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Armageddon in Retrospect

3.91 of 5 stars 3.91 · rating details · 5,510 ratings · 572 reviews

View our feature on Kurt Vonnegut's Armageddon in Retrospect.

Published on the first anniversary of Kurt Vonnegut's death in April 2007, Armageddon in Retrospect is a collection of twelve new and unpublished writings on war and peace. Written with Vonnegut's trademark rueful humor, the pieces range from a visceral nonfiction recollection of the destruction of Dresden during...more

Hardcover, 234 pages

Published April 1st 2008 by Putnam Adult

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Jul 22, 2008 Bruce rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Bruce by: Trevor Nagle

I often wonder how readers who did not come of age in the sixties view Kurt Vonnegut. I did, and he was iconic. How many times since then I have reread Cat's Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five with the same enjoyment I did when they were first published. Vonnegut's novels are deceptive; one has the feeling that one is reading something light, flippant, and ultimately insubstantial only to find the plots and characters remain with one for years afterward.

I approached this short collection of his unpu...more

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May 23, 2008 Steven Burt rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Anyone who has read Slaughterhouse Five

I finished "Armageddon in Retrospect" a few weeks ago. It was really good. I often wonder about works published posthumously, particularly when the works had been kicking around for a while before the author died.

Did the author want them to be published? Is there a reason they weren't published while they were alive?

I graduated from Law School just over one year ago, and it seems that in every different area of law there is a seminal case, the first that you read for the first day of class beca...more I finished "Armageddon in Retrospect" a few weeks ago. It was really good. I often wonder about works published posthumously, particularly when the works had been kicking around for a while before the author died.

Did the author want them to be published? Is there a reason they weren't published while they were alive?

I graduated from Law School just over one year ago, and it seems that in every different area of law there is a seminal case, the first that you read for the first day of class because it is the first in the book. In my Trusts and Estates class, there was a case about Franz Kafka's will. The will called for the burning of Kafka's papers upon his death, but the administrator of his estate (Brod, I believe) refused to burn them, and instead had them published. If memory serves, not only could Brod not bear to burn the papers, he was convinced that the world needed to see them. Though it's hard to argue with Brod's reasoning or blame him for his actions, it still makes one wonder. . .

Which brings be back to "Armageddon in Retrospect." Whenever I am reading or watching or otherwise experience art that has been published after the artist's death, I can't help but look for, and perhaps create, a "suicide note" quality to the work. This is particularly true, like I mentioned, if the work had been around for a while but, for whatever reason, was not published.

"Armageddon in Retrospect" is interesting not only because of the stories that it includes, but also the original visual artwork produced by Vonnegut. The stories and the artwork either explicitly or implicitly orbit around what seems to have been the defining moment of Vonnegut's life, and the subject of his most famous work, Slaughterhouse Five--his experiences as a prisoner of war in Dresden, Germany during World War II, where he was held before, during, and after the Allied Forces firebombed and destroyed the city.

This central theme makes what might have seemed a random collection of stories purposeful and related. On the last page of the book, there is a quote that sums up the book and, arguably, the Vonnegut library quite well:

“Where do I get my ideas from? You might as well have asked that of Beethoven. He was goofing around in Germany like everybody else, and all of a sudden this stuff came gushing out of him.

It was music.

I was goofing around like everybody else in Indiana, and all of a sudden stuff came gushing out.

It was disgust with civilization.”

As with any significant work of art, this book is both timeless and timely, dealing with universal themes that seem uniquely applicable to our day. I highly recommend this book.(less)

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Apr 08, 2008 cory rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: my kids

Quoting the author:

"And now please note that I have raised my right hand. And that means that I'm not kidding, that whatever I say next I believe to be true. So here it goes: The most spiritually splendid American phenomenon of my lifetime wasn't our contribution to the defeat of the Nazis, in which I played such a large part, or Ronald Reagan's overthrow of Godless Communism, in Russia at least.

