Interestingly, I probably owe much of my reading enjoyment today to Simon Heselev (a melbourne music guy). He released a song called Tock Tick, a nice jazzy, post rock type track, which has Kurt Vonnegut reading a section from Slaughterhouse 5 (I had, of course, heard about Slaughterhouse 5 and its classic-ness from the movie Footloose, "classic in any time!"). Anyway, so I went to read it, and it was the first novel I'd read in about 6 years. Before that, I'd read David Eddings books, and other than skimming year 11 and 12 texts I hadn't really touched literature. So yes, Simon Heselev, and whoever it is that wrote that lovely anti-american-policy book "Rogue State" got me into reading - and Slaughterhouse 5 can hence be considered a sort of "first book".
Vonnegut's style is one of dry humour, with observations throughout that just make you think "wasn't it nice to notice that?!". I see Slaughterhouse 5, really, as a consolation to the human condition. It is proclaimed by Vonnegut himself as his "anti-war" book, centralising around the firebombing of Dresden (although the story goes most places in space and time). The repetitions throughout of the serenity prayer and the resolve "and so it goes" whenever anything dies (including the Champagne), I think portray an almost melancollie acceptance concerning the meaningless disappointments and trials of life. The aliens who visit Billy Pilgrim see time all-at-once (not linearly), so someone dying isn't sad, because it's already happened and they still exist at all those moments where they were alive. Billy looks at his life, and says, all-at-once, it's okay. I do like this philosophy, and I think it's one that has stayed with me since I read this.
I have conflicting feelings of loving Kurt Vonnegut, and simultaneously recognising that he may not be that great an author. After I read Breakfast of Champions, I thought perhaps I didn't need any more Vonnegut - although this particular Vonnegut does have the awesome consciousness given to a character who recognises that he is being controlled by a narrator, who decides to visit him in a cafe during the book... "Stranger than Fiction" may have borrowed from here, or there could be an heirarchical superatom.
I reneged on the idea to discount Vonnegut on my reading list to read his final rant, Man without a country. I wrote a letter after this, to which he replied (although perhaps not individually), but he has nice sentiments... if this isn't good I don't know what is!
