My muse, more or less
A different approach to Kurt Vonnegut passing, a column from a sports writer that I enjoy reading. Since I am not well-read enough to give Vonnegut his due, I thought I would share Woody's column in the Denver Post today.
Enjoy -
My muse, more or less
By Woody Paige
Denver Post Staff Columnist
Article Launched: 04/13/2007 01:00:00 AM MDT
Kurt Vonnegut is dead.
So he went.
At this point in the story, Kilgore Trout asks this rhetorical question, an aside with a paragraph all to itself:
"What the heck?"
Too bad, you say. What does Vonnegut have to do with sports, you remark. More than you think, I answer, somewhat indignantly.
* * *
Vonnegut was hired in 1954 by a new magazine, to be called "Sports Illustrated." He was told to write an article to accompany a photograph of a thoroughbred horse that had jumped the rail during a race and run wild in the infield. Vonnegut stared at the picture for hours, finally typed something and left without a word.
What he had written was: "The horse jumped the (expletive) fence."
And Vonnegut quit.
Which was good for the world, because the world didn't need another sportswriter, but did need one of the greatest novelists in American history.
And I needed somebody else, other than my dad or the center fielder for the Yankees or a guard for the Celtics, to admire.
A young woman interviewing me the other day for her graduate-school project wanted to know how I developed my writing style.
Replied I: "I copied Kurt Vonnegut.
"For instance, Vonnegut often used one-sentence paragraphs."
Like this one.
And the seven paragraphs above this one and the next one.
So there.
I copied Vonnegut's writing style and his humorous approach to serious subjects - he did war, and I do football games - and his distrust of people in power - he, politicians; I, baseball general managers - and his cynicism - "There is only one me, and I am stuck with him" - but I never could copy his brilliance, uniqueness and manipulation of the language.
Nobody else can or will.
Of course, Vonnegut copied Mark Twain as a satirist and essayist and even looked almost exactly like him. Baby boomers adopted Vonnegut when he wrote "Slaughterhouse-Five," a novel about the bombing of Dresden and prisoner of war Billy Pilgrim, who is "unstuck in time" and becomes a successful optometrist, survives a plane crash in Vermont and visits the planet Tralfamadore.
Some of Vonnegut's books were taught in schools, then some of his books were banned by schools. People don't always understand, and often fear, what they read, is what we learn from that.
Generations X and Why? don't read Vonnegut and don't know what they are missing. I made my daughter read him.
Which I thought would be the end of our dear relationship.
Not so. She got it.
Vonnegut came to Denver in 1996 to show two dozen of his sketches at a gallery and to introduce a new short story he had written for the label of a beer bottle. As he might say, most of what I'm telling you is true, except the parts I'm making up.
The owner of a LoDo microbrewery had the grand idea of producing specialty beers with famous authors writing stories for the labels. The brewpub owner, a disheveled sort, worked up the courage to ask Vonnegut to contribute, and he agreed, under the condition that the beer's recipe be the same as his grandfather's, brewed commercially in Indianapolis before Prohibition.
It turned out that the brewpub owner's father lived down the hall from Vonnegut, and was his fraternity brother, when they attended Cornell. (Vonnegut later attended Tennessee, which is my school, and you're thinking I'm making all of this up.)
The secret ingredient in the beer - called "Kurt's Mile High Malt" - was coffee. Vonnegut's story on the label was entitled "Merlin," about a olden knight with an automatic weapon.
Vonnegut documented his Denver visit in his last biographical novel, "Timequake," and told of meeting his friend's son - the brewpub owner.
The barkeep's name: John Hickenlooper.
"Ting-a-ling," as Vonnegut would write.
Hickenlooper knew of my idolization of Vonnegut and invited me and my daughter to spend time(quake) with Vonnegut. My daughter sat on a bus bench with him and talked about colleges, and I later had a beer with him.
Said Vonnegut: "I hear you are a good writer."
Said I: "I copied your style."
In "Slaughterhouse-Five," Billy Pilgrim mused: "Now, when I myself hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is 'So it goes."'
Staff writer Woody Paige can be reached at 303-954-1095 or wpaige@denverpost.com.