The most spiritually splendid American phenomenon of my lifetime is how African-American citizens hav...more

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Apr 19, 2009 Jonathan rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Harley King, Vonnegut fans

I love this book because it offers so much - it's a buffet of essays, artistic sketches and short stories by a writer who managed to stay relevant and fresh into his late 80's. Some may be skeptical of the quality of work because the book was collected and published posthumously, but there's no need to fear that this is just another paycheck for the publisher. Most of the contents stand up with the rest of Vonnegut's work, which is to say, he paints pictures here with words of a humorous, horrib...more

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Oct 20, 2008 John rated it 3 of 5 stars

Vonnegut’s harrowing essay on the Dresden bombing, “Wailing Shall Be in All Streets,” is the highlight and centerpiece of this collection, and one of the best works of anti-war art I’ve read—something like the literary equivalent of Francisco Goya’s ‘Disasters of War’ series. This previously unpublished work is undated, but has the immediacy and urgency of an open wound. Dresden was the last major German city to escape bombing because there was nothing combative about it; it was a city of hospit...more

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May 26, 2008 Gerry rated it 2 of 5 stars

This collection of unpublished Vonnegut short stories demonstrates why they were never published when he was alive: they aren't very good. The only interesting item in Armageddon in Retrospect is a reproduction of the letter he wrote to his family after being freed as a POW in WWII, where he was forced carry the dead to bonfires following the bombing of Dresden. The letter hints at the writer he'd become: a dry humorist with a seemingly unpolished style who tackled great moral questions.

The onl...more

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May 12, 2008 Sibyl rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Coffee shop motor mouths

Post-Mortem collections published by family members in an
attempt to create a tribute or a final goodbye for their
famous relatives often leave you wondering if the deceased
is somewhere shaking their 'heads'.

In this case, I'm sure Vonnegut would roll his eyes as thousands of die-hard 'fans' of his work read through the stories searching for some 'goodbye' to the world.

Thankfully, Vonnegut never wrote such a piece a of crap.

These stories put you in a silent place and give the current batch of h...more

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Apr 05, 2008 Josh rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: you

What can one possibly say about Mr. Vonnegut? Hilarious? Yes. Honesty taken to extremes? Absolutely.

This collection of unpublished short stories borders on the amazing. Unlike his two other short story collections, this is a finely tuned treatise on the most overwhelming subject of Kurt's last years, war. Specifically, the ramifications of war on human life as explored in a slew of stories.

I could go into the specifics of each story, but I leave it to you to read and find yourself lost in the w...more

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May 28, 2008 Andy rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: own

This was kind of disappointing. The stories were generally good, though a lot of them were kind of same-y, about his time in the army, in a wrapper of fiction. But the book kicks off with a commencement speech he was to deliver, but died before he did. It was just depressing. He was angry, disheveled, and not funny. He was just angry, without seeing any way things could be better.

I don't know if the stories were old, and just unpublished, or written somewhat recently, but I was also disappointed...more

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May 15, 2008 R. rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2008

*does spit take with bloody mary* K'fwaaaah?!

That was my reaction upon hearing that Vonnegut had a new book coming out. But I'm here to tell you today that that was merely for show. To show that I was a little more than surprised. I suppose I could have written, "I'm a little more than surprised at this revelation, folks." But where's the fun in that?

Some would say its themes are repetitive. These are the same people who would complain about too many sparkles coming out of one diamond.

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Dec 05, 2008 Ned rated it 4 of 5 stars

As a fan of Kurt Vonnegut for over 40 years I really enjoyed this final book, published posthumously of previously unpublished essays. They are classic Vonnegut, showing the same craftsmanship as his earlier published works. For me, his great talent was leaving the reader unaware of the thought and polish that went into his writing, which often seems on the surface to be just casual story telling.

The forward, offered by his son Mark, revealed that Kurt passed on more than just his genes as he is...more

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Aug 06, 2012 Greg Bates rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012

There's always a sort of sense of worry surrounding collections of posthumous work by recently deceased authors: should Kurt Vonnegut's writing desk be emptied of its contents (after being exhaustively searched for secret compartments) and published, or is the whole thing better off being nailed shut and consigned to a storage locker, like a family refusing to see a loved one in their last moments and preferring to remember them the way they were in their prime? Fortunately, this is not a decisi...more There's always a sort of sense of worry surrounding collections of posthumous work by recently deceased authors: should Kurt Vonnegut's writing desk be emptied of its contents (after being exhaustively searched for secret compartments) and published, or is the whole thing better off being nailed shut and consigned to a storage locker, like a family refusing to see a loved one in their last moments and preferring to remember them the way they were in their prime? Fortunately, this is not a decision we as readers had to make, and as it turns out there's no cause for worry: this collection of twelve short stories, essays and speeches composed by Vonnegut shortly before his death displays him as both a fine wit and an emotionally moving author, even if he'd begun to get a bit worse for wear.

