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The appeal of Kurt Vonnegut, especially to bright younger readers of the past few decades, may be attributed partly to the fact that he is one of the few writers who have successfully straddled the imaginary line between science-fiction/fantasy and "real literature." He was born in Indianapolis and attended Cornell University, but his college education was interrupted by World War II. Captured during the Battle of the Bulge and imprisoned in Dresden, he received a Purple Heart for what he calls a "ludicrously negligible wound." After the war he returned to Cornell and then earned his M.A. at the University of Chicago.He worked as a police reporter and in public relations before placing several short stories in the popular magazines and beginning his career as a novelist. His first novel, Player Piano (1952), is a highly credible account of a future mechanistic society in which people count for little and machines for much. The Sirens of Titan (1959), is the story of a playboy whisked off to Mars and outer space in order to learn some humbling lessons about Earth's modest function in the total scheme of things. Mother Night (1962) satirizes the Nazi mentality in its narrative about an American writer who broadcasts propaganda in Germany during the war as an Allied agent. Cat's Cradle (1963) makes use of some of Vonnegut's experiences in General Electric laboratories in its story about the discovery of a special kind of ice that destroys the world. God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (1965) satirizes a benevolent foundation set up to foster the salvation of the world through love, an endeavor with, of course, disastrous results. Slaughterhouse-Five; or The Children's Crusade (1969) is the book that marked a turning point in Vonnegut's career. Based on his experiences in Dresden, it is the story of another Vonnegut surrogate named Billy Pilgrim who travels back and forth in time and becomes a kind of modern-day Everyman. The novel was something of a cult book during the Vietnam era for its antiwar sentiments. Breakfast of Champions (1973), the story of a Pontiac dealer who goes crazy after reading a science fiction novel by "Kilgore Trout," received generally unfavorable reviews but was a commercial success. Slapstick (1976), dedicated to the memory of Laurel and Hardy, is the somewhat wacky memoir of a 100-year-old ex-president who thinks he can solve society's problems by giving everyone a new middle name. In addition to his fiction, Vonnegut has published nonfiction on social problems and other topics, some of which is collected in Wampeters, Foma and Granfalloons (1974). He died from head injuries sustained in a fall on April 11, 2007. (Bowker Author Biography) — biography from Slaughterhouse-Five… (more)
Disambiguation Notice

Kilgore Trout, the name of a character in several of Kurt Vonnegut's books, was later used as a pseudonym by Philip José Farmer. Vonnegut himself never wrote under or went by the name Kilgore Trout.

