Witticist

Human Race | Independent thinking characterized great American novelist Kurt Vonnegut | Mark Bergin

When Kurt Vonnegut died April 11 due to brain injuries from a nasty fall, hundreds of writers eulogized the 84-year-old author with some of his best humanistic quotes and witticisms—fitting tributes for the simple and elegant prose of this troubled and prolific American novelist.

But Vonnegut proved no ordinary humanist, noting in an interview last year that human bodies "are miracles of design. Scientists are pretending they have the answers for how we got this way when natural selection couldn't possibly have produced such machines. . . . Something perfectly wonderful is going on, I do not doubt it. But the explanations I hear do not satisfy me."

That kind of independent thought coupled with Vonnegut's dark humor and whacky science-fiction storytelling elevated him among the most influential voices of his time. Despite the success of his books, most notably Slaughterhouse-Five in 1969, Vonnegut attempted suicide in 1984 and spent much of his life in depression. So it goes.