Reviews for Bluebeard

The average rating for Bluebeard based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2007-03-30 00:00:00 Diana Robinson One thing I've discovered is that people tend to have different favorites of Vonnegut's work. Many prefer Slaughter House Five, some love Breakfast of Champions, and my sister's favorite is Galapagos. The only person I've ever met whose favorite Vonnegut book is Bluebeard is... me. So it goes. The book follows former abstract expressionist painter Rabo Karabekian, serving as his autobiography and a mystery story simultaneously. The mystery? What is Rabo keeping in the huge potato barn on his large estate. Some of you may remember Mr. Karabekian from Breakfast of Champions; he was largely the same character, albeit younger in years. He's famous for his paintings, you see: he would take huge canvases, spray paint them all one color, and put pieces of colored tape on them. There's several jokes regarding Rabo's paintings, one of which he gave away in Breakfast: his work is Rabo's view of the human soul. When you strip away all of the unnecessary crap that makes us up, we're all basically glowing shafts of light, represented by the pieces of tape. I won't give away the other joke, but it's a good one. Anyway, this book is a lot of things: a reflection on an imaginary life, a faux biography, and a moral we could all probably take to heart. And we do get to find out what Bluebeard keeps in his potato barn. It's a darned big thing.

Review # 2 was written on 2019-10-13 00:00:00 John Henrikson "Everything about life is a joke. Don't you know that?" From beginning to end, Bluebeard has Kurt Vonnegut written all over it. His irreverent tone, summed up in the quote above, along with his concomitant exploration of what it means to be human, brings together familiar themes in Vonnegut's work. Bluebeard is the mock autobiography of abstract expressionist painter, Rabo Karabekian, a character who first appeared in Breakfast of Champions. This is a book about what art is and what it can do in a society in which, according to Karabekian, "the young people of today seemed to be trying to get through life with as little information as possible." For Karabekian, such information offers a connection to humanity and all of its symbols and cultural artifacts. It thus goes to the heart of what it means to be an artist. However, best-selling popular writer, Circe Berman (who moves in with Karabekian) tells him that such knowledge is useless. Their relationship reflects a debate between high and low culture. It is no surprise then that Karabekian and Berman have a very different view of the abstract expressionism Karabekian espouses. Karabekian is repeatedly asked to explain what his art is about. However, in a response that works for the artist as well as the writer, he repeatedly maintains that the artist doesn't owe it to the public to give them what they want. What's really wanted is a challenge. Not sure how I'll place it with other Vonnegut classics, but I really enjoyed Bluebeard! 4.5 stars "The darkest secret of this country, I am afraid, is that too many of its citizens imagine that they belong to a much higher civilization somewhere else. That higher civilization doesn't have to be another country. It can be the past instead'the United States as it was before it was spoiled by immigrants and the enfranchisement of the blacks." From Bluebeard (1987)