Slaughterhouse-Five 42,797 copies, 683 reviews
Cat's Cradle 21,774 copies, 292 reviews
Breakfast of Champions 15,900 copies, 164 reviews
The Sirens of Titan 10,102 copies, 119 reviews
Galápagos 7,531 copies, 79 reviews
Mother Night 7,102 copies, 89 reviews
Welcome to the Monkey House 6,974 copies, 63 reviews
Player Piano 6,588 copies, 77 reviews
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater 6,130 copies, 51 reviews
Timequake 5,304 copies, 55 reviews
Hocus Pocus 5,204 copies, 42 reviews
A Man Without a Country 4,769 copies, 81 reviews
Slapstick, or, Lonesome No More! 4,534 copies, 41 reviews
Bluebeard 4,437 copies, 32 reviews
Jailbird 4,011 copies, 24 reviews
Deadeye Dick 3,790 copies, 22 reviews
Wampeters, Foma & Granfalloons 2,077 copies, 9 reviews
Armageddon in Retrospect 1,877 copies, 33 reviews
God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian 1,725 copies, 33 reviews
Palm Sunday 1,649 copies, 8 reviews
Fates Worse Than Death 1,013 copies, 12 reviews
Happy Birthday, Wanda June 694 copies, 4 reviews
While Mortals Sleep 659 copies, 18 reviews
2BR02B 639 copies, 32 reviews
Kurt Vonnegut: Letters 383 copies, 3 reviews
Harrison Bergeron [short story] 249 copies, 18 reviews
The Big Trip Up Yonder 176 copies, 7 reviews
Complete Stories 171 copies
Sun Moon Star 164 copies, 6 reviews
Canary in a Cat House 111 copies, 2 reviews
The Petrified Ants 85 copies, 1 review
Seven Contemporary Short Novels (Contributor) 75 copies
Slaughterhouse-Five [1972 film] (Novel) 62 copies, 5 reviews
Basic Training 42 copies, 2 reviews
Slaughterhouse-Five 28 copies, 1 review
The Barnhouse Effect 18 copies, 1 review
The Kid Nobody Could Handle 14 copies, 1 review
FUBAR 14 copies
Unready to Wear 11 copies, 2 reviews
The Lie 10 copies, 1 review
Who Am I This Time? 9 copies, 1 review
Thanasphere 6 copies
Slapstick/Mother Night 6 copies, 1 review
EPICAC [short story] 6 copies, 1 review
Hello, Red 6 copies
Next Door [short story] 5 copies, 1 review
The Euphio Question 5 copies, 1 review
Adam [short story] 5 copies, 1 review
Slice of Life 5 copies
Where I Live 5 copies
D.P. [short story] 5 copies, 1 review
More Stately Mansions 5 copies, 1 review
All The King's Horses 5 copies, 1 review
New Dictionary [essay] 4 copies, 1 review
The Manned Missiles 4 copies, 1 review
Confido 3 copies
The Souvenir 3 copies
Runaways 2 copies
Cold Turkey 2 copies
Compadezcan al lector 2 copies, 1 review
Cronosisma 1 copy
Mnemonics 1 copy
Del 1 copy
Bard books 1 copy
Stories 1 copy
Vremetres 1 copy
The Demolished Man (Introduction, some editions) 4,563 copies, 110 reviews
Again, Dangerous Visions (Contributor) 964 copies, 11 reviews
The Ides of March (Foreword, some editions) 905 copies, 17 reviews
The World Treasury of Science Fiction (Contributor) 865 copies, 2 reviews
The Seventh Cross (Foreword, some editions) 769 copies, 12 reviews
The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2006 (Composer) 751 copies, 10 reviews
The Future Dictionary of America (Contributor) 622 copies, 3 reviews
The Wizards of Odd: Comic Tales of Fantasy (Contributor) 616 copies, 5 reviews
The Flying Sorcerers: More Comic Tales of Fantasy (Contributor) 498 copies, 3 reviews
Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories (Contributor) 495 copies, 18 reviews
Free to Be... You and Me (Contributor) 465 copies, 8 reviews
The Big Book of Science Fiction (Contributor) 390 copies, 6 reviews
The Granta Book of the American Short Story (Contributor) 361 copies, 1 review
The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2010 (Contributor) 297 copies, 8 reviews
The Best of Modern Humor (Contributor) 286 copies, 2 reviews
Grand Central Winter (Foreword, some editions) 285 copies, 4 reviews
The Treasury of American Short Stories (Contributor) 262 copies, 1 review
The Road to Science Fiction #3: From Heinlein to Here (Contributor) 239 copies, 4 reviews
The Arbor House Treasury of Modern Science Fiction (Contributor) 193 copies, 2 reviews
World's Best Science Fiction: 1969 (Contributor) 176 copies
The Ultimate Frankenstein (Contributor) 165 copies, 4 reviews
The Ruins of Earth (Contributor) 159 copies, 2 reviews
The Best American Mystery Stories 2010 (Contributor) 147 copies, 3 reviews
Connoisseur's Science Fiction (Contributor) 140 copies, 1 review
Space Odyssey (Contributor) 135 copies, 1 review
Stories of the Sea (Contributor) 129 copies, 3 reviews
The Playboy Book of Science Fiction (Contributor) 128 copies
Animal Farm and Related Readings (Contributor) 104 copies, 1 review
The Frankenstein Omnibus (Contributor) 102 copies, 2 reviews
An ABC of Science Fiction (Contributor) 100 copies, 1 review
Science Fiction: The Future (Contributor) 82 copies, 1 review
CYBERSEX (Contributor) 77 copies, 1 review
The Fourth Science Fiction Megapack (Contributor) 67 copies, 2 reviews
Back to School [1986 film] (Actor) 61 copies, 1 review
Assignment in Tomorrow: An Anthology (Contributor) 54 copies
The Unabridged Mark Twain (Introduction) 52 copies
Science Fiction (Author) 40 copies, 1 review
Long Walk to Forever {play} (Original story) 31 copies
The Fiend (Contributor) 23 copies
Studies in Fiction (Contributor) 22 copies, 1 review
Love Stories (Contributor) 18 copies
Mother Night [1996 film] (Author of original) 17 copies
Next Door {play} (Author of original) 17 copies
Out of This World (Contributor) 16 copies
Storia del piccolo Mouck (Translator, some editions) 9 copies
The Short Story & You (Contributor) 7 copies

