hope and Mercy41. A Karass Built for Two42. Bicycles for Afghanistan43. The Demonstrator44. Communist Sympathizers45. Why Americans Are Hated46. The Bokononist Method for Handling Caesar47. Dynamic Tension48. Just Like Saint Augustine49. A Fish Pitched Up by an Angry Sea50. A Nice Midget51. O.K., Mom52. No Pain53. The President of Fabri-Tek54. Communists, Nazis, Royalists, Parachutists, and Draft Dodgers55. Never Index Your Own Book56. A Self-supporting Squirrel Cage57. The Queasy Dream58. Tyranny with a Difference59. Fasten Your Seat Belts60. An Underprivileged Nation61. What a Corporal Was Worth62. Why Hazel Wasn't Scared63. Reverent and Free64. Peace and Plenty65. A Good Time to Come to San Lorenzo66. The Strongest Thing There Is67. Hy-u-o-ook-kuh!68. Hoon-yera Mora-toorz69. A Big Mosaic70. Tutored by Bokonon71. The Happiness of Being an American72. The Pissant Hilton73. Black Death74. Cat's Cradle75. Give My Regards to Albert Schweitzer76. Julian Castle Agrees with Newt that Everything Is Meaningless77. Aspirin and Boko-maru78. Ring of Steel79. Why McCabe's Soul Grew Coarse80. The Waterfall Strainers81. A White Bride for the Son of a Pullman Porter82. Zah-mah-ki-bo83. Dr. Schlichter von Koenigswald Approaches the Break-even Point84. Blackout85. A Pack of Foma86. Two Little Jugs87. The Cut of My Jib88. Why Frank Couldn't Be President89. Duffle90. Only One Catch91. Mona92. On the Poet's Celebration of his First Boko-maru93. How I Almost Lost My Mona94. The Highest Mountain95. I See the Hook96. Bell, Book, and Chicken in a Hatbox97. The Stinking Christian98. Last Rites99. Dyot meet mat100. Down the Oubliette Goes Frank101. Like My Predecessors, I Outlaw Bokonon102. Enemies of Freedom103. A Medical Opinion on the Effects of a Writers' Strike104. Sulfathiazole105. Pain-killer106. What Bokononists Say When They Commit Suicide107. Feast Your Eyes!108. Frank Tells Us What to Do109. Frank Defends Himself110. The Fourteenth Book111. Time Out112. Newt's Mother's Reticule113. History114. When I Felt the Bullet Enter My Heart115. As It Happened116. The Grand Ah-whoom117. Sanctuary118. The Iron Maiden and the Oubliette119. Mona Thanks Me120. To Whom It May Concern121. I Am Slow to Answer122. The Swiss Family Robinson123. Of Mice and Men124. Frank's Ant Farm125. The Tasmanians126. Soft Pipes, Play On127. The Endcat's cradle
The Day the World Ended 1
Call me Jonah. My parents did, or nearly did. They called me John.Jonah--John--if I had been a Sam, I would have been a Jonah still--not because I have been unlucky for others, but because somebody or something has compelled me to be certain places at certain times, without fail. Conveyances and motives, both conventional and bizarre, have been provided. And, according to plan, at each appointed second, at each appointed place this Jonah was there.Listen:When I was a younger man--two wives ago, 250,000 cigarettes ago, 3,000 quarts of booze ago.When I was a much younger man, I began to collect material for a book to be called _The Day the World Ended_.The book was to be factual.The book was to be an account of what important Americans had done on the day when the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.It was to be a Christian book. I was a Christian then.I am a Bokononist now.I would have been a Bokononist then, if there had been anyone to teach me the bittersweet lies of Bokonon. But Bokononism was unknown beyond the gravel beaches and coral knives that ring this little island in the Caribbean Sea, the Republic of San Lorenzo.We Bokononists believe that humanity is organized into teams, teams that do God's Will without ever discovering what they are doing. Such a team is called a _karass_ by Bokonon, and the instrument, the _kan-kan_, that brought me into my own particular _karass_ was the book I never finished, the book to be called _The Day the World Ended_.Nice, Nice, Very Nice 2
"If you find your life tangled up with somebody else's life for no very logical reasons," writes Bokonon, "that person may be a member of your _karass_."At another point in _The Books of Bokonon_ he tells us, "Man created the checkerboard; God created the _karass_." By that he means that a _karass_ ignores national, institutional, occupational, familial, and class boundaries.It is as free-form as an amoeba.In his "Fifty-third Calypso," Bokonon invites us to sing along with him: Oh, a sleeping drunkard Up in Central Park, And a lion-hunter In the jungle dark, And a Chinese dentist, And a British queen-- All fit together In the same machine. Nice, nice, very nice; Nice, nice, very nice; Nice, nice, very nice-- So many different people In the same device.Folly 3
