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* UpperClassWit: Senator Rosewater, although he has a job.
to:
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* ThisIsAWorkOfFiction: He had a standard parody of this, as exemplified in ''Bagombo Snuff Box'':
-->As in my other works of fiction: All persons living and dead are purely coincidental, and should not be construed. No names have been changed in order to protect the innocent. Angels protect the innocent as a matter of Heavenly routine.
-->As in my other works of fiction: All persons living and dead are purely coincidental, and should not be construed. No names have been changed in order to protect the innocent. Angels protect the innocent as a matter of Heavenly routine.
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** ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive'' is a major offender of this, with Billy Pilgrim meeting several other protagonists: Eliot Rosewater ''(God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater)'' appears in the neighboring bed to Billy when he's institutionalized; Howard W. Campbell ''(Mother Night)'' is the Nazi American trying to convince the POWs to change sides; and both Kilgore Trout and the Tralfamadorians (pretty much every book) both meet Billy at some point.
to:
** ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive'' is a major offender of this, with Billy Pilgrim meeting several other protagonists: Eliot Rosewater ''(God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater)'' appears in the neighboring bed to Billy when he's institutionalized; Howard W. Campbell ''(Mother Night)'' is the Nazi American trying to convince the POWs [=POWs=] to change sides; and both Kilgore Trout and the Tralfamadorians (pretty much every book) both meet Billy at some point.
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[[SlaughterhouseFive Listen]]: Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) was an American science fiction writer. His work is known for its satirical, anti-authoritarian, humanist, and often [[CrapsackWorld brutally depressing]] [[SickSadWorld worldview]]. If this worldview can be pinned down to one event, it would be the bombing of Dresden.
to:
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* EitherOrTitle: ''God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, or Pearls Before Swine'', ''Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade'', ''Breakfast of Champions, or Goodbye Blue Monday'' and ''Slapstick, or Lonesome No More!''
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* WhiteAndGreyMorality: Despite his brutally cynical worldview, Vonnegut also wrote in the introduction to ''Welcome to the Monkey House'' that there were no villains in his stories, just people with conflicting interests.
to:
* WhiteAndGreyMorality: Despite his brutally cynical worldview, Vonnegut also wrote in the introduction to ''Welcome to the Monkey House'' that there were no villains in his stories, just people with conflicting interests.
interests. He also touches on this in the introductory chapter of ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive''.
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* TheVerse: Vonnegut's stories and characters have a tendency to overlap with one another. If it's one of his fictional works, expect at least a [[TheCameo cameo]] from Kilgore Trout and/or the Tralfamadorians.
** ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive'' is a major offender of this, with Billy Pilgrim meeting several other protagonists: Eliot Rosewater ''(God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater)'' appears in the neighboring bed to Billy when he's institutionalized; Howard W. Campbell ''(Mother Night)'' is the Nazi American trying to convince the POWs to change sides; and both Kilgore Trout and the Tralfamadorians (pretty much every book) both meet Billy at some point.
** ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive'' is a major offender of this, with Billy Pilgrim meeting several other protagonists: Eliot Rosewater ''(God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater)'' appears in the neighboring bed to Billy when he's institutionalized; Howard W. Campbell ''(Mother Night)'' is the Nazi American trying to convince the POWs to change sides; and both Kilgore Trout and the Tralfamadorians (pretty much every book) both meet Billy at some point.
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* StrangeSyntaxSpeaker: [[UsefulNotes/Haiti Haitian]] Creole is said to only have a present tense, leading to some very odd grammar. Of course, it's implied that the Haitians simply don't bother trying to teach the American proper grammar.
to:
* StrangeSyntaxSpeaker: [[UsefulNotes/Haiti [[UsefulNotes/{{Haiti}} Haitian]] Creole is said to only have a present tense, leading to some very odd grammar. Of course, it's implied that the Haitians simply don't bother trying to teach the American proper grammar.
