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Portrait of Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut

(1922–2007) Writer United States

2092 quotes in 3483 categories

Kurt Vonnegut was a Writer from the United States, best known for Slaughterhouse-Five.

Quick Facts About Kurt Vonnegut

Born: November 11, 1922
Died: April 11, 2007
Nationality: United States
Profession: Writer
Notable works: Slaughterhouse-Five, Cat's Cradle, Breakfast of Champions
Known for: Satirical and darkly humorous novels
Spouse: Jill Krementz

About Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) was an American author whose reputation rests on novels blending satire with dark humor. Across a writing life of five decades he published fourteen novels, five plays, three collections of short stories, and five works of nonfiction, with additional material appearing after his death.

His best-remembered books include Slaughterhouse-Five, Cat's Cradle, and Breakfast of Champions. Vonnegut collected ten honors over his career, among them the National Book Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Purple Heart, and induction into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.

Biography source: Wikipedia

Awards & Honors

Purple Heart National Book Award Guggenheim Fellowship Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation Mondello Prize Prometheus Award - Hall of Fame Humanist of the Year Carl Sandburg Literary Award

Show 2 more awards

Eugene V. Debs Award Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame

Quotes by Kurt Vonnegut

“You must bloom as a writer and I must bloom as a painter. Everything else about us is uninteresting.”

Flowers

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“People aren't supposed to look back.”

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“Have a good nap, did you?” said the porter. “Yes,” said Billy. “Man,” said the porter, “you sure had a hard-on.”

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“I told him that if we doubted that we are demons in Hell, he should read The Mysterious Stranger, which Mark Twain…

First world war

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“Thomas Jefferson High School [..] His high school was named after a slave owner who was also one of the world’s greatest…

Freedom

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“I had a certain amount of skill as a dramatist, and Dr. Goebbels wanted me to use it”

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I was some of the mud that got to sit up and look around. Lucky me, lucky mud.

Bokonon

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“The town was Newport, Rhode Island, U.S.A., Earth, Solar System, Milky Way.”

Milky way

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“Her face was one of a kind, a surprising variation that made observers think, Yes--that would be another very nice way for…

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“You finally fell in love, I see,” said Salo. “Only an Earthling year ago,” said Constant. “It took us that long to…

Human life

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“Like all Earthlings at the point of death, Mary Young sent faint reminders of herself to those who had known her. She…

Death

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“And contrast Mary Kathleen, if you will, with my wife Ruth, the Ophelia of the death camps, who believed that even the…

Death

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Someday, someday, this crazy world will have to end, And our God will take things back that He to us did lend.…

Bokonon

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“They were going back to the slaughterhouse for souvenirs of the war.”

War

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“There are plenty of good reasons for fighting," I said, "but no good reason ever to hate without reservation, to imagine that…

Every man

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“He tried. That's the big thing. He tried to do the best he could with what God gave him. He should get…

Dystopia

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And what is literature, Rabo," he said, "but an insider's newsletter about affairs relating to molecules, of no importance to anything in…

Affair

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“You will last a lot longer, if you don't try to sing.”

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“Anyone unable to understand how a useful religion can be founded on lies will not understand this book either.”

Book

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“You stake a guy out on an anthill in the desert—see? He’s facing upward, and you put honey all over his balls…

Sun

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It strikes me as gruesome and comical that in our culture we have an expectation that man can always solve his problems…

Comical

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We must be careful about what we pretend to be.

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“Maybe you like being unhappy so much, you wouldn't do anything to change it.”

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“During that war we had a word for extreme man-made disorder which was fubar, an acronym for 'fucked up beyond all recognition.'…

First person

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“As far as I’m concerned,” said Constant, “the Universe is a junk yard, with everything in it overpriced. I am through poking…

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Kurt Vonnegut by topic

Life (179) Time (160) People (152) War (129) Writing (123) Books (106) Love (86) Thinking (85) Art (62) World (59) Way (59) Ifs (55) Humans (54) Inspirational (53) Men (52)