Look at the Birdie: Unpublished Short Fiction Book

Kurt Vonnegut has always been one of my favorite authors; he was one of the very first writers that was able to change the way I think. I had always loved books, but after my first encounter with KV in high school, I amazingly realized what a novel could actually do. But it's more than than that. Vonnegut has always reminded me of my grandpa, though thinking about it, I'm not really sure why. The only things I know of that they had in common were their age, WWII, and Pall Mall cigarettes.

Maybe it's that reading KV's books have clued me in to a side of my grandpa I was never able to know. So many times, I would ask him about his experiences during WWII, only to hear, "Aww honey, you don't want to hear about all that." Then he would quickly tell a joke to change the subject. This man, who practically raised me, and gave me everything else I'd ever wanted, never gave me that. I didn't know if he really just didn't want to talk about it; I mean, who knows what he saw and what things he had to do over there. I remember my grandma telling me that he never even said much about it to her. She told me he thought it was inappropriate to talk about certain things in front of women. It's not that he thought women were inferior, to him it was a matter of respect. He was from a different era, that's just how he was. Awhile ago, my GR friend Cait sent me a great article about Vonnegut attending the Connecticut Forum shortly before he passed away. At the interview, Joyce Carol Oates went all feminist on him in front of everybody. After reading that, I still can't bring myself to read one of her books. Bitch. (JCO, not my friend Cait) Seriously Joyce, he's an old man. Lay. The. Fuck. Off.

I'm not sure when all of these stories were written, but some of the ideas in them do seem a bit dated. Most of them wouldn't seem spectacular to anyone who hasn't read any Vonnegut before, but considering the sub-title of the book, Unpublished Short Fiction, I'm okay with the fact it wasn't a phenomonal collection. Who knows if Vonnegut, who was always re-writing, even wanted these to ever be published? One high point, this book has some of KV's illustrations that I'd never seen before. (yay, pictures!!!) Here's my favorite, drawn only a few months before he died.


Reading this felt like it gave me an extra inside look into Vonnegut. Kind of like finding a picture or letter from a loved one who's passed away. No matter what it looks like, or what it says, it still feels like a treasure. Certain things can remind us of who people actually were, and this book shows that Kurt Vonnegut above all, was a writer. In my eyes, just like my grandpa, there is nothing he could do that I wouldn't absolutely love.