TODAY'S ENTRY IS DEDICATED TO KURT VONNEGUT JR., 1922 - 2007.

Today's song: Waiting for a Superman by The Flaming Lips, performed by Iron & Wine.

(First of all, I'd like to thank all of my friends - from all over the world, in fact - who have written or called today expressing their condolensces.  It really drives home the point that Kurt Vonnegut was like family to me.  And everyone in my life knows that.  So, thank you.)

When I was about sixteen, my English teacher, Mr. Day - who also taught Humanities and was the single greatest teacher I probably ever had - pulled me aside after class one day and told me I should read Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.  Mr. Day said he was pretty sure I'd like him.

I found a copy of God Bless You Mr. Rosewater and read it in about two days.  The novel is about Eliot Rosewater, a wealthy philanthropist, who's also a bit weird - as are most characters in Vonnegut's stories.  It's a charming, positive and humane work.  And it flows in the effortless, simple way all Vonnegut stories flow.  I was hooked immediately.  And went to find more.  I read Breakfast of Champions, Slaughterhouse-5, Cat's Cradle, Jailbird, Mothernight, and on and on.  

Over the next several years, I read every single word the man had ever published, and I immediately devoured anything new that appeared.  

Kurt Vonnegut's works were brilliant satires, strong arguments for peace and kindness amongst men, and laced with a sadness I always had a difficult time identifying.  His works were a beacon for me, something to aspire to.  He made me want to be a writer.  He made me want to live a conscious life, a good life, to be a good man.  He pointed me in the direction and I took his advice.  My life is the way it is today for so many reasons, many of which Kurt Vonnegut is responsible for.  I only can hope I have lived up to his initial direction.

The loss of a favorite writer is an emotional and devestating loss on many levels.  One, we feel as though we have lost a friend, someone whom we can trust.  And I feel in many ways that I know Kurt Vonnegut because I've read all his nonfiction and essays.  Which is absurd, surely.  But we bond and grow loyal to these people because reading a book is a very private and personal thing.  It is just us and them.  Me and Kurt.  And we share that time together.  Loyal fans will defend the honor of their favorite author.

The other reason it is so devestating to lose a favorite author is because we will never be privvy to more words.  We will not be afforded the luxury to get to know him or her any better.  We can only read and re-read their works again.  

And trust me.  I will.

Below is a list of some of my favorite quotes from Kurt Vonnegut, as well his own list of rules for writing a short story.

But before that ...

I will miss you, Kurt.  And thank you.  Thank you for everything you did for me.

Rest in Peace.

On pages 9 and 10 in his book Bagumbo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction, Vonnegut listed eight rules for writing a short story:

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.

2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.

3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.

4. Every sentence must do one of two things: reveal character or advance the action.

5. Start as close to the end as possible.

6. Be a sadist.  No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them - in order that the reader may see what they are made of.

7. Write to please just one person.  If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.

8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible.  To heck with suspense.  Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages. 

And finally,

A Few Words From My Hero

The below quotations are a few of my favorites from Kurt Vonnegut. 

"If you really want to hurt your parents and you don't have nerve enough to be homosexual, the least you can do is go into the arts."
- Palm Sunday

"Who is more to be pitied, a writer bound and gagged by policemen or one living in perfect freedom who has nothing more to say?"
- Bluebeard

"My soul knows my meat is doing bad things, and is embarrassed. But my meat just keeps right on doing bad, dumb things."
- Bluebeard

"Roses are red and ready for plucking
You're sixteen and ready for high school."
- Breakfast of Champions

"It is always pitiful when any human being falls into a condition hardly more respectable than that of an animal. How much more pitiful it is when the person who falls has had all the advantages!"
- Sirens of Titan

"A purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved."
- Sirens of Titan

"1492. As children we were taught to memorize this year with pride and joy as the year people began living full and imaginative lives on the continent of North America. Actually, people had been living full and imaginative lives on the continent of North America for hundreds of years before that. 1492 was simply the year sea pirates began to rob, cheat, and kill them."
- Breakfast of Champions

"Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance."
- Hocus Pocus

"During my three years in Vietnam, I certainly heard plenty of last words by dying American footsoldiers. Not one of them, however, had illusions that he had somehow accomplished something worthwhile in the process of making the Supreme Sacrifice."
- Hocus Pocus

"Well, the telling of jokes is an art of its own, and it always rises from some emotional threat. The best jokes are dangerous, and dangerous because they are in some way truthful."
- Interview, Mcsweeneys.net

"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.
-Mother Night

"Just because some of us can read and write and do a little math, that doesn't mean we deserve to conquer the Universe."
- Hocus Pocus

"Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made sense from things she found in gift shops."
- Slaughterhouse Five

"All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is. Take it moment by moment, and you will find that we are all, as I've said before, bugs in amber."
- Slaughterhouse V

"How nice--to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive."
- Slaughterhouse V

"I am eternally grateful.. for my knack of finding in great books, some of them very funny books, reason enough to feel honored to be alive, no matter what else might be going on."
- Timequake

"I say in speeches that a plausible mission of artists is to make people appreciate being alive at least a little bit. I am then asked if I know of any artists who pulled that off. I reply, 'The Beatles did'."
- Timequake 

"We're terrible animals. I think that the Earth's immune system is trying to get rid of us, as well it should."
- On Humans, in an appearance on The Daily Show (September 2005)

"I'd like to teach Iraq about Democracy because we're so experienced with it. First they should know that after 100 years they should free their slaves. Then after 150 years they should give their women the right to vote. Oh, and of course when they start it all they should begin with some genocide and ethnic cleansing."
- Appearance on The Daily Show (September 2005)

"I do feel that evolution is being controlled by some sort of divine engineer. I can't help thinking that. And this engineer knows exactly what he or she is doing and why, and where evolution is headed. Thats why weve got giraffes and hippopotami and the clap."
- On Evolution vs. Intelligent Design, on The Daily Show (September 2005)

(talking about when he tells his wife he's going out to buy an envelope)
"Oh, she says well, you're not a poor man. You know, why don't you go online and buy a hundred envelopes and put them in the closet? And so I pretend not to hear her. And go out to get an envelope because I'm going to have a hell of a good time in the process of buying one envelope. I meet a lot of people. And, see some great looking babes. And a fire engine goes by. And I give them the thumbs up. And, and ask a woman what kind of dog that is. And, and I don't know. The moral of the story is, is we're here on Earth to fart around. And, of course, the computers will do us out of that. And, what the computer people don't realize, or they don't care, is we're dancing animals. You know, we love to move around. And, we're not supposed to dance at all anymore."
- Interview Public Broadcasting Service (2005)