Vonnegut's prose shines even when his plot doesn't, and he can easily turn a stale group of stories into an entertaining group of comedies and tragedies. Most every story in AiR takes place during WWII, and almost all involve some group of captured soldiers on one side or another. It's a testament to Vonnegut's ability that he can take essentially the same plot and make it gut-bustingly funny ("Butter Before Bullets") or long-faced sad. (It must be said, unfortunately, that the very first entry in the novel - a transcript of the last speech Vonnegut gave some months before his death - should probably have been excised entirely. It's a rambling, scattershot ten minute diatribe in which Vonnegut makes several detours to bash George W. Bush and plug his family members' books, and wasn't his finest hour.)

Is [i]Apocalypse in Retrospect[/i] worth your time? It's hardly a good entry point into Vonnegut, but it is a solid addition to the man's canon. Sometimes the desk drawer can be thrown open without it being the end of the world.

Random note: i'm actually reviewing the audiobook version of this title, which I listened to on my brand new 45-minute commute to work. I'm not very good at reviewing the "audiobook" aspect of it, as I really have no basis for comparison, but I will say that it was an absolutely fantastic experience. The introduction is read by Kurt Vonnegut's son, the rest of the stories by actor Rip Torn, and i'm honestly giving this collection an extra star solely because Torn is almost supernaturally suited to reading Vonnegut's stories - i'd kill for a rendition of Slaughterhouse Five or Cat's Cradle done by him. His deadpan style and gruff characters fit perfectly with Vonnegut's absurdist war stories, and if he didn't get honesty choked up a couple of times reading then he did an admirable job of faking it. Definitely one to grab on disc.(less)

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Jun 12, 2012 Corey Pung rated it 4 of 5 stars

Somehow, over the years, people have started using the phrase “bleeding-heart liberal” as if it were a bad thing. In Armageddon in Retrospect, a posthumous collection of essays and stories, Kurt Vonnegut Jr. comes off as a bleeding-heart liberal in the best sense of the term.

There’s a distinction to be made between the bleeding-heart liberal and the hardline leftist. Both are useful and valuable in their own way. For an example of the more hardened individual, let’s look to my idol Christopher H...more Somehow, over the years, people have started using the phrase “bleeding-heart liberal” as if it were a bad thing. In Armageddon in Retrospect, a posthumous collection of essays and stories, Kurt Vonnegut Jr. comes off as a bleeding-heart liberal in the best sense of the term.

There’s a distinction to be made between the bleeding-heart liberal and the hardline leftist. Both are useful and valuable in their own way. For an example of the more hardened individual, let’s look to my idol Christopher Hitchens, who frequently writes of having to hold in his vomit whenever he meets perpetrators of crimes against humanity. Christopher never pulled his punches with serious offenders and was always quick to join in on idealogical battles when he could discern which side was right. Kurt Vonnegut on the other hand is more interested in the victims than the perpetrators, something that comes up in book after book throughout his long career.

In his most famous books, Vonnegut usually hides his bleeding heart under layers of irony and sardonic humor, but you can always tell its there, pulsing and gushing. Armageddon in Retrospect though is a collection of his unpublished writings concerning war and peace, and if I had to guess, the reason as to why these pieces went unpublished is because most lacked his trademark sense of humor. That’s not to say these entries aren’t good–no, many are good, but they’re different than what you’ve come to expect from Kurt Vonnegut’s ouevre.

For example, the most important piece in the collection is Kurt’s essay Wailing Shall Be In All Streets, where he once again revisits the frightful night when he witnessed the bombing of the German town Dresden by the Allied forces. If you’re not familiar with this incident, Kurt Vonnegut was a POW in WW2, and happened to be on the scene when the entire town of Dresden, which he called the most beautiful city in the world, was bombed for strategic reasons (a major railroad ran through it). This incident already provided the centerpiece for his greatest novel Slaughterhouse-Five. For those who simply won’t read that novel due to the sci-fi elements or the often crass humor, this essay is essential. Even those who have read and fallen in love with Slaughterhouse Five would benefit from reading the essay as it contains a more pure and refined take on the tragedy than appears in the novel.

