Quest for Purpose in the Novels of Kurt Vonnegut Essay -- Works of Kurt

Quest for Purpose in the Novels of Kurt Vonnegut Kurt Vonneguts personal experiences force him to question the meaningless cruelties and conflicting paradigms in life. As a second generation German-American and a witness of Dresdens bombing during World War II, he observes firsthand the pointless destruction of which domain are capable (Dictionary 494). He devotes his works to understanding the jumbled, cruel gentlemans gentleman he encounters. According to Peter Reed, Vonneguts works feature a ...protagonist in quest of meaning in an absurd world (500). While attempt to understand the disordered universe around them, Vonneguts protagonists attempt to be strike convenient individuals by understanding the purpose of human life. As he probes the chaotic nature of the universe, Vonnegut, according to Ernest Ranly, ...seems preoccupied with genuine human questions, about war, peace, technology, human happiness (454). Vonneguts works show an obsessive desire to answer these que stions, and he explores them by narrating quests for order and purpose in human life. According to Stanley Schatt, Vonnegut ...believes passionately in both the importance of the individual and the need for human hit the hay and compassion (348). Vonneguts beliefs become apparent as the searchers invariably realize Vonneguts uprightness the universe is too chaotic to understand, so the secret to order in their lives is simply kindness. In Vonneguts novel, Galapagos, the narrator, Leon Trout, attempts to understand humanitys cruelty after witnessing the Vietnam Wars brutality and need of purpose. As a marine in ...a nearly endless, thankless, horrifying, and, finally, pointless war... (Galapagos 254), Trout struggles to come to terms w... ...nd A Study of the American Novel in the Nineteen-Sixties. Yale, 1973. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism, Vol. 3. Detroit Gale,1975. Ranly, Ernest W. What Are People For? Commonweal. 7 May 1971, 207-211. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism, Vol. 2. Detroit Gale,1974. Reed, Peter J. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. Dictionary of Literary Biography. Vol.2 American Novelists Since World War II. Detroit Gale, 1978. _____. Kurt Vonnegut. American Writers. 1981. Scribners Writers Series. Schatt, Stanley. The World of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. in reassessment Studies in Modern Fiction. Vol. XII, No. 3, 1971. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism, Vol. 1. Detroit Gale,1973. Vonnegut, Kurt. Galapagos. cutting York Dell, 1985. _____. Mother Night. New York Dell, 1961. _____. The Sirens of Titan. New York Dell, 1959.