Vonnegut, Kurt, Jr. 1922-2007

NOVELIST

A Writer for Youth.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., entered the 1960s regarded as a promising but obscure science-fiction writer and left it as one of the most respected and popular figures of American literature. In particular, he was adopted by young readers on college campuses as a guru of sorts, one of the few people over thirty who could be trusted, given his cynical view of society.

From the Science-Fiction Ghetto.

Since his fiction before 1960 typically used futuristic settings to critique American society, mainstream publishers shunned his work as science fiction, leading him to publish it in science-fiction magazines and paperbacks—both the kiss of death during the 1950s as far as critics were concerned. Even when he turned to World War II as a setting in his novel Mother Night (1962) publishers and critics refused to see him as anything but a "popular".

To Literary Stardom.

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