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* StrangeSyntaxSpeaker: Haitian Creole is said to only have a present tense, leading to some very odd grammar. Of course, it's implied that the Haitians simply don't bother trying to teach the American proper grammar.
to:
* StrangeSyntaxSpeaker: Haitian [[UsefulNotes/Haiti Haitian]] Creole is said to only have a present tense, leading to some very odd grammar. Of course, it's implied that the Haitians simply don't bother trying to teach the American proper grammar.
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Doesn\'t have its own page.
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* "[[Literature/AgainDangerousVisions The Big Space Fuck]]" (1972)
to:
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* GoshDangItToHeck: The narrator never swears, because his grandfather told him that if he uses profanity, it's easy to dismiss what he's saying.
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* TakeThat: At one point the narrator receives a pamphlet titled ''The Protocols of the Elders of Tralfamador'' (with Tralfamador being an alien planet), obviously a mockery of the anti-Semitic tract ''Protocols of the Elders of Zion.''
to:
* TakeThat: At one point the narrator receives a pamphlet titled ''The Protocols of the Elders of Tralfamador'' (with Tralfamador being an alien planet), obviously a mockery of the anti-Semitic tract ''Protocols of the Elders of Zion.''''Literature/TheProtocolsOfTheEldersOfZion''.
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* NauticalKnockout: Eliot accidentally killed his mother when he took her sailing on his small boat and tacked. The boom swung across, knocked her off the boat where she sank like a stone.
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* "[[Literature/AgainDangerousVisions The Big Space Fuck]]"
* ''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions''
* ''Literature/CatsCradle''
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}"
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}''
* "Literature/HarrisonBergeron"
* ''Literature/MotherNight''
* ''Literature/TheSirensOfTitan''
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive''
* ''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions''
* ''Literature/CatsCradle''
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}"
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}''
* "Literature/HarrisonBergeron"
* ''Literature/MotherNight''
* ''Literature/TheSirensOfTitan''
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive''
to:
!!!Novels
* ''Literature/TheSirensOfTitan'' (1959)
* ''Literature/MotherNight'' (1961)
* ''Literature/CatsCradle'' (1963)
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive'' (1969)
* ''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions'' (1973)
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}'' (1985)
!!!Short stories
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}" (1950)
* "Literature/HarrisonBergeron" (1961)
* "[[Literature/AgainDangerousVisions The Big SpaceFuck]]"
* ''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions''
* ''Literature/CatsCradle''
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}"
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}''
* "Literature/HarrisonBergeron"
* ''Literature/MotherNight''
* ''Literature/TheSirensOfTitan''
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive''
Fuck]]" (1972)
* ''Literature/TheSirensOfTitan'' (1959)
* ''Literature/MotherNight'' (1961)
* ''Literature/CatsCradle'' (1963)
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive'' (1969)
* ''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions'' (1973)
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}'' (1985)
!!!Short stories
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}" (1950)
* "Literature/HarrisonBergeron" (1961)
* "[[Literature/AgainDangerousVisions The Big Space
* ''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions''
* ''Literature/CatsCradle''
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}"
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}''
* "Literature/HarrisonBergeron"
* ''Literature/MotherNight''
* ''Literature/TheSirensOfTitan''
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive''
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* ''MotherNight''
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* ''MotherNight''''Literature/MotherNight''
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* LostInCharacter: In ''Who Am I This Time?''
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* LostInCharacter: In ''Who "Who Am I This Time?''Time?".
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* AuthorAvatar: Kilgore Trout, recurring {{science fiction}} author, [[SelfDeprecation sometimes described as a hack]]. Stuck deep in the SciFiGhetto. Although Vonnegut also noted that Trout was somewhat based on Creator/TheodoreSturgeon as well.
to:
* AuthorAvatar: Kilgore Trout, recurring {{science fiction}} author, [[SelfDeprecation sometimes described as a hack]]. Stuck deep in the SciFiGhetto. Although Vonnegut has also noted that Trout was somewhat based on Creator/TheodoreSturgeon as well.
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* AmoralAttorney: Norman Mushari.
