Sunday, September 13, 2009
Innocent Murderers
Cat’s Cradle immediately captures the reader’s interest imbibing them in a world of blatant irony and subtle pacifism. Throughout the novel, the author, Kurt Vonnegut employs ironic humor to highlight humanity’s indifference and blatant stupidity. Vonnegut illustrates that the same scientific community that produced life-altering breakthroughs like medicine and refrigeration, also created the atomic bomb, which had catastrophic consequences for millions of people. On page 29 Jonah, the story’s protagonist, has a conversation about the a murderer with Dr. Breed the supervisor of the laboratory which created the atomic bomb that killed over 100,000 Japanese citizens at the end of WWII. Breed said, “Think of it! Twenty-six people that man had on his conscience!” A man who murdered 26 people astounds Dr. Breed, when the death of 100,000 people should be on Dr. Breed’s conscience. All the characters that Vonnegut portrays have a disturbing sense of innocence about them; they are blissfully unaware of how their choices hurt others. No individual character is intrinsically evil; rather each characters seemingly innocuous attempts to find happiness has a ripple affect leading to the suffering of untold numbers of innocent people. Dr. Breed is quoted again on page 29 saying “New knowledge is the most valuable commodity on earth. The more truth we have to work with, the richer we become.” Does advancement in science really improve humanity? In this book, new science put in the hands of the stupid people consistently hurts humanity as a whole. Throughout Cat’s Cradle, Vonnegut utilizes irony as a means to question whether science is truly beneficial.
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Lovely post! I completely agree that Vonnegut's use of irony is an important pivot point around which to come to at least one interpretation of the novel. Science is certainly at issue here, as is humanity's ability to wield it. I suppose we must also keep in mind that Vonnegut himself was present during the fire bombing of Dresden (1945), so perhaps the characters of this apocalyptic tale are not so much a "karass" as little chips off the old block! IOW, perhaps Vonnegut has divvied up his experience at Dresden into the lives of his fictional creations. And thus perhaps he has, as you suggest above, constructed this fiction to get at the truth of science in the hands of man...
ReplyDeleteI definately agree with what you are saying in this post. It seems as though each individual character is so comsumed with obtaining new knowledge that they do not take into consideration what may happen because of their actions. Though Felix seemed innocent in his creation of the atom bomb, he still helped kill thousands, and didn't seem affected by it. It is as though Vonnegut is saying that society was arrogant, only caring about the knowledge they obtained. "Afterall, who cares what happens to someone else if we have the knowledge? That's what's most important..."
ReplyDeleteI agree. It's shocking the lack of effect morality has on most of it's main characters. The deaths of the 100,000s of people due to the evils of science is seen more as an experimental success that a crime against humanity. The views of these "logical" scientists seem very, very jaded morally. Their journey to find out what is logically correct seriously deterrs them from the more necessary journey to seek what is ethically correct.
ReplyDeleteI agree. Who knew that science could have such a devious side to itself. Usually when science comes to mind the things that pop up are penicillin, vaccination to small pox or polio.(Which is what the Crosby's say when John tells them that science hurts the civilians of San Lorenzo) You definitely bring out a broader view that science can also bring harm to mankind as well. But it is us human beings that are corrupt and immoral who bring catastrophies upon our own race. Well, at least that's how Kurt portrays it. I guess knowledge is really power even in a bad way.
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