Monday, February 10, 2014

Constant Manipulation



Vonnegut is constantly manipulating his readers in Cat’s Cradle.  This book of his is Vonnegut’s own personal cat’s cradle.  Traditionally, a game based on manipulating shapes out of a piece of string with just one’s fingers, Vonnegut has turned his book into a manipulation of his own, substituting paper and words for string and fingers. Newt Hoenikker would repeatedly say, “No damn cat, and no damn cradle” (p.166) throughout the second half of the book.  In doing so, Newt is pointing out the lies exist everywhere.
            The entire book is made of lies, as the readers are told right from the get go in the pretext.  Even within the book, and through the lessons of Bokonon the reader is taught that fomas are essentially lies and important for people to have hope.  Vonnegut layers lies on top of lies to challenge the reader to find the truth in what he is writing.  Where the truth lies, I have yet to determine myself.  However, from reading the book I understand there is no cat and there is no cradle, meaning what I am told I am reading may not necessarily be what that.  Vonnegut has successfully manipulated me, and I assume plenty of other readers, into a whirlwind of confusion as I try to wrack my mind around the truth and untruth and actual meaning of his novel Cat’s Cradle.

1 comment:

  1. I agree that this novel revolves around manipulation and is really a big game. I think Vonnegut is the ringmaster of this game. Before the table of the contents, the reader has already been brought into the game, whether he or she knows it or not. If I had read Cat's Cradle on my own it would have been a very different experience for me, but a game nonetheless. Vonnegut is manipulating our thinking throughout the entire book, in many different convoluted ways. You mentioned that Vonnegut challenges the reader to find the truth in his writing. I wonder if there's one "truth" that he wants us to discover, or if the point is that we all find our own "truth" in the story. I think part of the game might be that the truth that lies in this story is different to everyone, and just depends on the reader. I don't think we would ever be able to uncover one definitive truth, no matter how hard we looked for it.

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