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* ConvenientlyInterruptedDocument: A distant cousin of Mr. Rosewater reads his family history, only to discover that the last pages were eaten by maggots.
to:
* ConvenientlyInterruptedDocument: A Fred Rosewater, a distant cousin of Mr. Rosewater reads his family history, only to discover that the last pages were most of it was eaten by maggots.
* InterruptedSuicide: Fred Rosewater is about to hang himself, but he's stopped by a visit from Mushari.
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* StrawmanPolitical: Senator Rosewater, although he is far more TruthInTelevision than most people will admit (even to themselves).
to:
* StrawmanPolitical: Senator Rosewater, although he is far more TruthInTelevision than most people will admit (even to themselves).themselves).
* TitleDrop: The title is told both to Eliot and Fred Rosewater.
* TitleDrop: The title is told both to Eliot and Fred Rosewater.
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* [[AgainDangerousVisions "The Big Space Fuck"]]
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* [[AgainDangerousVisions "The "[[Literature/AgainDangerousVisions The Big Space Fuck"]]Fuck]]"
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* ''HarrisonBergeron''
to:
* ''HarrisonBergeron''"Literature/HarrisonBergeron"
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[[SlaughterhouseFive Listen]]: Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) was an American science fiction writer who is known for such works as ''{{Slaughterhouse-Five}}'', ''CatsCradle'', and ''BreakfastOfChampions''. His work is known for its satirical, anti-authoritarian, humanist, and often [[CrapsackWorld brutally depressing]] [[SickSadWorld worldview]]. If this worldview can be pinned down to one event, it would be the bombing of Dresden.
to:
[[SlaughterhouseFive Listen]]: Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) was an American science fiction writer who is known for such works as ''{{Slaughterhouse-Five}}'', ''CatsCradle'', and ''BreakfastOfChampions''.writer. His work is known for its satirical, anti-authoritarian, humanist, and often [[CrapsackWorld brutally depressing]] [[SickSadWorld worldview]]. If this worldview can be pinned down to one event, it would be the bombing of Dresden.
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* ''BreakfastOfChampions''
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* ''BreakfastOfChampions''''Literature/BreakfastOfChampions''
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* HarrisonBergeron
* {{EPICAC}}
* {{EPICAC}}
to:
* HarrisonBergeron
''BreakfastOfChampions''
*{{EPICAC}}''Literature/CatsCradle''
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}"
*
* "Literature/{{EPICAC}}"
* ''HarrisonBergeron''
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* ''Literature/CatsCradle''
* ''BreakfastOfChampions''
* ''BreakfastOfChampions''
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* ''BreakfastOfChampions''
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->"Many people need desperately to receive this message: 'I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. [[YouAreNotAlone You are not alone.]]'"
to:
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* AuthorAvatar: Kilgore Trout, recurring {{science fiction}} author, [[SelfDeprecation sometimes described as a hack]]. Stuck deep in the SciFiGhetto. Although Vonnegut also noted that Trout was somewhat based on TheodoreSturgeon as well.
to:
* AuthorAvatar: Kilgore Trout, recurring {{science fiction}} author, [[SelfDeprecation sometimes described as a hack]]. Stuck deep in the SciFiGhetto. Although Vonnegut also noted that Trout was somewhat based on TheodoreSturgeon Creator/TheodoreSturgeon as well.
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* MechanisticAlienCulture: KurtVonnegut's Tralfamadorians, depending on the story or novel that features them, are either StarfishAliens or MechanicalLifeforms that replaced their organic ancestors (Vonnegut never makes it clear if there was a RobotWar or if this was a more benevolent [[TheSingularity Singularity-like event]]), their culture is perhaps [[UpToEleven even more]] [[BuffySpeak Starfish-y]] then their physical form (when Salo tries to explain their system of government in ''TheSirensOfTitan'', he sounds like [[TheStoner he's fraking stoned]]). So, they ''sometimes'' count as examples of this trope, depending on the story. Vonnegut's literary, AuthorAvatar, Kilgore Trout, [[ShowWithinAShow wrote several stories]] using aliens that had the stereotypical features of this trope, including a race of Car-People.
