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Author: Visit Amazon's Kurt Vonnegut Page
ISBN : 044012929X
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Download for free books Epub God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater Mass Market Paperback for everyone book mediafire, rapishare, and mirror link
Review
“[Vonnegut] at his wildest best.”—
The New York Times Book Review“A brilliantly funny satire on almost everything.”—Conrad Aiken
“[Vonnegut was] our finest black humorist. . . . We laugh in self-defense.”—
The Atlantic Monthly --This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
From the Inside Flap
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater is a comic masterpice. Eliot Rosewater, drunk, volunteer fireman, and president of the fabulously rich Rosewater foundation, is about to attempt a noble experiment with human nature... with a little help from writer Kilgore Trout. The result is Vonnegut's funniest satire, an etched-in-acid portrayal of the greed, hypocrisy, and follies of the flesh we are all heir to.
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Books with free ebook downloads available Epub God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater Mass Market Paperback
- Mass Market Paperback: 192 pages
- Publisher: Dell (October 15, 1978)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 044012929X
- ISBN-13: 978-0440129295
- Product Dimensions: 6.9 x 4.2 x 0.4 inches
- Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
Epub God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater Mass Market
Eliot Rosewater was the scion of an extremely wealthy family- his grandfather had even married a Rockefeller. Eliot stood to inherit control of the vast family fortune through the Rosewater Foundation (a legal entity constructed to shield that fortune from taxation.) But then Eliot went off to WW2 to become a highly decorated Captain of combat infantry. He served with men from all walks of life. Oh yes, he also accidentally bayoneted a 14-year old non-combatant, and afterwards tried to throw himself under a truck. After this he was never the same, much to his rich and powerful family's distress. While he did come back to graduate from Harvard Law and assume control of the foundation, he started behaving...irrationally. He started to actually use the money to HELP people! He also started drinking, wandering, and visiting volunteer firehouses- among other eccentricities.
Eventually, he ended up in Rosewater, Indiana- a depressed backwater that his family had long ago used up and abandoned to found the beginnings of their fortune. He found the people there to be without pride, without hope, without work. So he opened up an office over the liquor store in order to help anyone who needed his help. The sign on the door said simply, "Rosewater Foundation: How Can We Help You?" So Eliot Rosewater, philanthropist, poet, volunteer fireman, Harvard graduate, and drunk proceeded to help any and all that came to him for help.
Needless to say his family could not allow such insanity to continue. Why even Eliot's psychoanalyst came to the conclusion that Eliot was a pervert. The nature of his perversion being the fact that he had channeled all his psychic energy into bringing Utopia to earth for all those in need. What could be more abnormal in modern, capitalist society?
There was something in Vonnegut's first rush of books that is lacking in his later novels. Although I enjoy his later books and for the life of me I can't say what this mystery quality is, whatever it is it tends to elevate even his minor books into affairs that are far more memorable than they tend to be. Maybe because the themes and images he's using here were new to him and he was still comparitively young . . . I don't know. It's not for me to say. This novel has a simple premise and a simple plot and moves unsurprisingly from point A to point B and yet I still have an incredibly enjoyable experience reading it, even though I finished it basically on my lunch break over the course of maybe an hour and a half. The premise then is that Eliot Rosewater has a lot of love to give to the world and spends most of his time doing very nice things for people who are almost pathetic enough to not deserve it, simply because he was born rich and feels he has a lot to give to the world. A lawyer, meanwhile wishes to prove that he is insane and has it in him to make quite the case. The book basically waffles back and forth between the lives of the various people Eliot helps, the comically depressing lives of some of these people, a little Rosewater family history and the lawyer's attempt to gather information on Eliot's apparent insanity. All of these pieces don't cohere into the great whole that his absolute best books (like Slaughterhouse-Five) do, but the pieces themselves are great fun and Vonnegut's humanity has never been as apparent here. It doesn't have the grim central event like the bombing of Dresden to put everything in context but somehow he manages to make the book moving and hilarious at the same time.
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