So we talked a bit in class yesterday about how Vonnegut positions himself and many of the facets in his novel by using very theatrical techniques. Also, from the excerpt that Nawel read in class, it is pretty clear that Vonnegut is all for the idea of people asserting themselves in roles and that those roles ultimately have a purpose. This could be said for individual characters in the novel or people in the real world. What are some examples in the novel of people who occupy roles that are necessary for plot to unfold the way it does. Conversely, can we think about any non-fictional people who play roles, not necessarily good or bad…
“Papa” Monzano! + me are just playing roles… I aint gonna explain unless someone asks me 2. and by two i mean two people have to ask me to for me to respond…
there i go playin a role again (i thought we wanted to facilitate more discussion) and this blog is proof that it doesn’t have to make sense or be well written. an online classroom is reliant on vigilance and I am always happy to make say or do the “wrong” thing.
but I will say this. we all play different roles at different times, which is to say we choose to act in opposition to our innate nature
What do you mean by your above statement? I believe that when we talk about roles, we can progress into a discussion of how everybody must fulfill their own role in life…or in other words, fulfill “God’s” plan?
What necessarily is our role? Do we constantly change our role, or is it always what was meant to happen? In the book, even though never physically present, Dr. Felix Hoenikker’s role is still very strong throughout the plot and is arguably the most influential to the other characters. But can his role possibly change? If so, how? I believe that once you’re gone….you’re gone: in the sense that one could not possibly change their role or impact in society or in other individuals. Is this true? I mean once you have fulfilled “God’s” plan, that is when you die right? Will religion have to come to an end for science to progress? Is religion’s ROLE to prevent us from destroying ourselves with scientifically advanced nuclear weapons?
Im sorry for the questions, but hopefully we can continue this discussion off of one of them…..
Tyler, I like your questions, they aid in discussion.
Firstly, I think “Papa” is a contradictory role. He is a leader, a figurehead who is constantly on the warpath chasing and “hating” Bokonon. And then we find out he is a Bokonist. So I will pose the question for someone else,
Why did Vonnegut make “Papa” a Bokonist in a twist at the end?
Secondly, Vonnegut would agree with you when you say:
“I believe that when we talk about roles, we can progress into a discussion of how everybody must fulfill their own role in life…”
BUT
I don’t think Kurt is calling life, “God’s” plan.
Finally, as for being gone or more specifically, dead. Some people, because of their death and how they die and their life before their death, have more impact then when they were alive…
Do you think Vonnegut would agree that “Cats Cradle” shares a theme inherent in Dr. Kings following quote?
“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.” Martin Luther King, Jr.
Great questions Tyler, I enjoyed thinking about them.
So… maybe I am thinking of this the wrong way (brain skewed by my day long study of Japanese politics) BUT…
I think our roles absolutely change, however I don’t know if Vonnegut would agree with this (or maybe he would, but in his books he has to keep his characters concrete for a reason). It seems like his characters really stick to a certain role for the entirety of the novel. I think the role of the narrator is one too complicated to address here (good to talk about in class), but through it all, he stays true to his character to the end as an author, a story teller.
And another example: look at the Hoosiers. “Mom”, after all of the destruction and chaos, is still filling her same damn role. Her character undergoes little change. And she still annoys me (I have never liked people from the Midwest).
Vonnegut’s characters all seemingly stick to a role, serve their purpose. But in life, in reality… I’d like to think my role changes. Not because I am in “opposition of my innate nature” like Cameron says above, but because there are different roles to be filled in life. A good brother, a respectable son, a responsible student… aren’t those different roles? And won’t those roles change, i.e. in ten years I (hopefully) won’t be in college anymore, so my role as a student will have evolved into something else? Maybe I am thinking of the idea of “roles’ in a different way than you are… oh well.
When it comes to “roles”and whether or not we “play” them, I think that each one of us has certain roles which we fulfill just by being alive, like n_knoop said, sibling, human, upper middle class, etc. How we choose to act once we are designated in our roles, is much more like an acting style, we can choose to play with honesty, or we can choose to play with diguise, or even a mixture of the two.
What about McCabe and Bokonon? It’s revealed in chapter 78 that the Bokonon himself decide to outlaw Bokononism, in order to create a sense of zeal in its followers. He and McCabe then play their roles in disguse, only to become them in actuality over time. They both became so involved in their roles of Tyrant, and Saint that “They both became, for all practical purposes, insane.”
How many of us begin in disguise only to then become our role in actuality? Are we insane to change ourselves so drastically to fit what we perceive to be our role in this world?
Are we insane? Or are we human? Is this human nature to become what we choose to be? More specifically, WHY do we play these roles? And, WHY do we choose the roles we do?
