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Rumpus Book ClubEverything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt
*
The cocktail reception was in a massive lobby. I staked out a spot near the table with the Kurt Vonnegut sign and gulped a glass of wine and said hello to my official hosts, the good people of Bank of America. They were all incredibly nice. This is one of the characteristics of the rich: if you are dressed properly, and don’t appear to want their money, they are incredibly nice.
After a while, one of the guys in our circle said, “Isn’t that him?” We all turned and there was Kurt Vonnegut, shuffling toward his little table. I had never seen Vonnegut in any form other than his author photo. I expected a towering figure with a surplus of brown curls. But gravity had tamped him down; his famous curls were ashy and shorn.
We forget what the truly old look like in this culture, because we tuck them away in group homes when they start to look too scary.[3] Vonnegut was terribly frail. The flesh had shrunk away from his eyes and gathered in folds above his collar. He stared out at the room full of strangers and sighed.
“That’s so sad!” Catherine said. “He’s going to sit there and nobody is going to go up and talk to him.”
It was sad. For about 30 seconds, none of us could work up the nerve to approach Kurt Vonnegut. He was such a legend, so much larger than life in the minds of his fans, and here he was, revealed as a mere mortal, closer to tortoise than God.
This was my big chance. I needed to move. But I couldn’t do it. My whole plan felt suddenly absurd. Pushy. Or worse than pushy – grabby. I didn’t want to be just one more person grabbing at the guy. This would dishonor my status as a true fan. By the time I’d decided I was being a ninny (24 seconds later) a young couple had walked up to him, and this set off a kind of Brownian surge. He was immediately enveloped by people, all of whom wanted to speak with him at the same time.
A bald fellow at the back of the scrum shouted out, “Hey Kurt! I was in your house in Cape Cod back in 1969! Your nephew invited me to a party.”
“Is that so?” Vonnegut’s voice was faint and wheezy.
Someone asked about his kids and he ticked off their names. “Mark went crazy,” he said, referring to his eldest son. “But he’s okay now. He wrote a fine book.”
“Eden Express!” said a woman with a camera. “I almost brought my copy.”
Vonnegut coughed delicately. He looked pleased.
An eager-looking blond woman asked him what he thought of George W. Bush.
“He makes me wish Nixon were still President,” Vonnegut muttered.
“Who do you think was the greatest president in your lifetime?”
“I was fortunate to have lived during the reign of a man named Franklin Delano Roosevelt.” He added, to no one in particular, “It was the polio that made him compassionate, you know. Being sick like that.”
“You look great,” someone else said.
“Nonsense,” he said.
A pretty girl with auburn hair stepped shyly into Vonnegut’s view.
“This girl came all the way from California to see you!” the blond woman exclaimed.
“Why would you do that, my dear? It’s sunny in California!”
The girl was trembling a little. She wore a white blouse that framed her breasts. There was a moment of suspense while she stood, flushed, struggling to speak. “I wanted to thank you,” she stammered. “Reading your work was what made me start to think for myself.”
Vonnegut gazed at her. There was nothing lascivious in his eyes. He was merely sipping at her beauty. She radiated transference. It was as if Vonnegut were her father, some idealized version, which, of course, he was.
*
By the time I worked up the nerve to approach him, Vonnegut looked wiped, so I didn’t waste any time.
“I’ve been asked to write a biography of you,” I said.
“By whom?” he said.
It was a fair question and I did what any self-respecting young fiction writer would do in this situation: I fictionalized. “Giroux & Schuster.”
Vonnegut sighed. “I’ve heard nothing about it. My papers are collected at the University of Indiana Library. You are welcome to go look at them.”
And that, as far as he was concerned, was that. He wasn’t defensive, exactly. But he declined to look at me. I felt like a traveling salesman being shown the door.
“What I was hoping is that you might want to be interviewed.”
Vonnegut gazed mournfully at his knuckles, as if hoping to discover a lit cigarette between two of them.
I handed him my letter. He inspected the envelope briefly – such a lovely envelope! – and slipped it into his coat pocket.
The end.
*
Was I bummed? I was bummed as hell. My one chance to meet Vonnegut had been such a bust, such a nothing.
Then again, the guy was 85 years old. He was in Hartford, Connecticut. He had 500 people coming at him. I wasn’t going to get much. So we moved on to dinner, which consisted of large hunks of cow and a wedge of chocolate cake.
I was seated at the table with Jennifer Weiner. I didn’t know her work, only that she was regarded as a popular chick lit author. She made a great point of proclaiming how honored and humbled and baffled she was to be part of a panel with Oates and Vonnegut. Little old her! It wasn’t actually that hard to figure out, really: she was the fizzy pop culture component.
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November 11th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
I spent a good part of my day at work reading this and it’s really wonderful. Thank you.
November 11th, 2009 at 9:48 pm
Thank you for sharing this.
