History Literature / MotherNight

* AnAesop: Vonnegut states in the introduction that this is his only story whose moral he knows: "We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be." What you do is more important than what you believe. You are good or evil based on your acts, not whether or not you think you are good or evil. He was asked to become a Nazi by an American agent and the information he provided the Allies throughout the war was of great help. The aesop is illustrated when near the end of the war a Nazi friend tells him he knew the protagonist was a spy but never reported him because whatever damage he did as a spy would be more than offset by the help he was giving the Nazis in his cover role. Obviously, that would bother any anti-Nazi person, which he was.

* PublicSecretMessage: This is how Campbell passes on information to the Americans. He's given a list of things they want him to find out about the Nazis, and after he finds them out he communicates the answer on his radio show by, say, coughing in the middle of a certain sentence if the answer is "yes" and not coughing if the answer is "no", or by using a certain word he wouldn't otherwise use, etc.

* UnreliableNarrator: Vonnegut warns that Campbell is this in the novel's introduction.

* EpicFail: Bernard O'Hare, the soldier who captured and beat up Campbell after the war, makes it his life's goal to find Campbell and kill him with his bare hands once he discovers that Campbell was alive and free in the US. Unfortunately for O'Hare, he's no longer the lean, mean fighting machine that he was when he first encountered Campbell (in fact, he's a frail, pathetic drunk), and when O'Hare finally succeeds in finding his enemy, Campbell breaks his arm in self defense and throws him out of his apartment.

* EpicFail: Bernard O'Hare, the soldier who captured and beat up Campbell after the war, makes it his life's goal to find Campbell and kill him with his bare hands once he discovers that Campbell was alive and free in the US. Unfortunately for Bernard, he's no longer the lean, mean fighting machine that he was when he first encountered Campbell (in fact, he's a frail, pathetic drunk), and when he finally succeeds in finding his enemy, Campbell breaks his arm in self defense and throws him out of his apartment.

* ReverseMole: Campbell takes up this role during the war, secretly conveying messages for the American agents through his Nazi broadcasts. Whether or not he does so out of "goodness" however, is a different matter.

* {{Dedication}}: [[DirectLineToTheAuthor Campbell]] dedicated the book to Mata Hari, who "whored in the interest of espionage" like him. However, in a foreword, he writes that it should've been dedicated to someone less exotic and more contemporary. He ends up dedicating it to himself: "to Howard W. Campbell, Jr., a man who served evil too openly and good too secretly, the crime of his times."

* {{Dedication}}: [[LiteraryAgentHypothesis Campbell]] dedicated the book to Mata Hari, who "whored in the interest of espionage" like him. However, in a foreword, he writes that it should've been dedicated to someone less exotic and more contemporary. He ends up dedicating it to himself: "to Howard W. Campbell, Jr., a man who served evil too openly and good too secretly, the crime of his times."

* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: There are two introductions - one by Vonnegut that speaks about the book plainly, another where Vonnegut speaks as the editor of Campbell's autobiography.

* CruelMercy: [[spoiler:Subverted, when Campbell confesses to the Jewish American doctor neighbor he wanted to turn himself in with his and his Holocaust survivor's mother's assistance after his true identity is exposed to them, the neighbor initially vehemently denies his request and shuts the door in his face. The neighbor would have left him to continue his suffering with his guilt as a KarmaHoudini, but after an argument with his mother, in which the neighbor believes that VengeanceFeelsEmpty as his mother wants to bring justice for her and her fellow comrades, the mother ensures Campbell's KarmaHoudiniWarranty and contacts her NaziHunter acquaintances to take Campbell in.]]

-->--'''[[LesCollaborateurs Howard W. Campbell, Jr.]]'''

''Mother Night'' is a 1961 novel by Creator/KurtVonnegut that tells of the life of Howard W. Campbell Jr., an expatriate American who moved to Germany with his parents shortly after UsefulNotes/WorldWarI. Despite being an infamous Nazi radio personality and propagandist under Joseph Goebbels, Campbell is actually an author who writes sappy idealistic MedievalEuropeanFantasy plays and spends all of his time obsessing over his wife; in actuality [[FantasticallyIndifferent he has no interest in politics, the Nazi movement, its resulting World War II]] or anything besides his plays and wife. However, he's also a DoubleAgent under a minor division of the US and sends coded messages for reasons he doesn't even understand.[[note]]Several characters suggest he either did it out of his latent idealism, or more likely - he simply thought it was fun.[[/note]]

* GoodbyeCruelWorld: [[spoiler:Not exactly a suicide note, but sort of. In the last chapter, Campbell describes that he got a letter from Wirtanen which would absolve him, but he decides not to use it and allow himself to be hanged. He ends the book with these words: "Goodbye, cruel world! Auf wiedersehen?"]]

* LackOfEmpathy

* SuicideByCop: [[spoiler:What Campbell wanted when he turned himself over to the Israelis.]]
* SuicideIsPainless: [[spoiler:Despite a heartwarming letter from Wirtanen proving his innocence, Campbell accepts he still has nothing left to do with his life, and decides to hang for his crimes anyway.]]

* TrueNeutral: Campbell, so much so it's explained InUniverse. He cares about his wife and their "Nation of Two", and no-one and nothing else.

* WasItAllALie

->''"The New York Daily News suggested that my biggest war crime was not killing myself like a gentleman. Presumably Hitler was a gentleman."''

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mother_night_book_cover.jpg]]

* HarmlessVillain: The American Nazis who give Campbell their unwanted and counterproductive support are portrayed as such abject failures that they inspire nothing but pity, in spite of their horrific beliefs. August Krapptauer's EstablishingCharacterMoment shows that he's so decrepit that can't even make it up a flight of stairs without stopping to rest several times along the way.

* HarmlessVillain: The American Nazis who give Campbell their unwanted and counterproductive support are portrayed as such abject failures that they inspire nothing but pity, in spite of their horrific beliefs. August Krapptauer's EstablishingCharacterMoment shows that he's so decrepit that can't even make it up a flight of stairs without stopping to rest several tims along the way.

* StrangeBedfellows: The alliance between American Nazi white supremacist Dr. Lionel Jones, "black Führer" Robert Sterling Wilson, and Catholic priest Father Patrick Keeley.

Made into a film directed by Keith Gordon (''[[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/BackToSchool Back to School]], Film/TheChocolateWar'') and starring Nick Nolte in 1996. It's not bad, and quite faithful to the source material.

* CodeName: "Blue Fairy Godmother"