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KLINKOWITZ, JEROME. Kurt Vonnegut's America. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2009. x + 142 pp. $34.95. Cloth.
Although written by a leading critic and published by a university press, Kurt Vonnegut's America is not really an academic book. It is, however, the one book that anyone coming to Vonnegut for the first time or wanting to reacquaint her- or himself with Vonnegut should read to learn about the work and the man. A cross between a short study and a long obituary, Kurt Vonnegut's America is written in the conversational style that JerTo the Point, and other news shows following Vonnegut's death in 2007 and is intended to be summary rather than seminal in the way that Klinkowitz's groundbreaking 1975 book, Literary Disruptions, devoted to Vonnegut and other "post-contemporary" American fiction writers was. Made up almost entirely of decade-by-decade, bookby- book discussions of Vonnegut and his work, this compact but comprehensive volume offers a Cook's tour with an immensely knowledgeable guide who tells us what Vonnegut did; how and why he did it; and to what effect on author, reader, and nation alike. If the judgments made and the lessons drawn seem at times a little too pat, the reason is not intellectual laziness but Klinkowitz's way of paying homage to Vonnegut by borrowing some of his techniques and taking some of the same risks, including being willing to sound less sophisticated than he is. Although the overall structure is linear, much of Kurt Vonnegut's America is as collage-like as Vonnegut's own work, combining criticism, homage, obituary, and personal reminiscence into a brief but compelling portrait of a distinctly American artist. In it, we see, for example, how the humor Vonnegut used as the youngest child to get his family's attention became a major element of his literary style as he grappled with larger personal, national, and global issues. Klinkowitz also discusses how the Depression that...