Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.’s first novel, Player Piano, is about Dr. Paul Proteus, a manager in a futuristic American society. Everything is so advanced technologically-wise that there are two groups of people: those who have a doctorate in something (engineering, real estate, secretary, etc.) and those who don’t have a high IQ according to the machines; therefore, there is nothing for them to do, not even physical labor. The machines do it all, meaning the “have nots” live on a stipend, have excellent medical care, housing, modern appliance (dinner is done in 28 seconds), etc. Their thinking is done for them: “His standard of living is constantly rising, and he and the country at large are protected from the old economic ups and downs by the orderly, predictable consumer habits the payroll machine gives him. Used to be he’d buy an impulse, illogically, and industry would go nutty trying to figure out what he was going to buy next.” However, humans cannot live with no stimulation, no purpose. You may be asking, “Why don’t they become artists!?” Well, art is carefully monitored, meaning no book is published, no art is produced that doesn’t already have a clear number on how many would sell, and at what profit.

Dr. Paul likes to sneak across the bridge to hang out in a bar with the purposeless folks. What he doesn’t realize that on his side of the bridge, people like him are always being watched, which puts him in hot water. There are strict anti-saboteur laws to prevent dissatisfaction in the lower class (though Vonnegut does not use that word that I remember, as it would probably create dissatisfaction). Dr. Paul starts having ideas about buying a farm to get escape some of the pressure of being busy doing nothing (really, the machines can run everything) and his high-pressure wife, who constantly wants Paul to climb the social ladder. Of course, he hasn’t asked his wife if she wants to move to a farm, let alone be a farmer. Paul’s desire to do physical labor in a skilled profession, about which he has no knowledge. On the farm, which has been on the market for over a decade, lives an actual farmer who doesn’t own the land, but whose family has cared for it for generations. Here, we get that clash between the “intelligent” and the “wise.” I thought Paul’s dreams were hilarious because they are so on point for today’s “trad wife” fad. “I just wanna hold my baaaabies barefoot in a dress and gather chicken eggs!” LOL, lady, that’s not farming.

The second storyline is about Shah of Bratpuhr, who is visiting the US to see what it’s like. He’s brought his nephew to translate, which is funny to me because in our industry, we consider interpreting for family members to be unethical. Family members are happy to “clean up” what the person says, or leave information out. Anyway, the Shah serves as an outsider who clearly notes that the people without jobs are basically slaves. The envoy leading the Shah around the US is appalled to find out that the translation for the jobless Americans is the word “slaves.” I think Vonnegut is trying here to make the point that America thinks of itself as first and best. Meanwhile, this Shah is supposedly from some underdeveloped country. This absolutely reminds me of the current American president and how he proclaims all Americans are doing awesome (the current narrative is that we are not struggling with cost of living), and other countries are [insert something derogatory].

Player Piano tended to feel all over the place because Vonnegut info dumped in the first chapter, had Dr. Paul bumming around for a while because he doesn’t actually have anything to do, though he does get into some shenanigans with an old friend who shows up to town, a character known mostly in my mind for his Irish last name and failure to shower. Like, ever. Then, we start hearing about The Meadows. Oh, lordy, The Meadows is coming! It sounds oddly like field day at summer camp, but the attendees are all people with PhDs. I had no clue how to feel about The Meadows because I couldn’t discern what the point was.

It finally became apparent when Paul gets to The Meadows and a loudspeaker repeatedly shouts at attendees to sit next to someone they don’t know so they can learn about each other:

“The more contacts you make here at the Meadows,” said the loudspeaker, “the more smoothly industry will function, co-operationwise.” It’s a networking event!

Except they are always 5-8 minutes behind schedule, so no one ever actually networks. Do they even need to if all these people don’t really work? Early on, Paul’s secretary is threatened by a radical thinker who shows up at Paul’s work — radical in that he’s depressed because he invented a machine that put him out of a job. He tells the secretary she’s easily replaceable (this reminds me so much of America’s 2008 economic recession), to which she balks, “There are all sorts of special decisions I have to make . . . I mean, all sorts of things come up that require more than routine thought — more than any old machine could do.”

And here’s the sticking point for me. If the people who are assessed as “dumb” don’t work, and the people with PhDs go to work but can be replaced by machines, and everyone is provided for…. is this a class novel? Is it about boredom and having a purpose? I found the conclusion of the novel rather hilarious because people are so damn predictable. On the other hand, the novel didn’t distribute information clearly, leaving me wondering where I was going and what I was doing. Not only did my spouse, a reader of deep thinky books, struggle to get into Player Piano (he didn’t finish), most of my book club didn’t finish either. People really struggled to get into it, even after switching from text to audio, and vice versa. Overall, it’s a worthy read, but you have to want it.

Books of Fall 🎃🍵🍂

• Feeding Ghosts by Tessa Hulls
• Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
• Just Desserts by G.A. McKevett
• Slewfoot by Brom
• She Throws Herself Forward to Stop the Fall by Dave Newman
• Submerged by Hillel Levin
• The Unmothers by Leslie J. Anderson
• Homing by Sherrie Flick (DNF)
• The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter (DNF)
• Ask Elizabeth: Real Answers to Everything You Secretly Wanted to Ask about Love, Friends, Your Body — and Life in General by Elizabeth Berkley (DNF)
• No Good Deed by Allison Brennan (#10)
• Fat!So? by Marilyn Wann
• The West Passage by Jared Pechaček (DNF)
• Quest for the Unknown: Bizarre Phenomena by Reader’s Digest (DNF)
• Icebreaker by Hannah Grace (DNF)
• Notes on an Execution by Danya Kukafka
• Queer Little Nightmares, edited by David Ly and Daniel Zomparelli
• Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
• A Life in Letters by Zora Neale Hurston
• Bitter Thirst by S.M. Reine (Preternatural Affairs #8)
• Deaf Eyes on Interpreting, edited by Thomas H. Holcomb and David H. Smith
• Compassion, Michigan by Raymond Luczak
• Syd Arthur by Ellen Frankel