If what you’re looking for is science-fiction, then you should skip ahead to Great Day, a story set on the battlefield of a future war where the army has found a way to distract the enemy with visions of soldiers from WW1 running rampant.

The title story is where we’re reunited with the classic smirking Kurt Vonnegut we know and love. In it, he gives us a vision of a world where Intelligent Design has run amok, and scientists are now tasked with trying to rid themselves of the Devil.

Some of the other stories that make up this short book are not quite as good. I have to wonder if Kurt Vonnegut would have even wanted these stories published were he alive today, but I’m sure this line of thought will only lead to specious reasoning. The weaker stories aren’t bad per se, but your time would be better spent re-reading his better stories like 2BRO2B.

If there’s one thing Kurt Vonnegut taught us, it’s that if we’re confronted with grave atrocities, it’s fine to let your heart bleed a little. Moreso, it’s human.

--Review by Corey Pung, author of The Madness of Art: Short Stories and A Rapturous Occasion (less)

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May 19, 2012 Mandy Jo rated it 3 of 5 stars

This week’s headline? “a gateway drug”

Why this book? "making new friends"

Which book format? bookcrossing.com traveling hardback

Primary reading environment? three years late

Any preconceived notions? *shrugs* it’s Vonnegut

Identify most with? “hiding her warmth”

Three little words? “dull, prim mask”

Goes well with? whiskey and cigarettes

Recommend this to? “people of Dresden”

This was a bookcrossing.com “traveling book” I found in a coffee shop three years ago, the first and only bookcrossing book to f...more

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Mar 26, 2012 Simon rated it 4 of 5 stars

Armageddon In Retrospect by Kurt Vonnegut
I read this in about 48 hours in Prague and was
perfect to be read whilst sitting on our window
ledge overlooking the Old Town Square and
opposite the Astronomical Clock.
This is the Second Book Kurt has put out since
he died, why let death get in the way of a good
career.
It was also the second book of our trip to be
set at least in part in Czechoslovakia as it is
one of the places Kurt writes about in this
collection of unpublished short stories on the
t...more

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Jun 20, 2011 Elliot rated it 3 of 5 stars

Dear friend:

May I have a minute of your time?

In a sophmoric Sophomoric craze, I read a dozen or so of Kurt Vonnegut's novels, loving almost all of them dearly, but retaining very little about each individual book. Instead, I have the an amorphous Vonnegut cloud, the hazy remnants of my first real literary fascination from a time when my critical taste was somewhat negligible.

And while I'm at it, I've always loved that, no matter when a particular work was written, all of Vonnegut's oeuvre reads...more Dear friend:

May I have a minute of your time?

In a sophmoric Sophomoric craze, I read a dozen or so of Kurt Vonnegut's novels, loving almost all of them dearly, but retaining very little about each individual book. Instead, I have the an amorphous Vonnegut cloud, the hazy remnants of my first real literary fascination from a time when my critical taste was somewhat negligible.

And while I'm at it, I've always loved that, no matter when a particular work was written, all of Vonnegut's oeuvre reads as if it were written by the primary image I have of the man -- an old coot, grumpy yet so kind, the aging uncle who wants to leave you something of his wisdom.

Though unified in theme, this collection is a bit unstable in quality. Nothing is terrible (could Vonnegut write something terrible? I remember hating Slapstick, and finding God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater annoying, but I wouldn't trust myself at 16 -- I liked Ayn Rand, for Christ's sake), but a few pieces are clearly the sort of mediocre works that a talented writers keeps unpublished on purpose. I enjoyed Mark Vonnegut's introductory essay, and particularly fell in love with Kurt's first piece,a bizarrely disjointed, rambling speech that reminds me, even in its circumabulation, why I found the man so electrifying in the first place. The title piece is also terrific, as well was the powerful (and real! I think...) letter home to Kurt's family while he was a Private. "Wailing Shall be in All Streets" is glorious, frightening and yet hilarious and yet mournfully sad.

