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Never reaching the celebrity of Hunter S. Thompson, Kurt Vonnegut remains one of America's great writers.
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was born in 1922 in Indianapolis, to third generation German Americans. In 1943, he left Carnegie Mellon University to enlist in the U. S. Army during World War II. Vonnegut was an advanced scout with the U.S. 106th Infantry Division during the Battle of the Bulge in Dresden, Germany. Cut off from his battalion, Vonnegut was one of just seven to survive capture by the Germans. He was held in an underground cellar dubbed, Slaughterhouse 5. He was awarded a Purple Heart. Kurt Vonnegut died April 11, 2007 at 83, in Manhattan, New York, due to complications from a fall. Vonnegut is survived by his second wife Jill Krementz and seven children, four of which are adopted. NEW YORK TIMES HAILS VONNEGUT AS GREAT WRITER OF OUR TIMEThe New York Times hails Vonnegut as a “Novelist who caught the imagination of his age . . .” In 2005, he announced his retirement from writing fiction. In his last novel, A Man Without a Country, Vonnegut wrote, “George W. Bush has gathered around him upper-crust C- students who know no history or geography.” Politically, he was a liberal and a humanist. He served as Honorary President of the American Humanist Association replacing Isaac Asimov. Vonnegut did not think much of his position, due to the fact he was not optimistic about the future of his country. VONNEGUT CALLED UNPROFESSIONAL BY UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGOVonnegut wrote his first short story, Report on the Barnhouse Effect, which appeared in 1950 in Collier’s. He also wrote his first novel, Cat’s Cradle. Before 1950, Vonnegut was prepared to give up writing when the University of Chicago refused to accept him as a graduate student, calling his work “unprofessional” and rejected his thesis. Then, Vonnegut was offered a teaching position at the University of Iowa Writer’s Workshop. While there, Cat’s Cradle became a bestseller and he began work on Slaughterhouse Five, considered one of the best American novels of the 20th century. On writing, Vonnegut was extremely generous sharing his own experience with other writers. He even “graded” his own work, giving Slaughterhouse Five an A-plus and Breakfast of Champions a C. Vonnegut continued to write for the magazine, In These Times, and was Senior Editor until his death in 2007. Many of these essays, which range from George W. Bush bashing to observational pieces appear in A Man Without a Country, his last contribution. Kurt Vonnegut will be remembered as an intimate and tender writer, sometimes joking, at other times despairing, but always searching.
The copyright of the article Kurt Vonnegut in Pop Culture Personalities is owned by Diane Germano. Permission to republish Kurt Vonnegut in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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