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namespace
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* ''TheSirensOfTitan''
to:
* ''TheSirensOfTitan''''Literature/TheSirensOfTitan''
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* ''[[CatsCradle Cat's Cradle]]''
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* ''[[CatsCradle Cat's Cradle]]''''Literature/CatsCradle''
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[[AC: Armageddon In Retrospect]]
* HypocriticalHumor: His son, Mark Vonnegut, wrote the foreward for this book and recounts this exchange from one of his last conversations with his father:
-->'''Kurt:''' How old are you, Mark?\\
'''Mark:''' I'm fifty-nine, Dad.\\
'''Kurt:''' That's old.\\
'''Mark:''' Yes it is, Dad.
* HypocriticalHumor: His son, Mark Vonnegut, wrote the foreward for this book and recounts this exchange from one of his last conversations with his father:
-->'''Kurt:''' How old are you, Mark?\\
'''Mark:''' I'm fifty-nine, Dad.\\
'''Kurt:''' That's old.\\
'''Mark:''' Yes it is, Dad.
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Listen: Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) was an American science fiction writer who is known for such works as ''{{Slaughterhouse-Five}}'', ''CatsCradle'', and ''BreakfastOfChampions''. His work is known for its satirical, anti-authoritarian, humanist, and often [[CrapsackWorld brutally depressing]] [[SickSadWorld worldview]]. If this worldview can be pinned down to one event, it would be the bombing of Dresden.
to:
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[[quoteright:292:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/1197391923_4082_7287.jpg]]
->"Many people need desperately to receive this message: 'I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. [[YouAreNotAlone You are not alone.]]'"
-->--''from {{Timequake}}, his final novel''
Listen: Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) was an American science fiction writer who is known for such works as ''{{Slaughterhouse-Five}}'', ''CatsCradle'', and ''BreakfastOfChampions''. His work is known for its satirical, anti-authoritarian, humanist, and often [[CrapsackWorld brutally depressing]] [[SickSadWorld worldview]]. If this worldview can be pinned down to one event, it would be the bombing of Dresden.
Vonnegut served in WorldWarII. When in Germany he was captured by the enemy and brought to Dresden. Dresden was a large German town known for its doll-making that had little to no strategic military significance, yet was still fire bombed by the Allies into a smoldering charred pile. [[CatchPhrase So it goes]]. This event would become a major theme in many of his books, especially the later ones.
Vonnegut is also notable because he was one of the first modern science fiction authors to get serious attention in the literary world. [[ScifiGhetto Although your literature professors (and Vonnegut himself) may try to tell you he's not actually a science fiction writer,]] the aliens and time-travel seem to disagree.
----
!!Vonnegut's stories with their own pages
* [[AgainDangerousVisions "The Big Space Fuck"]]
* HarrisonBergeron
* {{EPICAC}}
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}''
* ''MotherNight''
* ''TheSirensOfTitan''
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive''
* ''[[CatsCradle Cat's Cradle]]''
* ''BreakfastOfChampions''
----
!! Tropes common in his work:
* AuthorAvatar: Kilgore Trout, recurring {{science fiction}} author, [[SelfDeprecation sometimes described as a hack]]. Stuck deep in the SciFiGhetto. Although Vonnegut also noted that Trout was somewhat based on TheodoreSturgeon as well.
* HumansAreBastards
* InYourNatureToDestroyYourselves
* WhiteAndGreyMorality: Despite his brutally cynical worldview, Vonnegut also wrote in the introduction to ''Welcome to the Monkey House'' that there were no villains in his stories, just people with conflicting interests.
!!Examples of tropes from his other stories
[[AC:Short Stories]]
* BrownNote: A radio telescope in "The Euphio Question" picks up "the music of the spheres", which gives such pleasure to listeners that they stop whatever they're doing, and only snap out of it when the playback is interrupted.
* DeathBySex: Specifically cited in "Welcome To The Monkey House" (the short story itself, not the collection that borrowed the name).
* EvolutionaryLevels
* GracefulLoser: [[spoiler: In "EPICAC", the eponymous machine's response when it is told that it would never be able to be with the woman that it and its operator are competing for? Wish the operator well and commit suicide by overtaxing itself... writing thousands of love poems for him to give to her.]]