The other pieces? Well, they contain many of the elements that would later go into Vonnegut's most anthologized short stories, as well as motifs that occurred in his longer fiction as well. They are forgettable, but not unenjoyable. I laughed out loud a few times, and felt myself fall silent as I pondered the total absurdity of war, and generally had a stimulating time with the book.

I'm somehow coming closer to having read everything this great American published -- though by now you know the story of my second year of high school -- but I have not yet grasped all that Uncle Kurt had to teach me.(less)

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Mar 30, 2011 Bookophile rated it 5 of 5 stars

Kurt Vonnegut's novels are among my favorite, which led me to question whether his essays and short stories would be as good. The 2008 publication was the first posthumous collection and has a pretty funny introduction by Kurt's son Mark Vonnegut. The book itself contains 13 stories and essays about War and Peace, two of Vonnegut's most common themes.

The stories contained a lot of autobiographical information. Each story had a character or two whose experience was more directly based on Kurt's l...more

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Sep 03, 2010 Book Calendar rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: essays, literature, writing

Armageddon In Retrospect-- Kurt Vonnegut, Review

Armageddon in Retrospect by Kurt Vonnegut is a posthumous collection of his work. It opens with a letter dated May 29, 1945 about his stay as a prisoner of war near Dresden. He decries what happened there.

The short stories in this collection are about war and conflict. There is nothing about peace. Many of them are set in the immediate aftermath of World War II. There is often a simple brutality to these stories. These stories are not so much abou...more
Armageddon In Retrospect-- Kurt Vonnegut, Review

Armageddon in Retrospect by Kurt Vonnegut is a posthumous collection of his work. It opens with a letter dated May 29, 1945 about his stay as a prisoner of war near Dresden. He decries what happened there.

The short stories in this collection are about war and conflict. There is nothing about peace. Many of them are set in the immediate aftermath of World War II. There is often a simple brutality to these stories. These stories are not so much about combat, but about occupation, prison camps, and the psychology of war.

In the story, Guns Before Butter, we find three American Prisoners of War discussing what food they will eat when they get home. They are so hungry, they can think of little else. In Just You and Me Sammy, we get a story about a collaborator in a German P.O.W. camp.

The stories have a biting humor to them and a degree of sadness. Kurt Vonnegut questions the motives of the firebombing of Dresden by the United States in World War II but not the overall motives for the war.

There are numerous simple drawings, almost doodles between the stories. Some are in color. One says "There should be a secretary of the future." I rather like it.

I think some of the writings were clearly meant to be published posthumously. The Commandant's Desk is an interesting story which questions patriotism and occupation. I think it would have generated quite a bit of vitriol if Kurt Vonnegut was still alive. But, he is dead so there is little that can be said.

In Kurt Vonnegut at Clowes Hall, April 27, 2007 he gives a speech. There are numerous one liners. I think it would have been better if it was heard. The speech feels like he is trying to emulate Mark Twain. In the second part of the speech, he mentions his son Mark Vonnegut is also a writer. Mark Vonnegut wrote the introduction to this book.

A number of stories are clear statements against war and political manipulation. Armageddon In Retrospect seems to make a statement about the cold war. Happy Birthday 1951 is about attempting to live free of war in a war zone.

I enjoyed reading this collection. It was very easy to read. The craft of the writing was beautiful. Not all of the stories will be for everyone, but at least a few of the stories will get you thinking about the meaning war, violence, and political manipulation.

I wrote this short review using folded in half 8 1/2 inch by 11 inch plain white paper. This is just about the size of a hardback book cover. The cover of Armageddon In Retrospect was my tablet. Like most library books it has a plastic cover over the dust jacket. I labeled each section of the paper with a circled number as I finished it. I wrote this on the train with a black ballpoint pen. I am typing it into the computer right now.

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Jul 16, 2010 ICPL Staff Picks added it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, john, staff-picks-blog

After Mark Twain died, some of his works were posthumously published, which he considered too daring to release while he was still alive–The Mysterious Stranger, Incident in the Philippines, Letters from the Earth, and more. I’ve always hoped the same would be true of Kurt Vonnegut.