I also was one of those irrevocably changed by reading all Vonnegut’s books before the age of 18. His work provided the mentorship I sorely needed.
The day he died I woke at 6 a.m. to a text message from an estranged friend who broke the news. I went to work in a daze. I was more stunned (I know it’s sad to say) than I had been by the news of my grandparents deaths. Somehow Kurt Vonnegut had for me a more certain familial bond.
It’s difficult to distill the impact Vonnegut has on his readers, but you’ve done a splendid job here, Steve Almond. It is an emotional effect, to be sure. Somewhere along the line I, too, stopped listing Vonnegut among my favorite authors. I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me.
November 12th, 2009 at 1:06 am
Great piece Mr. Almond. I was working at chain bookstore when Vonnegut died and had several weeks earlier convinced the merchandising manager to let me replace her Ayn Rand display with Vonnegut. The top row was all Breakfast of Champions, still my favorite Vonnegut, and the book I most often suggested to people when they asked me what I liked to read.
November 12th, 2009 at 5:43 am
This is one of the finest essays about the formation of a writer (or, in this case, two writers) that I’ve ever read.
November 12th, 2009 at 6:11 am
i think it’s important to think about what vonnegut would want us to do in the face of our current moral challenges. he made things quite simple, as did Jesus in the beatitudes. he implored for our decency. when i think about what he faced, and how he coped, i’m both grateful and heartbroken. we’re wasting so much love on this earth.
November 12th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
Don’t mean to be a dick, but it’s Delano. Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Sorry, I get douchey about spelling.
November 12th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
Thanks for pointing that out Jono. It’s been corrected.
November 13th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
I have never read Vonnegut but was captivated nonetheless by your thoughtful essay. I also went to a college that basks in the unmistakable glow of prosperity, in my case Bard, so I can relate to that part of the piece, although I never read Vonnegut while I was there. No one I knew was reading him. We were too busy trying to decode Derrida and Lacan, I suppose. After college, I lived with an English professor, a literary critic who would periodically make pronouncements like “there’s really no point in reading modern fiction,” or “modern poetry is dead.” It’s amazing sometimes how easily the things people say to you can shape what you read. What an idiot I was to listen. So thank you so much for introducing me to this wonderful author (I adore the quote you found in a letter to him: “I’m afraid I have an almond macaroon for a heart when it comes to your writing.” That is now tattooed on my brain).
It is very timely, I think, to reconsider Vonnegut, now more than ever in this politically challenging and environmentally vexing historical moment. As you rightly point out, there is a real lack of love in this country as far as what we choose to do, what we choose to ignore and way too much self-aggrandizement. Hello, facebook, anyone? How is it that we are so thoughtless and unkind? I am left with the image of Vonnegut himself, old and wizened, facing an audience of many, carefully crossing the stage alone so as not to trip over the microphone cord…and no one there to help him across.
Thanks again for this riveting essay.
November 13th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
Very happy I took the time. Thank you.
November 20th, 2009 at 2:38 am
I wasn’t sure if I’d get through the 60 pages, but I couldn’t put it down (in a matter of speaking)…thankyou!
November 25th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
I mean, in a manner of speaking.. not matter of speaking.
September 29th, 2010 at 11:27 pm
This may be the best thing I’ve read this year.
November 11th, 2010 at 6:43 pm
It’s late and much later than when I started, but worth the lateness. Thanks.
November 11th, 2010 at 10:03 pm
I just enjoyed that in one gulp! Smashing read. Yours too, Stephen. Thanks for sharing.
November 11th, 2010 at 10:18 pm
and now it’s going to haunt me in bed.
November 22nd, 2010 at 8:14 pm
so wonderful to see this again.
January 27th, 2011 at 10:25 pm
Steve,
I met Mr. Vonnegut very briefly after a commencement address he gave at a college in Atlanta about ten tears ago. My son’s girlfriend was in the graduating class. My only acquaintance with Mr. Vonnegut’s work was via a small movie called “Who am I this time?” which was probably based on one of his short stories.
I liked his speech, and really love the movie – so I wanted to get his autograph. He was standing on the landing of a campus building, with a single police bodyguard. It seemed to me that he had just gotten away from the milling crowd, maybe to have a smoke, though I don’t remember if he was smoking. The bodyguard tensed a bit as I approached, but relaxed as he saw I was friendly.
As to the autograph, Mr. Vonnegut said something like ” I don’t do those. Once you start there is no end to it.” I was disappointed, but, reflexively held out my hand, saying “well, thanks anyway”. He shook hands with me. He seemed very kind and not the least bit ‘affected’ in any way.
Steve, I really enjoyed this article. The part about many, many failures finally teaching you how to succeed rings true. Your humor is wonderful.
I will now go about reading some Vonnegut, and some more of your work.
Thank you.