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Picture of the Day
Monday
May 17, 2021
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Hard to believe it's been 14 years
since Kurt Vonnegut passed away.
When I first started reading him,
he was considered something of a
has-been, but today his standing is
greater than ever, as evidenced by
the steady trickle of posthumous
publications, critical studies, and
the revamped KVML. Most of his
unpublished fiction could have
stayed that way, but this pastiche
of his comments on writing is an
enjoyable and edifying read. It's
basically a 400-page elaboration
of a short essay on style he wrote
for a paper company ad campaign
in 1980. Reproduced in the book,
it says reprints could be had by
request, so I dropped them a line,
41 years after the fact. It'd take a
miracle, but I picture a Bartleby
rooting in a closet and resignedly
forwarding a whole box of them.