* GravityIsOnlyATheory: In ''Slapstick'', the protagonist and his sister theorize that gravity was once variable, which is how the Pyramids in Egypt were built. This turns out to be true when their theory is used by the Chinese to change gravity back to how it used to be. From that point on it varies daily.
* HerCodeNameWasMarySue: Mercilessly {{deconstructed}} in "Shout it out from the Rooftops." The author is shunned by everyone in her town, loses her living and is on the verge of breaking up her marriage after [[DysfunctionJunction "Hypocrites' Junction"]], a book about [[NoCommunitiesWereHarmed a thinly disguised version of her town]], becomes a smash hit.
* InstantAIJustAddWater: "EPICAC", in which the old-school punch-card computer learns how to love when its operator flicks a couple of positions at random.
* LostInCharacter: In ''Who Am I This Time?''
* SadisticChoice: In "All The King's Horses," the captain at one point sees the one way he can save all but one of the remaining Americans... but he has to choose one of his twin sons to die. [[spoiler: Due to intervention from one of his adversary's concubines, the child doesn't have to die.]]
[[AC:A Man Without A Country]]
* [[ImmuneToDrugs Immune To Cigarettes]]: Near the beginning of chapter four, Kurt writes...
-->...I am going to sue the Brown and Williamson Tobacco Company, manufacturers of Pall Mall cigarettes, for a billion bucks! Starting when I was only twelve years old, I have never chain-smoked anything but unfiltered Pall Malls. And for many years now, right on the package, Brown and Williamson have promised to kill me. But I am now eighty-two. Thanks a lot, you dirty rats. The last thing I ever wanted was to be alive when the three most powerful people on the planet were named [[GeorgeWBush Bush]], Dick and Colon.
[[AC:Deadeye Dick]]
* StrangeSyntaxSpeaker: Haitian Creole is said to only have a present tense, leading to some very odd grammar. Of course, it's implied that the Haitians simply don't bother trying to teach the American proper grammar.
-->"He is dead?" he said in Creole. "He is dead," I agreed. "What does he do?" he said. "He paints," I said. "I like him," he said.
[[AC:God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater]]
* ConspicuousConsumption: What rich people are supposed to do, averted by Eliot and embraced by his father.
* ConvenientlyInterruptedDocument: A distant cousin of Mr. Rosewater reads his family history, only to discover that the last pages were eaten by maggots.
* CrapsackWorld: One which Eliot is trying to make less [[BuffySpeak crapsacky]].
* HeroicBSOD: Happens to Eliot. Twice.
* ItsNotPornItsArt: To settle once and for all the question of which is which, Senator Rosewater has created a law of which he is quite proud. The law says that if it has pubic hair, it's pornography. (Note that this was before the modern custom of porn stars [[LoopholeAbuse shaving off their pubic hair]]).
* MoneyFetish: Norman Mushari.
* MoralGuardians: Senator Rosewater. He's so proud that he managed to create a law that passed muster with the Supreme Court in defining obscenity. If it has pubic hair, it's not art, it's obscene.
* RichIdiotWithNoDayJob: What Eliot Rosewater is trying to avoid. At least the idiot and no day job part.
* ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney: Senator Rosewater.
* StrawmanPolitical: Senator Rosewater, although he is far more TruthInTelevision than most people will admit (even to themselves).
* UpperClassWit: Senator Rosewater, although he has a job.
[[AC:Hocus Pocus]]
* AnachronicOrder: In this case, due to the scraps of paper from the "original artist" getting a bit mixed up.
* TakeThat: At one point the narrator receives a pamphlet titled ''The Protocols of the Elders of Tralfamador'' (with Tralfamador being an alien planet), obviously a mockery of the anti-Semitic tract ''Protocols of the Elders of Zion.''
* ViewersAreGeniuses: The riddle at the end.
