Cat's Cradle Study Guide
Cat’s Cradle is a novel by Kurt Vonnegut that is science fiction by style and the bitter satire by nature. The main theme of it is the huge impact of technical progress on humanity and the possible hazards that it can bring. The author uses as characters the children of the (fictional) scientist who worked on the nuclear bomb that was used in Hiroshima. This is deeply symbolic, because the scientist created even more deadly weapon that can kill the whole planet. He didn’t intend to do so (like the scientists who studied nuclear reactions didn’t intend to kill people in Hiroshima), but the weapon - the dreadful ice-nine that can instantly freeze any water and turn it into more ice-nine - is released.
The poor and militaristic country the main action is set in is also a metaphorical allusion of the human society where any discoveries and achievements of science are used not to make the life of the people better, but to reach more power and military strength. The dictator of San Lorenzo is a barely educated man who threatens his opponent with being impaled on a hook. The religion of the country is hypocritical to the core: officially it is Christianity, but the real religion is nihilistic Bokononism that was forbidden according to the plan of its founder, to make it spread faster as a secret knowledge.
The catastrophe caused by ice-nine can destroy all the world like the nuclear explosion destroyed Hiroshima. The main character, John, who was just a simple writer at the beginning, gets involved into the events and his incompetence, though good-intentioned, plays as important part as the violence of the San Lorenzo dictator or the genius of the inventor of ice-nine. These three things - mindless violence, spineless incompetence, and sharp mind dedicated to science only without thinking about the consequences - are what Vonnegut warns us against.
Cat’s Cradle is a sci-fi, a powerful satire and an anti-war novel that, despite having a bit outdated plotline for the pampered modern audience, is definitely worth reading.
Author: Erica Morris
New Essays
The book begins with a writer named John researching for his book about the day the atomic bomb was dropped. He talks with Newt, son of Dr. Felix Hoenikker, the creator of the atomic bomb. He then goes to Illium, the town where the Hoenikkers grew up, and there he learns of ice-nine, one splinter...
“Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly;Man got to sit and wonder 'why, why, why?'Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land;Man got to tell himself he understand.” — — “In the beginning, God created the earth, and he looked upon it in His cosmic loneliness.And God said, "Let Us make living creatures out of...
The dictionary defines Nihilism as a doctrine which considers all values baseless and states that nothing is knowable or can be communicated. In Cat s Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut suggests a meaninglessness of all human pursuits, therefore stating nothing leads to jubilance, especially not desires, by...
In both Cat"s Cradle by Kurt Vonegut and Good Country People by Flannery O"Connor the authors show how a character is corrupted and changed from an existentialist to a nihilist. The existentialist ends up losing their faith in life, and is left believing in nothing. They then turn to being...