#339 The No-Talent Kid- Kurt Vonnegut

#339 The No-Talent Kid- Kurt Vonnegut

Mr. George M. Helmholtz lived in a world of music, and even the throbbing of his headache came to him musically, if painfully, as the "deep-throated boom of a bass drum seven feet in diameter.”

The Lincoln High School band had won every single band competition the last ten years until last year, when the Johnstown High School Band had stunned the judges with their amazing over-sized bass drum.  The loss haunts Helmholtz as he tries to prepare this year's band for the next competition.

Enter Walter Plummer, the least talented kid in the school: “No one else. He realized, no matter how untalented, could fill the last chair of the organization as well has Plummer had.”

When Plummer was able to procure an even larger drum, he tried to make a deal with Helmholtz for a place of honor in the band. The agreement they struck, as would this story, would make O. Henry proud.

Rating: 7-8-8-7 Total= 30

#318 The Package- Kurt Vonnegut

#318 The Package- Kurt Vonnegut

Earl Fenton just sold the plant he spent his life building and after spending months traveling the world, he comes home to his brand new state of the art home, the whole package.

He wasn’t always rich however, he was the poorest of his college fraternity brothers. He wasn’t “exactly behind the door when they passed out looks and brains.”

“No—but when they passed out money, they handed me a waiter’s jacket and a mop.”

So, he has got a bit of a chip on his shoulders. When he gets a call suddenly from one of his wealthier Frat brothers, he sees it as a great opportunity for a little bragging. But as he starts showing off the opulence and grandness of his life, he doesn’t get the satisfying jealousy and envy he wished for…and that deepens the resentment he has unfairly held for Charley the last forty years.

It turns out that Charley isn’t exactly the person Earl thinks he is, but that chip on his shoulder is hard to remove after all these years.

Rating: 7-7-7-7 Total= 28

#297 Any Reasonable Offer- Kurt Vonnegut

#297 Any Reasonable Offer- Kurt Vonnegut

This is a very funny Vonnegut story, first person tale following the plight of a real estate agent. He believes he has the job with the most thankless clients. “Maybe dentists have rougher client relationships, but I doubt it. Give a man a choice between having his teeth or a real estate salesman’s commission extracted, and he’ll choose the pliers and Novocain every time.”

If the house sells fast the client complains that he didn’t do enough to earn the commission, if the house doesn’t sell for months, he didn’t do enough to earn the commission. When a rich couple walks in asking about the most expensive property he manages, he sees dollar signs.

As always, life isn’t that easy. This story gives new meaning to “real estate fraud.” It might give the agent some good ideas for his next vacation.

Rating: 8-7-8-8 Total= 31

#276 Mnemonics- Kurt Vonnegut

#276 Mnemonics- Kurt Vonnegut

This is just a small story about Alfred Moorehead, a new man. He has learned to unlock a gift for memory. His career has taken off and his life is almost perfect, but there is always one thing that stops us from being happy.

“Now since he has attended the company’s two-day Memory Clinic, names, facts, and numbers clung to his memory like burdocks to an Airdale. The clinic had, in fact, indirectly cleared up just about every major problem in his uncomplicated life, save one—his inability to break the ice with his secretary, Ellen, whom he had silently adored for two years.”

His mnemonic prowess was due to his ability to attach a fact or a figure in his head to the image of a beautiful movie star. This talent was put to the test one day by a long list of things to remember, and when he had to use the image of Ellen as well as the famous starlets, his fondness for her finally slips.

Rating: 7-7-7-7 Total= 28

#256 Thanasphere- Kurt Vonnegut

#256 Thanasphere- Kurt Vonnegut

“…a short story, because of its physiological and psychological effects on a human being, is more closely related to Buddhist styles of meditation than it is to any other form or narrative entertainment.”

The second and last collection of short fiction by Kurt Vonnegut, Bagombo Snuff Box, is his stories which appeared in magazines. This was the hey-day of magazine writing. Households would have subscriptions to dozens of magazines and these small fictions would be entertainment for the whole family.

Because of the large scale number of these magazines and stories, much of what was printed was of relatively low value, probably the same value as what’s on TV. Sure there maybe a good show here and there, but most of it was blind entertainment. Vonnegut, however became a sought after voice in post-war American letters, so this collection should be fun.

We begin with Thanasphere (dead space so to speak), a tale about the first manned space craft as it orbits the earth. It was launched for military purposes, but when reports come back from its pilot Major Rice, all he can do is talk about the voices he hears, voices of dead people talking in the cosmos.

Vonnegut taps into the age’s imagination like no one else. Space, the great unknown. What is out there and how does it effect us? Great thought often happens before we know the truth of such mysteries…and with it, interesting fiction.

Notable Passage: “Maybe that was the spirit of this era of the atom bomb, H-bomb, God-knows-what-next-bomb—to be amazed at nothing.”

Rating: 7-7-8-7 Total= 29