[[AC:Timequake]]
* ARealManIsAKiller: Vonnegut told this story many times, both in speeches and in at least one book other than ''Timequake''. After he returned from WorldWarTwo, his Uncle Dan came up to him and clapped him on the back, proclaiming "You're a ''man'' now!" The [[UnfortunateImplications implication]] being that the only way for a boy to become a man was to kill people. Although Vonnegut had never had occasion to kill anybody during his military service, he had seen a ''lot'' of death and lived through the firebombing of Dresden, which wasn't a lot of fun. Imagine that you've just gone through the worst, most traumatic experience of your life, and before you've finished dealing with that trauma somebody comes up to you and ''[[BerserkButton congratulates you on it]].'' Yeah, [[{{Irony}} Kurt wanted to kill the guy.]]
----
So it goes.
<<|{{Authors}}|>>
->"Many people need desperately to receive this message: 'I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. [[YouAreNotAlone You are not alone.]]'"
-->--''from {{Timequake}}, his final novel''
Listen: Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) was an American science fiction writer who is known for such works as ''{{Slaughterhouse-Five}}'', ''CatsCradle'', and ''BreakfastOfChampions''. His work is known for its satirical, anti-authoritarian, humanist, and often [[CrapsackWorld brutally depressing]] [[SickSadWorld worldview]]. If this worldview can be pinned down to one event, it would be the bombing of Dresden.
Vonnegut served in WorldWarII. When in Germany he was captured by the enemy and brought to Dresden. Dresden was a large German town known for its doll-making that had little to no strategic military significance, yet was still fire bombed by the Allies into a smoldering charred pile. [[CatchPhrase So it goes]]. This event would become a major theme in many of his books, especially the later ones.
Vonnegut is also notable because he was one of the first modern science fiction authors to get serious attention in the literary world. [[ScifiGhetto Although your literature professors (and Vonnegut himself) may try to tell you he's not actually a science fiction writer,]] the aliens and time-travel seem to disagree.
----
!!Vonnegut's stories with their own pages
* [[AgainDangerousVisions "The Big Space Fuck"]]
* HarrisonBergeron
* {{EPICAC}}
* ''Literature/{{Galapagos}}''
* ''MotherNight''
* ''TheSirensOfTitan''
* ''Literature/SlaughterhouseFive''
* ''[[CatsCradle Cat's Cradle]]''
* ''BreakfastOfChampions''
----
!! Tropes common in his work:
* AuthorAvatar: Kilgore Trout, recurring {{science fiction}} author, [[SelfDeprecation sometimes described as a hack]]. Stuck deep in the SciFiGhetto. Although Vonnegut also noted that Trout was somewhat based on TheodoreSturgeon as well.
* HumansAreBastards
* InYourNatureToDestroyYourselves
* WhiteAndGreyMorality: Despite his brutally cynical worldview, Vonnegut also wrote in the introduction to ''Welcome to the Monkey House'' that there were no villains in his stories, just people with conflicting interests.
!!Examples of tropes from his other stories
[[AC:Short Stories]]
* BrownNote: A radio telescope in "The Euphio Question" picks up "the music of the spheres", which gives such pleasure to listeners that they stop whatever they're doing, and only snap out of it when the playback is interrupted.
* DeathBySex: Specifically cited in "Welcome To The Monkey House" (the short story itself, not the collection that borrowed the name).
* EvolutionaryLevels
* GracefulLoser: [[spoiler: In "EPICAC", the eponymous machine's response when it is told that it would never be able to be with the woman that it and its operator are competing for? Wish the operator well and commit suicide by overtaxing itself... writing thousands of love poems for him to give to her.]]
* GravityIsOnlyATheory: In ''Slapstick'', the protagonist and his sister theorize that gravity was once variable, which is how the Pyramids in Egypt were built. This turns out to be true when their theory is used by the Chinese to change gravity back to how it used to be. From that point on it varies daily.
* HerCodeNameWasMarySue: Mercilessly {{deconstructed}} in "Shout it out from the Rooftops." The author is shunned by everyone in her town, loses her living and is on the verge of breaking up her marriage after [[DysfunctionJunction "Hypocrites' Junction"]], a book about [[NoCommunitiesWereHarmed a thinly disguised version of her town]], becomes a smash hit.