Armageddon in Retrospect isn’t that book. It turns out to be a perfectly readable collection of his early, uncollected stories, with an occassional speech or essay thrown in. Much of the book represents early attempt...more

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Apr 29, 2010 Diane rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Why?
Just because I'm a Vonnegut junkie, I picked this up at my local Borders a while back. I was excited to read some short tidbits by the infamous Kurt, considering he was always so good at getting his point across within a few short words after building you up, building you up, making you laugh, and smashing reality in your face. He really would only need a few pages to do this, and so I wanted to read this, even after his ironic death.

It really wasn't what I wanted. Though the stories were go...more

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Dec 08, 2009 Jonny99 rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The book of posthumous writings are a diverse collection including a 2007 speech given by Vonnegut in Indiana and a letter written home by Vonnegut detailing his capture and mistreatment as a WWII prisoner of war in Dresden and some short fiction. The speech has the silly, rambling tone of that somewhat senile grand-uncle that comes to Thanksgiving each year. The non-fiction account of the 200,000 who were killed in the Dresden fire-bombing by the allies gives some insight into Vonnegut’s later...more

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Jun 15, 2013 Ellice rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a posthumous collection of previously unpublished writings (fiction and nonfiction--letters, speeches, stories, and artwork) by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (though here they drop the "Jr." for some reason). As I was reading it, I kept thinking the stories were not Kurt's best work--but with Kurt, that doesn't necessarily mean they aren't great. I really enjoyed many, including "The Unicorn Trap," "The Commandant's Desk," and "Guns Before Butter"--these brought Kurt's signature dark wry humor and p...more

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Mar 01, 2013 Logan Williams rated it 3 of 5 stars

Kurt Vonnegut does not seem like the average hero for a angsty teenage boy who'd rather get his pinkie cut off than get a haircut, but that is the beauty hidden inside his works. He is the literary teenage dream with his underlying message, blatant absurdity, and understanding of the tough things in life.\

These stories are all very short, only about 20 pages at the most, but he is able to coax out the life of his characters in these mere paragraphs with which he forms his work. He opens it up wi...more

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Feb 12, 2013 Cy Bennett rated it 3 of 5 stars

If for nothing else, read this for the speech Vonnegut would have given in Indianapolis in April of 2007. I felt that it was the best representation of Vonnegut's writing in this collection, and it gives such a marvelous insight into the type of man (and speaker!) he was. There are a few powerful wartime stories that give chilling accounts of the author's time as a POW in Dresden in WWII. The theme of war, as with many of his works, plays a large role in this collection.

"A Good Day" is one of th...more

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Sep 02, 2009 Catherine rated it 5 of 5 stars

A bittersweet collection; so thoroughly enjoyable and as always, thought provoking in his condemnation of war and politics. So sad to know that there will be no more writings from this great humanist and author. Those of greater skill and knowledge have filled the literature with more thoughtful comments than the likes of me--so go read those reviews. For me, the forward by his son, Mark Vonnegut, was such an act of love that it should be enjoyed simply for the insights it provides into Vonnegut...more

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May 19, 2012 Lauren rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: made-me-cry, made-me-laugh, nonfiction, reviewed, short-stories

Sometimes posthumous works are a bad idea. Often, there's a reason that an author never published the work, and often that reason is because it wasn't very good. While that may be true of a few of the stories in this collection about war and its effects on the world and on humankind, there are far more gems than there are duds. Some are nonfiction, some are fiction, some are illustrated. War, and particularly Vonnegut's involvement in World War II, is a focus of almost every one of his novels, b...more

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Dec 07, 2011 Eric Cartier rated it 4 of 5 stars

"Nobody knew what to do. The fate of humanity seemed out of the control of human beings. Every day was filled with desperate helplessness, and with worse news than that of the day before." - from the title story

This is a very fine assembly of unpublished writings about war and peace. There are short stories, artwork, a speech, a non-fiction piece, and a scan of the letter Kurt wrote his parents shortly after being freed as a prisoner of war. I highly recommend it to Vonnegut fans, all of whom wi...more "Nobody knew what to do. The fate of humanity seemed out of the control of human beings. Every day was filled with desperate helplessness, and with worse news than that of the day before." - from the title story

This is a very fine assembly of unpublished writings about war and peace. There are short stories, artwork, a speech, a non-fiction piece, and a scan of the letter Kurt wrote his parents shortly after being freed as a prisoner of war. I highly recommend it to Vonnegut fans, all of whom will find something of interest between its covers. To those folks who don't know his work, or who happen to dislike it, I recommend the book as a inviting sampler. My one gripe is that there are no dates associated with the pieces. Had the publishers included them, KV afficianados could have had the fun task of figuring how they fit alongside other works he published during his life.

