Welcome to the Monkey House

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Kurt Vonnegut’s 1968 anthology of previously published short stories is a good introduction to his earlier work. Most of these were written in the 50s and early 60s and represent a more mainstream side of him that many of his fans and those not yet accustomed to his work would not readily recognize. Billy the Poet is waiting with illegal champagne. She tells him he will have to restrain her if he wants to rape her, which he does. However, he does not hurt her physically during the rape. She is humiliated and hides her face, which upsets Billy. He tells her this is like the wedding night virgins would have experienced centuries ago, and that she will come to enjoy sex in the future. She starts to think he is right. He tells her the Nothinghead movement is growing, and now that she is awake, she will find a mate who is worthy of her. In their society, sexual pleasure has come to be associated with death, rather than love, with most only experiencing sexual beauty when they undergo hostess-assisted suicide. He leaves her with the poem his grandfather read his bride on their wedding day—“How do I love thee” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning—as well as a bottle of old-fashioned birth control pills that will prevent pregnancy but not dull sexual desire. The bottle of pills is labeled “Welcome to the Monkey House.” The stories in this collection, however, written earlier than most of his novels, displays a great variety of themes and models, and though Vonnegut’s signature humor is evident in many, he shows a different, often more emotional side in many stories. When Nancy wakes up, her ethical birth control has worn off; she is a nothinghead. The women bathe her, dress her in a white nightgown, and lead her outside to the Kennedys' old yacht, now rooted in cement where the ocean used to be. Ultratop.be – The Dandy Warhols – Welcome to the Monkey House" (in French). Hung Medien. Retrieved October 12, 2020.

Now I understand you poor fish,” I said. “You couldn’t get along without fear. That’s the only skill you’ve got – how to scare yourselves and other people into doing things. That’s the only fun you’ve got, watching people jump for fear of what you’ll do to their bodies or take away from their bodies.” Pinternagel, Stefan T. (2005). Kurt Vonnegut jr. und die Science Fiction. Kilgore Trout, Trafaldamore and Bokononismus. Berlin: Shayol. p.38. EPICAC - Unlike some of his peers, Vonnegut can easily imagine a brilliant mathematician who happens to be a woman.

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The story was published just four years and nine months after the world's first electronic general-purpose computer, ENIAC, went on-line. ENIAC was the inspiration for his story. [3] The title is a near- homonym of " ipecac." Tom Edison's Shaggy Dog" (Collier's Magazine, 14 March 1953) - 4/5 A funny story about a really annoying "me monster" (Brian Regen) who corners a man in the park. Ultimately, Vonnegut comes down on the side that happiness must be earned and the blissful feelings induced by Euphiophone will leave the person in a miserable state of withdrawal and dissatisfaction when the Euphiophone is not operating. Happiness, though, being earned, is a more valid emotion and will endure. New Dictionary" (The New York Times, October 1966) - 3/5 Who hasn't looked up dirty words in the dictionary? :) Report on the Barnhouse Effect - Interesting to compare this with LeGuin's Lathe of Heaven in focus and tone and characterization.

In one of the yacht cabins, Billy the Poet waits with champagne, which is illegal. She insists she will have to be forcibly restrained if he is rape her. She is in fact held down, and he rapes her, though without hurting her. My favorite science fiction short story is VICTORY UNINTENTIONAL by Isaac Asimov. Two other lifetime personal sci-fi short story favorites: SURFACE TENSION by James Blish and MICROCOSMIC GOD by Theodore Sturgeon. (I just now noticed that I have been mispronouncing and misreading the title for more than twenty years; seeing it incorrectly as MICROSCOPIC GOD. Oops.) The story centres on whether or not a Euphiophone machine can be commercialised, and if so would it be ethical to sell happiness, and what price can you put on it?Deer in the Works - I'd say this one has exerted a small but deeply felt influence over my whole world view. Klinkowitz, Jerome (1998): Vonnegut in fact. The public spokesman of personal fiction. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press And yet he treats the idea of ethical birth control with the most irony here. The omniscient narrator explains that, "the pills were ethical because they didn't interfere with a person's ability to reproduce, which would have been unnatural and immoral. All the pills did was take every bit of pleasure out of sex. Thus did science and morals go hand in hand" (31). Of course, Vonnegut and the reader know that science and morals have not historically gone hand in hand, but have rather almost always worked at odds in most debates. Consider Galileo or the evolution controversy, for instance. Secondly, Vonnegut expects us to know that sex without pleasure is quite unappealing. Through his use of irony, Vonnegut compels the reader to question whether the government's mandate is, in fact, more "unnatural and immoral" than the birth control itself (31). By forcing us to consider the absurdity of the government's position, Vonnegut leads us to consider the absurdity of other similarly moral strictures that we might encounter in everyday life. The Manned Missiles" (Cosmopolitan, July 1958) - 4/5 This was a really emotional tale about two astronauts' fathers writing each other whose sons recently died.