Talking Vonnegut: Centennial Interviews and Essays

by Chuck Augello

Overview

This collection of 29 interviews explores the outer reaches of the Kurt Vonnegut universe. Conversations reveal how Robert B. Weide's letter to Kurt led to a long friendship and an acclaimed documentary, how readers in the former Soviet Union fell in love with Vonnegut during the Cold War, how Ryan North and Albert Monteys adapted Slaughterhouse-Five into a graphic novel, how two podcasters introduced him to a new generation of readers, and how Vonnegut's time teaching at the Iowa Writers Workshop helped transform him from an unknown paperback writer into a literary superstar.

Also included are eight essays by the author. These cover Vonnegut's thoughts on guns and loneliness, evaluate his posthumous publications, offer a guide to the best Vonnegut videos available online, and ask questions like "Was Kurt Vonnegut secretly a romance writer?" A resource for students, scholars and fans, this book offers windows into Vonnegut's life and art that are often overlooked in standard biographies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781476690704
Publisher:	McFarland & Company, Incorporated Publishers
Publication date:	04/27/2023
Pages:	252
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Chuck Augello is the founder of The Daily Vonnegut, a website exploring the life and art of Kurt Vonnegut. He is the author of two novels and his work has appeared in One Story, Necessary Fiction and Literary Hub. He lives in New Jersey.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Adventures in the Vonnegutsphere: Or, How I Came to Create The Daily Vonnegut
Beginnings and Endings
Kurt Vonnegut: The Pop Quiz
The Brothers Vonnegut: An Interview with Ginger Strand
Love, Kurt—The Vonnegut Love Letters: An Interview with Edith Vonnegut
Kurt Vonnegut’s Last Interview: An Interview with Heather Augustyn
Kurt Vonnegut Remembered: An Interview with Jim O’Loughlin
One Thief Was Saved: An Interview with Jerome Klinkowitz
Posthumous Vonnegut
The Classroom
Lessons from the Monkey House
Pity the Reader: An Interview with Suzanne McConnell
A Delicate Aggression—Kurt Vonnegut at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop: An Interview with David O. Dowling
Teaching “Harrison Bergeron”: An Interview with Benjamin Reed
Waking People Up to the Prophetic Voice of Kurt Vonnegut: An Interview with Steve Almond
Building the Monkey House: An Interview with Gregory Sumner
Kurt Vonnegut, Romance Writer
Planetary Citizen
Lonesome No More: Kurt Vonnegut’s Sunny Little Dream
American Fascism: An Interview with Susan Farrell
Tilting the Axis: An Interview with Christina Jarvis
Vonnegut as Cultural Guide—Kurt Vonnegut in the Soviet Union: An Interview with Sarah D. Phillips
The Writer’s Crusade: An Interview with Tom Roston
Recreating the Same Old Nightmare: An Interview with Josh Privett
Germs of Some Loathsome Disease: Kurt Vonnegut on Guns
New Adventures in Scholarship
The Vonnegutians
Breaking Down Vonnegut: An Interview with Julia Whitehead
An Overwhelming Treasure Trove: An Interview with Isabel Planton
The Vonnegut Encyclopedia: An Interview with Marc Leeds
Vonnegut and Hemingway: An Interview with Lawrence R. Broer
A Landmark for Common Decency
Beyond the Page
Kurt Vonnegut: YouTuber
Forever Altering Perceptions of Life: An Interview with Ryan North and Albert Monteys
Staging Happy Birthday, Wanda June: An Interview with Jeff Wise and Matt Harrington
Firing the Flare Gun and Shouting “Read it again!” An Interview with Alex Schmidt and Michael Swaim
Two Guys from the Same Family: An Interview with Robert Weide
Bringing the Sirens to the Stage: An Interview with Ben Rock
Directing Mother Night: An Interview with Keith Gordon
And All Music Is Sacred: An Interview with Richard Auldon Clark
Talking Vonnegut
Bibliography
About the Contributors
Index

Editorial Reviews

What a book! All these facets make for a most complete portrait of Kurt Vonnegut.”—Jerome Klinkowitz, author of The Vonnegut Effect and Kurt Vonnegut’s America

From the Publisher