Outside Reading: Cat's Cradle #4

     I have reached the end of Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut, and must say that the ending to the book was completely unexpected. Not for a moment did I think the end of the book was actually going to involve the end of the world, despite the constant talk of the super-weapon known as "ice-nine." However, I found myself extremely satisfied with the ending, as it was both interesting and meaningful in terms of offering explanations for the book. All this aside, however, during my last reading I was able to relate many more components of the story to things that we have been studying.
     One of the main things I noticed in this reading (which I should have realized before) was that Bokonon himself was a representation of Postmodernism. Bokonon literally viewed everything in his own way, and left everything that he wrote to be interpreted by his readers as they wanted it too. He tells people that what he writes is a lie so that they can find their own truths out of his books, while not being forced to take what Bokonon himself sees as truth. This idea came to me towards the end of the book when the protagonist begins to read the books of Bokonon (Vonnegut also constantly hit on how Bokonon himself viewed his advice as false, forcing the reader to consider why this was so and what this meant.) In terms of how this connects with American Literature, it embodies the Postmodern perspective on how readers should be able to interpret literature.
     I found a connection with Romanticism again with the tragic ending of the story: the end of the world. After the entire world being destroyed in an instant and after days of uncomfortable shelter with the protagonist's beloved Mona, they discover the rest of the population of San Lorenzo dead, except for Newton Hoenikker and the Crosbys who are found later. On top of this, Mona decides to join the dead in a way which I thought almost mocked the main character. Even I was depressed, and I'm not usually one to be moved by books. The description of nature and the blue-white ice-nine covering the earth after the cataclysm also demonstrated some Romantic qualities in the book.
     In terms of my definition, I think the material from this final reading that will be most useful is what I've gathered from Bokononism's symbolism as well as the symbolism of San Lorenzo. San Lorenzo, in some ways, was much like America in that many aspects of the citizens lives were overdramatic and untrue. Bokonon's commentary on such a society (or what Vonnegut writes of Bokonon's commentary) represents an interpretation of a national identity from Vonnegut's Postmodern perspective. Since my definition deals with American identity, I found this to be valuable.
     Overall, I enjoyed the book, and was able to make several connections to American literature as a whole. Though I went into the book thinking that it was going to have ideas that mostly related to Postmodernism since it was a Postmodern book, I was surprised to find several parts of the book that related to other time periods and philosophies as well.