The non-fiction piece is masterful and harrowing: "Wailing Shall Be in All Streets" is an historical account of Vonnegut's experiences before, during, and after the U.S. air force's destruction of Dresden, Germany. It's the clearest he's ever been about the incident (of course, Slaughterhouse-Five was intentionally fragmented, to mimic the hellacious disorientation) and one of the most powerful protestations against war that I've read. The five quotes that follow are from it:

"Giants stalked the Earth above us. First came the soft murmur of their dancing on the outskirts, then the grumbling of their plodding toward us, and finally the ear-splitting crashes of their heels upon us--and thence to the outskirts again. Back and forth they swept: saturation bombing."

"A corporal, who had lost an eye after two years on the Russian front, ascertained before we marched that his wife, his two children, and both of his parents had been killed. He had one cigarette. He shared it with me." Ah! (clutching heart)

"Burned alive, suffocated, crushed--men, women, and children indiscriminately killed. For all the sublimity of the cause for which we fought, we surely created a Belsen of our own. The method was impersonal, but the result was equally cruel and heartless. That, I am afraid, is a sickening truth."

"The 'Get Tough America' policy, the spirit of revenge, the approbation of all destruction and killing, has earned us a name for obscene brutality."

"When, late in the war, with the Wehrmacht breaking up on all fronts, our planes were sent to destroy this last major city, I doubt if the question was asked, 'How will this tragedy benefit us, and how will that benefit compare with the ill-effects in the long run?'"
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Jan 05, 2010 Mynameisandycostello rated it 5 of 5 stars

What a joy it was to read his short story work! And, also, it was a joy to read fiction by Vonnegut that dealt with entirely believable characters and plots. All of which, of course, was historical fiction of WWII.

You don't often see Vonnegut write without adding some sort of supernatural/science fiction aspect to the story. In these stories, he didn't seem to feel the urge to do such a thing (or he did, and restrained himself) because I think he wanted war to speak for itself.

In a sense, the b...more

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Sep 27, 2009 Tommy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, non-fiction, poetry-short-fiction

This book mixed non-fiction in the form of a few speeches by Kurt Vonnegut with quite a few short stories on the topic of war.

I absolutely loved the speeches at the beginning. I think Vonnegut's wit is tremendous and biting and his tongue-in-cheek delivery and critique is tough to match. I would have been thrilled if the entire book were speeches because I think he has a lot of great things to say and he's funny as hell.

That is not to say that the stories are terrible. Most of them are very good...more

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Jan 22, 2009 Adam rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, short-stories

Just another great collection of short stories form a masterful writer!

In Armageddon in Retrospect, Vonnegut explores humanity at war through a series of eleven fictional writings. Also included in the book are two 'realistic' pieces by the author. One is the transcript of the final speech he ever gave at Clowes Hall in Indianapolis. The second is a letter to his family written following his release from a German POW camp.

Though all the writings have Kurt's distinctly humorous, satirical and st...more

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About Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut, Junior was an American novelist, satirist, and most recently, graphic artist. He was recognized as New York State Author for 2001-2003.

He was born in Indianapolis, later the setting for many of his novels. He attended Cornell University from 1941 to 1943, where he wrote a column for the student newspaper, the Cornell Daily Sun. Vonnegut trained as a chemist and worked as a journali...more

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Quotes from Armageddon in Retrospect

“My advice to writers just starting out? Don't use semi-colons! They are transvestite hermaphrodites, representing exactly nothing. All they do is suggest you might have gone to college.” — 25 people liked it

“He often said he had to be a writer because he wasn't good at anything else. He was not good at being an employee. Back in the mid-1950's, he was employed for Sports Illustrated, briefly. He reported back to work, was asked to write a short piece on a racehorse that jumped over a fence and tried to run away. Kurt stared at the blank piece of paper all morning and then typed, "The horse jumped over the fucking fence," and walked out, self-employed again.” — 16 people liked it

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