* InstantAIJustAddWater: "EPICAC", in which the old-school punch-card computer learns how to love when its operator flicks a couple of positions at random.
* LostInCharacter: In ''Who Am I This Time?''
* SadisticChoice: In "All The King's Horses," the captain at one point sees the one way he can save all but one of the remaining Americans... but he has to choose one of his twin sons to die. [[spoiler: Due to intervention from one of his adversary's concubines, the child doesn't have to die.]]
[[AC:A Man Without A Country]]
* [[ImmuneToDrugs Immune To Cigarettes]]: Near the beginning of chapter four, Kurt writes...
-->...I am going to sue the Brown and Williamson Tobacco Company, manufacturers of Pall Mall cigarettes, for a billion bucks! Starting when I was only twelve years old, I have never chain-smoked anything but unfiltered Pall Malls. And for many years now, right on the package, Brown and Williamson have promised to kill me. But I am now eighty-two. Thanks a lot, you dirty rats. The last thing I ever wanted was to be alive when the three most powerful people on the planet were named [[GeorgeWBush Bush]], Dick and Colon.
[[AC:Deadeye Dick]]
* StrangeSyntaxSpeaker: Haitian Creole is said to only have a present tense, leading to some very odd grammar. Of course, it's implied that the Haitians simply don't bother trying to teach the American proper grammar.
-->"He is dead?" he said in Creole. "He is dead," I agreed. "What does he do?" he said. "He paints," I said. "I like him," he said.
[[AC:God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater]]
* ConspicuousConsumption: What rich people are supposed to do, averted by Eliot and embraced by his father.
* ConvenientlyInterruptedDocument: A distant cousin of Mr. Rosewater reads his family history, only to discover that the last pages were eaten by maggots.
* CrapsackWorld: One which Eliot is trying to make less [[BuffySpeak crapsacky]].
* HeroicBSOD: Happens to Eliot. Twice.
* ItsNotPornItsArt: To settle once and for all the question of which is which, Senator Rosewater has created a law of which he is quite proud. The law says that if it has pubic hair, it's pornography. (Note that this was before the modern custom of porn stars [[LoopholeAbuse shaving off their pubic hair]]).
* MoneyFetish: Norman Mushari.
* MoralGuardians: Senator Rosewater. He's so proud that he managed to create a law that passed muster with the Supreme Court in defining obscenity. If it has pubic hair, it's not art, it's obscene.
* RichIdiotWithNoDayJob: What Eliot Rosewater is trying to avoid. At least the idiot and no day job part.
* ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney: Senator Rosewater.
* StrawmanPolitical: Senator Rosewater, although he is far more TruthInTelevision than most people will admit (even to themselves).
* UpperClassWit: Senator Rosewater, although he has a job.
[[AC:Hocus Pocus]]
* AnachronicOrder: In this case, due to the scraps of paper from the "original artist" getting a bit mixed up.
* TakeThat: At one point the narrator receives a pamphlet titled ''The Protocols of the Elders of Tralfamador'' (with Tralfamador being an alien planet), obviously a mockery of the anti-Semitic tract ''Protocols of the Elders of Zion.''
* ViewersAreGeniuses: The riddle at the end.
[[AC:Timequake]]
* ARealManIsAKiller: Vonnegut told this story many times, both in speeches and in at least one book other than ''Timequake''. After he returned from WorldWarTwo, his Uncle Dan came up to him and clapped him on the back, proclaiming "You're a ''man'' now!" The [[UnfortunateImplications implication]] being that the only way for a boy to become a man was to kill people. Although Vonnegut had never had occasion to kill anybody during his military service, he had seen a ''lot'' of death and lived through the firebombing of Dresden, which wasn't a lot of fun. Imagine that you've just gone through the worst, most traumatic experience of your life, and before you've finished dealing with that trauma somebody comes up to you and ''[[BerserkButton congratulates you on it]].'' Yeah, [[{{Irony}} Kurt wanted to kill the guy.]]
----
So it goes.
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