Novels

Author(s)

• Vonnegut, Kurt
• Offit, Sidney

Bibliographic Information

Novels

Kurt Vonnegut ; Sidney Offit, editor

（The library of America, 252, 273）

Library of America, c2014-c2016

• 1976-1985
• 1987-1997

Note

Chronology: 1976-1985: p. 821-842; 1987-1997: p. 705-726

Contents of Works

• 1976-1985. Slapstick
• Jailbird
• Deadeye Dick
• Galápagos
• 1987-1997. Bluebeard
• Hocus pocus
• Timequake

Description and Table of Contents

Volume

1976-1985 ISBN 9781598533040

Description

With the success of Slaughterhouse-Five (1969), Kurt Vonnegut cemented his reputation as America's funniest and most original satirist. This third volume of the definitive edition of his fiction collects four novels written in the 1970s and '80s, when Vonnegut was at the height of his storytelling powers. Slapstick (1976) takes the form of the post-apocalyptic memoirs of Wilbur Daffodil-11 Swain, architect of a brilliant scheme to rid mankind of loneliness. Jailbird (1979) is a political fable of our time, the biography of a good man who becomes embroiled in several of the worst political scandals of the American Century. Deadeye Dick (1982) depicts a talentless playwright's struggle to atone for the crimes of his youth, and the sins of his country. Galapagos (1985), a favorite of the author's among his books, tells the story of how and why a million years ago-during the global ecological disaster of 1986-humankind embarked on an unlikely evolution. The volume is rounded out with an assortment of Vonnegut rarities: speeches, essays, and commentary from the period that touch upon the themes, incidents, and particulars of the novels. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.

Volume

1987-1997 ISBN 9781598534641

Description

The definitive edition of Kurt Vonnegut's fiction concludes with three brilliantly satirical novels of the 1980s and '90s collected in one volume for the first time. Here are the final three novels of the visionary master who defined a generation. Bluebeard (1987) is the colorful history of a phenomenally gifted realist painter who, in the 1950s, betrayed his artistic vision for commercial success. now, at seventy-one, he writes his memoirs and plots his revenge on the worldly forces that conspired to corrupt his talent. In Hocus Pocus (1990), a freewheeling prison memoir by a Vietnam vet and disgraced academic, Vonnegut brings his indelible voice to a range of still-burning issues-free speech, racism, environmental calamity, deindustrialization, and globalization. Timequake (1997), the author's last completed novel, is part science fiction yarn (starring perennial protagonist Kilgore trout), part diary of the mid-1990s (starring the author himself). the result is a perfect fusion of Vonnegut's two signature genres, the satirical fantasy and the personal essay, and a literary magician's fond farewell to his readers and his craft. Rounded out with a selection of short nonfiction pieces intimately related to these three works, this volume presents the final word from the artist who the San Francisco Chronicle, reviewing Timequake, called an "old warrior who will not accept the dehumanizing of politics, the blunting of conscience, and the glibness of the late-twentieth-century Western world." LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.

by "Nielsen BookData"

Details

• NCID: BB15520694
• ISBN:
  • 9781598533040
  • 9781598534641
• LCCN: 2013949836
• LCCN: 2015935691
• Country Code: us
• Title Language Code: eng
• Text Language Code: eng
• Place of Publication: [New York]
• Pages/Volumes: 2 v.
• Size: 21 cm
• Parent Bibliography ID:
  • BA00080739