The characters in Vonnegut’s books are created by one man as exaples so WHY does he choose each role? What is he trying to say?
cam
I agree with you about Mccabe and Bokonon. I believe they are the central players in San Lorenzan history. Vonnegut is presenting a mini-Miltonic paradigm it seems, one where we can see a sympathetic side of the Devil.
Thinking about this broad based scheme, it then brings into another quite abstract question of good and evil. Supposedly, we cannot have good without evil. So the evil, in another devilishly Miltonic sense, is seen in a somewhat sympathetic light.
In a historical perspective, I think the idea of communism and dictatorship comes into play again. In a roundabout and satirical way, he is showing how the lines that separate democracy and communism, and other political systems, are remarkably similar. Not to say that he is supporting some of the past “evil”, I think the blatant bombing of the Hitler et al. cutouts in the Bolivar harbour prove this. But he is presenting a picture where good and evil serve a certain purpose in society. Good could be primarily at the expense of evil, which is not necessarily morally obscene in any sense (ie political affiliation).
Perhaps it is up to the authors and humanistic minds of the world to question what this “evil” really is and determine what the truth of the matter is. Are things evil just because supposedly good people tell us they are? Ultimately, we need to be able to discern for ourselves, but writing like that in Cat’s Cradle is a slap in the face for us to wake up and re-evaluate things again.
the biggest aspect of theatricity and going back to our pointin class about “living our lives” relates to Vonnegut’s passion for religious non-sense.
For the sake of argument, let us grant that religion is all lies, yet we still foloow blindly in the direction that our authorities tell us to go. “It is god’s plan for me” etc. etc. However, if we as a species are searching for the answers and namely the turths to our world aren’t we being hypocrites ? (as Cam said in class)
Aren’t in fact choosing to accept lies for the simplicity of living a life that has some kind of direction and meaning?
Vonnegut makes so many statements in his interviews, works, novels, about how we need to stand up and try to the best of our capabilities as living entities make some kind of movement towards “simply living”.
This kind of liltterary attack to religion, and science (because I do think he criticizes our scientific curiosities as being taken too far and without limit. After all, in our modern day society you can pretty much do ANYTHING in the name of RELIGION or SCIENCE.
Think about it!
I agree with Becky and what shes saying about roles. its kind of like in Plato’s The Republic, he talks about this form of society, and its categorized into 3 levels, the soldiers who are the strongest, then theres like people we are smart, I forget what theyre called, and then there is everyone else.And youre born into that level and you have to fulfill that role, you cant change anything about it. Same can be said for roles like being a Mother, there are certain things every women is obligated to do as a mother, or a brother, or a friend, etc. But then Plato continues to mention something about being stuck in a cave and those who are the smartest will learn how to get out of it but no one will listen to them because theyre not on the same level of smartness. The people we are are roles that we have to fulfill on a daily basis and hopefully we dont let these roles consume us because in reality we can be who we are.
And just like Becky mentioned, Bokonon himself outlaws his own invented religion and later on we later find out he never listens to his own words.I think he was the only one on the island who understood how amusing his religion got and how people began to take it too seriously, which we should never do.
I couldn’t agree more with you, Karina. In my presentation tomorrow I will attempt to demonstrate my thoughts on how nothing, including science and religion, is meant to be taken too far or too seriously.
However, I believe that there is a certain amount of care that must be put in. It can be debated on how much care or attention is needed when we look at scientific discovery or the practice of any religion because the only thing that we must not do is be careless or indifferent!
I believe that among other things in this novel, one of the most important messages that Vonnegut so didactically portrays, is that we have the potential to destroy the world in our oblivious endeavors of making the world more “technologically advanced” or by taking ideas of religion, or anything for that matter, far too seriously. Im not even sure if I completely agree with Vonnegut on this, but his ideas are well supported by real world evidence: the same people who discovered antibiotics also created the atomic bomb, automatic firearms and nerve gas. True fact….
Tyler, I really love your point about the fatality of taking things too seriously or in the case of Dr. HOenniker, too far.
In our personal lives we are constantly given “good advice” to NOT let things go, to “punch it out” or to channel that anger into something else; as Joval mentioned last class. Whereas its better to just let things go!
Can this apply to every aspect of our lives? I think so. Fatality doesn’t have to be seen on a global scale, and I think that its important to look at the smaller, closer to home repercussions of taking things too far.
For example, think of “Sweeney Todd” he took his misson for revenge too far, and look where it got him. Dead.
or, look at couples who are too focused on their careers and eventually get divorced.
Maybe Vonnegut is making an intimate call to the reader to consider their daily actions, in relation to the “end of world” scenario presented in the novel.