Breaking Down Vonnegut

A practical guide to Kurt Vonnegut's works for middle and secondary students

Among the most significant and prolific post-war American writers, Kurt Vonnegut’s career spanned well more than fifty years including some of the nation's most troubling times. Vonnegut's world composes a complex web exploring themes of historical events and human limitations, all the while establishing his work as among the unique gems of American literature. Breaking Down Vonnegut seeks to clarify and contextualize some essential facts about Kurt Vonnegut's life, addressing humanity's most essential questions through the themes underlying his imaginary worlds and innovative plot structures. Those themes, most often first appearing in his anthropological or autobiographical introductions, often reappear cloaked in science fiction, historical parallels, and social science conundrums that address the major questions of life: the values by which we choose to live.

Breaking Down Vonnegut features an overview of Vonnegut's life and an investigation of his midwestern values that were challenged by his legendary wartime imprisonment. Author Marc Leeds shared a friendship with Kurt Vonnegut for nearly 20 years and is broadly respected for his expertise concerning Vonnegut's published work. Vonnegut thought so highly of Leeds's work that he appears as himself in Vonnegut's final novel, Timequake. Leeds is one of five living people invited to the Timequake clambake, Vonnegut's excuse for a reunion with his fictional alter ego, Kilgore Trout.

Breaking Down Vonnegut:

Showcases the multiple genres in Vonnegut's world Provides a brief thematic tour through Vonnegut's short fiction Contains an exposition of the underlying structure that repeats in every Vonnegut novel Offers a brief overview of Vonnegut's critics Explains why Kurt Vonnegut will remain one of the great American voices heard around the world

This book is a primer for younger or simply new Vonnegut readers and a welcome addition to the toolbox used by educators, parents, and anyone interested in or studying Vonnegut's life and work.