Nowhere does Bokonon warn against a person's trying to discover the limits of his _karass_ and the nature of the work God Almighty has had it do. Bokonon simply observes that such investigations are bound to be incomplete.In the autobiographical section of _The Books of Bokanon_ he writes a parable on the folly of pretending to discover, to understand:I once knew an Episcopalian lady in Newport, Rhode Island, who asked me to design and build a doghouse for her Great Dane. The lady claimed to understand God and His Ways of Working perfectly. She could not understand why anyone should be puzzled about what had been or about what was going to be.And yet, when I showed her a blueprint of the doghouse I proposed to build, she said to me, "I'm sorry, but I never could read one of those things.""Give it to your husband or your minister to pass on to God," I said, "and, when God finds a minute, I'm sure he'll explain this doghouse of mine in a way that even you can understand."She fired me. I shall never forget her. She believed that God liked people in sailboats much better than He liked people in motorboats. She could not bear to look at a worm. When she saw a worm, she screamed.She was a fool, and so am I, and so is anyone who thinks he sees what God is Doing, [writes Bokonon].A Tentative Tangling of Tendrils 4
Be that as it may, I intend in this book to include as many members of my _karass_ as possible, and I mean to examine all strong hints as to what on Earth we, collectively, have been up to.I do not intend that this book be a tract on behalf of Bokononism. I should like to offer a Bokononist warning about it, however. The first sentence in _The Books of Bokonon_ is this:"All of the true things I am about to tell you are shameless lies."My Bokononist warning is this:Anyone unable to understand how a useful religion can be founded on lies will not understand this book either.So be it.About my _karass_, then.It surely includes the three children of Dr. Felix Hoenikker, one of the so-called "Fathers" of the first atomic bomb. Dr. Hoenikker himself was no doubt a member of my _karass_, though he was dead before my _sinookas_, the tendrils of my life, began to tangle with those of his children.The first of his heirs to be touched by my sinookas was Newton Hoenikker, the youngest of his three children, the younger of his two sons. I learned from the publication of my fraternity, _The Delta Upsilon Quarterly_, that Newton Hoenikker, son of the Nobel Prize physicist, Felix Hoenikker, had been pledged by my chapter, the Cornell Chapter.So I wrote this letter to Newt:"Dear Mr. Hoenikker:"Or should I say, Dear _Brother_ Hoenikker?"I am a Cornell DU now making my living as a freelance writer. I am gathering material for a book relating to the first atomic bomb. Its contents will be limited to events that took place on August 6, 1945, the day the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima."Since your late father is generally recognized as having been one of the chief creators of the bomb, I would very much appreciate any anecdotes you might care to give me of life in your father's house on the day the bomb was dropped."I am sorry to say that I don't know as much about your illustrious family as I should, and so don't know whether you have brothers and sisters. If you do have brothers and sisters, I should like very much to have their addresses so that I can send similar requests to them."I realize that you were very young when the bomb was dropped, which is all to the good. My book is going to emphasize the _human_ rather than the _technical_ side of the bomb, so recollections of the day through the eyes of a 'baby,' if you'll pardon the expression, would fit in perfectly."You don't have to worry about style and form. Leave all that to me. Just give me the bare bones of your story."I will, of course, submit the final version to you for your approval prior to publication."Fraternally yours--"Next pageLight
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