Name: God bless you, Mr. Rosewater
ISBN: 9780586022795

God bless you, Mr. Rosewater

Second only to Slaughterhouse-Five of Vonnegut's canon in its prominence and influence, God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (1965) presents Eliot Rosewater, an itinerant, semi-crazed millionaire wandering the country in search of heritage and philanthropic outcome, introducing the science fiction writer Kilgore Trout to the world and Vonnegut to the collegiate audience which would soon make him a cult writer. Trout, modeled according to Vonnegut on the science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon (with whom Vonnegut had an occasional relationship) is a desperate, impoverished but visionary hack writer who functions for Eliot Rosewater as both conscience and horrid example. Rosewater, seeking to put his inheritance to some meaningful use (his father was an entrepreneur), tries to do good within the context of almost illimitable cynicism and corruption. It is in this novel that Rosewater wanders into a science fiction conference – an actual annual event in Milford, Pennsylvania – and at the motel delivers his famous monologue evoked by science fiction writers and critics for almost half a century: "None of you can write for sour apples... but you're the only people trying to come to terms with the really terrific things which are happening today." Money does not drive Mr. Rosewater (or the corrupt lawyer who tries to shape the Rosewater fortune) so much as outrage at the human condition. The novel was adapted for a 1979 Alan Menken musical.

What Hacker News says

mcphageOct 2024

For another take on Vonnegut, my favorite of his were Bluebeard and God Bless You Mr. Rosewater.

thread

drclauMar 2020

Kurt Vonnegut's works: The Sirens of Titan, Mother Night, Cat's Cradle, Slaughterhouse Five, Player Piano, Jailbird, God Bless You Mr. Rosewater...

Find the time to read Vonnegut.

thread

scrozierNov 2019

God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater is actually my favorite. Hope you get to it! Some of his later books, as you note, just got so preachy and overwrought, I couldn't get through them.

thread

twogDec 2018

Vonnegut is the author that I wish I was, and was a major influence on my reading, thinking and creating. Strongly recommend picking up a few of his novels, you wont be able to put them down. My favorites are Slaughterhouse Five, Cats Cradle, Breakfast of Champions and God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater

thread

dekhnSep 2013

"God Bless You, Mr Rosewater" is one of the most underrated books of all time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_Bless_You,_Mr._Rosewater

Of course, "Sirens of Titan" is the other great one.

thread

LeifCarrotsonJun 2025

There is an enormous, invisible river of wealth flowing all around us. An individual can contribute to it, and draw some off from it as it flows by. In an ideal world, each would withdraw in direct proportion to the amount they contribute: A salesman goes out and shares a solution to a problem that a customer didn't know could be solved, and takes a commission for this information distribution, an executive turns a large problem into small ones which can be solved by individual engineers and gets compensation in proportion to the managerial activities involved, and those individual engineers create the solution and receive a salary in proportion to their skill and effort and share in creating that value. Right?

No, this is too often completely wrong. Having utility is only half the battle, you also need leverage to withdraw in proportion to that utility. If the customers all know about the problem and your product, but your company has a near monopoly, the salesmen can position themselves as middlemen where the entire transaction flows past them, and they'll siphon off some nice round number - say 10% - completely disconnected from the minimal or even negative value they contributed to the process. Conversely, the engineers can find themselves completely powerless to negotiate compensation, producing value to the company 10x or 20x their salary, out of view of the customers and with no leverage to extract any more or less from the process.

> ‘Go where the rich and powerful are,’ I’d tell him, ‘and learn their ways. They can be flattered and they can be scared. Please them enormously or scare them enormously, and one moonless night they will put their fingers to their lips, warning you not to make a sound. And they will lead you through the dark to the widest, deepest river of wealth ever known to man. You’ll be shown your place on the riverbank, and handed a bucket all your own. Slurp as much as you want, but try to keep the racket of your slurping down. A poor man might hear.’

Kurt Vonnegut, "God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater"

https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/4076-god-bless-you-mr-...

thread