--- In [EMAIL PROTECTED], bob_brigante <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > "Mr. Vonnegut was born in Indianapolis in 1922, the youngest of three > children. His father, Kurt Sr., was an architect. His mother, Edith, > came from a wealthy brewery family. Mr. Vonnegut's brother, Bernard, > who died in 1997, was a physicist and an expert on thunderstorms. > > During the Depression, the elder Vonnegut went for long stretches > without work, and Mrs. Vonnegut suffered from episodes of mental > illness. "When my mother went off her rocker late at night, the > hatred and contempt she sprayed on my father, as gentle and innocent > a man as ever lived, was without limit and pure, untainted by ideas > or information," Mr. Vonnegut wrote. She committed suicide, an act > that haunted her son for the rest of his life." > > http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/12/books/12vonnegut.html > > *** > > The effects of inherited alcohol money, like with the Kennedys. > > > **** > > Vonnegut was a prisoner of war in Dresden when it was fire-bombed: > > "The defining moment of Mr. Vonnegut's life was the firebombing of > Dresden, Germany, by Allied forces in 1945, an event he witnessed > firsthand as a young prisoner of war. Thousands of civilians were > killed in the raids, many of them burned to death or > asphyxiated. "The firebombing of Dresden," Mr. Vonnegut wrote, "was a > work of art." It was, he added, "a tower of smoke and flame to > commemorate the rage and heartbreak of so many who had had their > lives warped or ruined by the indescribable greed and vanity and > cruelty of Germany."
He wrote some damn fine books too. "Slaughterhouse 5" - about Dresden, the best anti-war novel IMHO "Sirens of Titan" - Top sci-fi "Yes, we have no nirvana" - an essay about TM which is well worth a read. It's in his "wampeters, foma and granfaloons" collection which I have been completely unable to find a link to but check it out for an interesting perspective on MMY circa 1970ish