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Short biography
Kurt Vonnegut Jr est né à Indianapolis en 1922. Prisonnier de guerre à Dresde pendant cinq mois, il y fut témoin du bombardement de 1945. De retour aux États-Unis, il se mit à écrire. Son roman le plus célèbre, Abattoir 5, resta pendant trois mois en tête des best-sellers américains.
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (November 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007) was an American writer. In a career spanning over 50 years, Vonnegut published fourteen novels, three short story collections, five plays, and five works of nonfiction, with further collections being published after his death. He is most famous for his darkly satirical, bestselling novel Slaughterhouse-Five (1969).

Born and raised in Indianapolis, Indiana, Vonnegut attended Cornell University but dropped out in January 1943 and enlisted in the United States Army. As part of his training, he studied mechanical engineering at Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) and the University of Tennessee. He was then deployed to Europe to fight in World War II and was captured by the Germans during the Battle of the Bulge. He was interned in Dresden and survived the Allied bombing of the city by taking refuge in a meat locker of the slaughterhouse where he was imprisoned. After the war, Vonnegut married Jane Marie Cox, with whom he had three children. He later adopted his sister's three sons, after she died of cancer and her husband was killed in a train accident.

Vonnegut published his first novel, Player Piano, in 1952. The novel was reviewed positively but was not commercially successful at the time. In the nearly 20 years that followed, Vonnegut published several novels that were well regarded, two of which (The Sirens of Titan [1959] and Cat's Cradle [1963]) were nominated for the Hugo Award for best novel. He published a short story collection titled Welcome to the Monkey House in 1968. Vonnegut's breakthrough was his commercially and critically successful sixth novel, Slaughterhouse-Five. The book's anti-war sentiment resonated with its readers amidst the ongoing Vietnam War and its reviews were generally positive. After its release, Slaughterhouse-Five went to the top of The New York Times Best Seller list, thrusting Vonnegut into fame. He was invited to give speeches, lectures and commencement addresses around the country and received many awards and honors.

Later in his career, Vonnegut published several autobiographical essays and short-story collections, including Fates Worse Than Death (1991), and A Man Without a Country (2005). After his death, he was hailed as a black-humor commentator on the society in which he lived and as one of the most important contemporary writers. Vonnegut's son Mark published a compilation of his father's unpublished compositions, titled Armageddon in Retrospect. In 2017, Seven Stories Press published Complete Stories, a collection of Vonnegut's short fiction including five previously unpublished stories. Complete Stories was collected and introduced by Vonnegut friends and scholars Jerome Klinkowitz and Dan Wakefield. Numerous scholarly works have examined Vonnegut's writing and humor.
Disambiguation notice
Kilgore Trout, the name of a character in several of Kurt Vonnegut's books, was later used as a pseudonym by Philip José Farmer. Vonnegut himself never wrote under or went by the name Kilgore Trout.

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