The Complicated Futility of Ignorance: Kurt Vonnegut's Hocus Pocus
Written: Apr 07 '03
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Product Rating:
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Pros: amusing, easy to read style, structure
Cons: a little slow starting, forthright, some improper racial terms
The Bottom Line: A solid work toward the top of Vonnegut's library.
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| lorenmgreen's Full Review: Kurt Vonnegut Jr. - Hocus Pocus |
Hocus Pocus (1990) by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. tells the story of Eugene Debs Hartke, a Vietnam War veteran, professor at an unaccredited institution, and seducer of middle-aged, lonely women. In short, the novel's plot follows Hartke after Vietnam, into teaching, and mostly follows his ousting from the latter position in an awkward and cruel twist of fate. (Please note, my book reviews reveal minor/few details in effort not to be a spoiler.)
It begins and ends in a Japanese owned (for profit) prison in upstate New York. As Hartke unravels his past, he begins on one side of the water and ends up behind bars. In between, we see his marriage, his war experiences, his bosses and friends, a prison riot, the cruelty and animal instincts of humanity, and lots of wacky, amusing phrases. This all occurs through the recollections of the narrator, now awaiting trial and suffering from tuberculosis (cough cough). The structure is well weaved and there is no redundancy in revelations of the past, rather the story feels continuous.
Like other Vonnegut novels, the book is told in a first person, narrative style. Besides the book's intro, which explains the paragraphs formatting and tells of how the book was written by its author (Hartke), the voice belongs to the protagonist. Also similar with other Vonnegut works, the other characters that Hartke comes across are typically minor in their development and they serve mostly to give form to an expression of the main character. The book is incredibly focused on its hero. But, the hero is not the sole subject of concern here: it is the world in which this hero has risen and fallen that interests Vonnegut.
The world is one that offers little to those who have little to begin with-one where comically stupid (and nearly inbred) children of well-to-do families can earn educational degrees free of charge while living in a pristine valley while, contrastingly, thousands of Americans (mostly non-whites) sit behind bars that were more or less all they ever knew. The world that Hartke views is one that, like the computer simulation game within the novel-Griot, has already pinpointed just what an individual can and cannot do in society. Consequent to this viewpoint are the events in Hartke's life, namely in his career changes and in his eventual downfall and arrest. The story begins with Hartke in prison (across the lake from the symbolic upper-class society of which he was once a part), where he is writing his story, regardless of whether he will be found innocent or guilty.
The general tone of this book is that America's prime is past-that World War II was the country's "finale rack" (the final rack of explosives at a fireworks show). This tone is abundantly clear through direct statements rather than through subtle metaphor. Of course, Vonnegut crafts the novel so that many of these statements look just as ridiculous as those with which he is arguing, but quotes such as fellow teach Paul Slazinger's "Being an American means never having to say you're sorry" come across as pretty central to the book's outlook.
A key subplot to the book is the psychological effects of war on an individual-nothing new to the WWII veteran's work. Here, Hartke is a vet from Vietnam, and the lingering effects of war on an individual's psychology as well as the horrific and pointless nature of war are addressed clearly.
As with other Vonnegut, his tone, sarcasm, and a degree of cynicism mark the novel more than his character creation or his plot developments. His style of description and plot development rely heavily on an exaggeration of events to manipulate them into a satirical sendoff of life that still remains grounded in the real world even though it sometimes nears the ridiculous.
I would recommend this to fans of satire and parody fiction, but also to readers of socio-political novels like Orwell.
Reading difficulty: high school and up
Offensive nature: fair
Length: 300 pages, relatively quick read
Structure: semi-linear, easy to follow
hocus pocus: The nonsense and BS communicated to mislead people into thinking they control their lives.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
lorenmgreen
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Location: Minneapolis
Reviews written: 180
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