Enjoy -
My muse, more or less
By Woody Paige
Denver Post Staff Columnist
Article Launched: 04/13/2007 01:00:00 AM MDT
Kurt Vonnegut is dead.
So he went.
At this point in the story, Kilgore Trout asks this rhetorical question, an aside with a paragraph all to itself:
"What the heck?"
Too bad, you say. What does Vonnegut have to do with sports, you remark. More than you think, I answer, somewhat indignantly.
* * *
Vonnegut was hired in 1954 by a new magazine, to be called "Sports Illustrated." He was told to write an article to accompany a photograph of a thoroughbred horse that had jumped the rail during a race and run wild in the infield. Vonnegut stared at the picture for hours, finally typed something and left without a word.
What he had written was: "The horse jumped the (expletive) fence."
And Vonnegut quit.
Which was good for the world, because the world didn't need another sportswriter, but did need one of the greatest novelists in American history.
And I needed somebody else, other than my dad or the center fielder for the Yankees or a guard for the Celtics, to admire.
A young woman interviewing me the other day for her graduate-school project wanted to know how I developed my writing style.
Replied I: "I copied Kurt Vonnegut.
"For instance, Vonnegut often used one-sentence paragraphs."
Like this one.
And the seven paragraphs above this one and the next one.
So there.
I copied Vonnegut's writing style and his humorous approach to serious subjects - he did war, and I do football games - and his distrust of people in power - he, politicians; I, baseball general managers - and his cynicism - "There is only one me, and I am stuck with him" - but I never could copy his brilliance, uniqueness and manipulation of the language.
Nobody else can or will.
Of course, Vonnegut copied Mark Twain as a satirist and essayist and even looked almost exactly like him. Baby boomers adopted Vonnegut when he wrote "Slaughterhouse-Five," a novel about the bombing of Dresden and prisoner of war Billy Pilgrim, who is "unstuck in time" and becomes a successful optometrist, survives a plane crash in Vermont and visits the planet Tralfamadore.
Some of Vonnegut's books were taught in schools, then some of his books were banned by schools. People don't always understand, and often fear, what they read, is what we learn from that.
Generations X and Why? don't read Vonnegut and don't know what they are missing. I made my daughter read him.
Which I thought would be the end of our dear relationship.
Not so. She got it.
Vonnegut came to Denver in 1996 to show two dozen of his sketches at a gallery and to introduce a new short story he had written for the label of a beer bottle. As he might say, most of what I'm telling you is true, except the parts I'm making up.
The owner of a LoDo microbrewery had the grand idea of producing specialty beers with famous authors writing stories for the labels. The brewpub owner, a disheveled sort, worked up the courage to ask Vonnegut to contribute, and he agreed, under the condition that the beer's recipe be the same as his grandfather's, brewed commercially in Indianapolis before Prohibition.
It turned out that the brewpub owner's father lived down the hall from Vonnegut, and was his fraternity brother, when they attended Cornell. (Vonnegut later attended Tennessee, which is my school, and you're thinking I'm making all of this up.)
The secret ingredient in the beer - called "Kurt's Mile High Malt" - was coffee. Vonnegut's story on the label was entitled "Merlin," about a olden knight with an automatic weapon.
Vonnegut documented his Denver visit in his last biographical novel, "Timequake," and told of meeting his friend's son - the brewpub owner.
The barkeep's name: John Hickenlooper.
"Ting-a-ling," as Vonnegut would write.
Hickenlooper knew of my idolization of Vonnegut and invited me and my daughter to spend time(quake) with Vonnegut. My daughter sat on a bus bench with him and talked about colleges, and I later had a beer with him.
Said Vonnegut: "I hear you are a good writer."
Said I: "I copied your style."
In "Slaughterhouse-Five," Billy Pilgrim mused: "Now, when I myself hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is 'So it goes."'
Staff writer Woody Paige can be reached at 303-954-1095 or wpaige@denverpost.com.
That Vonnegut story was great. I'll have to go back and reread his stuff.
ReplyDeleteI'll have to read that Timequake book. By the way, speaking of that, I've been reading Life Of Riley finally and enjoying it. Thakns.
ReplyDelete