ABOUT KURT
VONNEGUT

A giant of American literature, Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) is the author of 14 novels, including the classic anti-war novel Slaughterhouse-Five, a Modern Library 100 Best Novels selection. His other works include Cat’s Cradle, Mother Night, Breakfast of Champions, and A Man without a Country. Vonnegut’s signature blend of satire, American history, and empathy for the human condition has earned a worldwide following.

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LATEST POST

The Many Vonneguts – An Interview with Zachary Perdieu

In 2016, Zachary Perdieu, co-Vice President of the Kurt Vonnegut Society, delivered a paper at the American Literature Association’s annual conferen...

08 November, 2017

Vonnegut scholar Lawrence Broer on the evolution of Kilgore Trout

In a 2017 interview with The Daily Vonnegut, Professor Lawrence Broer discussed his 2011 book Vonnegut & Hemingway – Writers at War. In ...

03 January, 2018

An Overwhelming Treasure Trove of Writings by Kurt Vonnegut – An Interview with Isabel Planton

If there’s a Disney World for hard-core Vonnegut fans, it just might be at the Lilly Library at Indiana University, home of the Kurt Vonnegut Manusc...

20 October, 2019

Salman Rushdie on Slaughterhouse-Five

In a fine essay published by The New Yorker, Salman Rushdie offers his thoughts on Slaughterhouse-Five. Comparisons to Catch-22 and War and Peace are ...

18 June, 2019

Kurt Vonnegut Remembered: An Interview with Jim O’Loughlin

Kurt Vonnegut Remembered, recently published by The University of Alabama Press, is a must-read for Vonnegut fans as it traces the author’s life thr...

20 May, 2019

The Vonnegut Review – An Interview with Wilson Taylor

Need something to do this summer? Why not tackle the Vonnegut canon? In 2013 Wilson Taylor and Matthew Gannon, two friends and writers with a passion ...

07 April, 2019

Happy Birthday, Slaughterhouse-Five

It’s been fifty years since Delacorte Press first published Kurt Vonnegut’s masterpiece, Slaughterhouse-Five, on March 31, 1969. The novel...

31 March, 2019

Reading Slaughterhouse-Five in Prison

The celebration of the 50th anniversary of Slaughterhouse-Five continues with news of two recent group readings of Vonnegut’s classic novel. First...

05 March, 2019

Vonnegut’s Paradox: Slaughterhouse-Five and the demoralized protagonist

In Sanity Plea: Schizophrenia in the Novels of Kurt Vonnegut (1989, University of Alabama Press), Lawrence R. Broer writes: “A striking paradox ...

27 January, 2019

Slaughterhouse-Five – 50th Anniversary

In 2019 The Daily Vonnegut will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the publication of Kurt Vonnegut’s 1969 masterpiece, Slaughterhouse-Five, R...

05 January, 2019

Gentle People Sharing a Common Bowl – Happy Holidays from The Daily Vonnegut

Though Kurt Vonnegut identified as a secular humanist, he often described himself as a “Christ-loving atheist,” and readers can find a wea...

24 December, 2018

Happy Birthday, Kurt Vonnegut

On November 11, 1922, a peephole opened quite suddenly in Indianapolis. Light and sound poured in, and the wisp of undifferentiated nothingness we n...

11 November, 2018

Wheelhouse Theater Company presents Happy Birthday, Wanda June – An Interview with Jeffrey Wise and Matt Harrington

In December 1970, Kurt Vonnegut wrote to his friend, fellow novelist Jose Donoso, “…The adventure of having a play produced was harrowing…But I ...

18 October, 2018

Vonnegut 2020?

After a brief hiatus, The Daily Vonnegut will return this Sunday with new trivia and some Vonnegut video. Until then, here’s a quote from Vonn...

15 August, 2018

Tilting the Axis: Kurt Vonnegut and the Environment – An Interview with Christina Jarvis

Even casual fans of Kurt Vonnegut’s work recognize him as a writer engaged with the issues of his time. Vonnegut’s range of interests was vast: th...

21 June, 2018

Philip Roth, Father’s Day, and Weekly Trivia – June 17, 2018

The Daily Vonnegut mourns the recent passing of the great American novelist Philip Roth. Vonnegut’s Jailbird and Roth’s The Ghost Writer...

17 June, 2018

Vonnegut on Guns

With another school shooting in the news last week, it’s worth revisiting some of Kurt Vonengut’s writing about guns. In Fates Worst tha...

21 May, 2018

Harmful Untruths – An Interview with Kevin Brown

One of Kurt Vonnegut’s most enduring phrases is foma, harmless untruths that can make life easier. Yet Vonnegut also explored the opposite—harmfu...

28 February, 2018

2011 Interview with Donald Farber

Check out this 2011 interview with Vonnegut’s long-time agent, business manager, and friend Donald Farber. Donald Farber on the Legacy of Kurt V...

01 July, 2016

The Vonnegut Encyclopedia – Revised and updated edition now available

The Vonnegut Encyclopedia by Marc Leeds, an invaluable reference for Vonnegut fans, has been published by Delacorte Press in a new updated edition. �...

23 November, 2016

American Fascism and Mother Night – An Interview with Professor Susan Farrell

Kurt Vonnegut’s Mother Night, originally published as a paperback original in 1961, continues to resonate with its times. Professor Susan Farrell, i...

21 March, 2017

The Brothers Vonnegut – An Interview with Ginger Strand

The Brothers Vonnegut, by Ginger Strand, is a fascinating study of Kurt Vonnegut’s career in public relations for General Electric (GE) in the late ...

01 April, 2017