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Title: Player Piano Author: Kurt Vonnegut Rating: Not available Avg. Score: 4 Submit Comment Hits: 31

Review of Player Piano

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Comments for Player Piano

• Posted on 2008-03-17
  Convential debut - not Vonnegut's best, but still worth reading
  
  Vonnegut's debut novel, published in 1952, is a little constrained. There are hints of Vonnegut's sardonic wit, wild imagination, and unconventional writing style, but only hints. Unlike virtually all of Vonnegut's other novels, Player Piano tells its story in a linier fashion. It starts at the beginning and ends at the end. There's nothing really wrong with that, but for fans of the author, accustomed to Vonnegut's eccentric voice, it feels a little too conventional.
  
  Vonnegut is a humanitarian and the message of Player Piano is that people need to have a sense of purpose, and that if you take that away from them - their lives will be empty. Throughout the novel, a leader from another country tours the cities of the United States and having no similar word in his own language, confuses `civilians' for `slaves'. The message of course, is that the civilians, in this machine dominated world, are in-fact slaves.
  
  Similarities between this novel and Brave New World are inevitable, as both novels explore the relationship between technology and happiness, and the role class structure plays in our society. In both Player Piano and Brave New World, the protagonist is unfulfilled by the trappings of the privileged class and longs for something `real'. Player Piano is arguably more hopeful than Brave New World (and certainly 1984) suggesting that people will band together to fight for their freedom, however futile, even if it means that they are doomed to repeat the same mistakes again.
  
  Player Piano is admittedly dated. It is evident from this novel, and others of the era, that people were wary of the advent of computers and the proliferation of machines and technology. As for predicting the future, neither Brave New World nor Player Piano (nor 1984 for that matter) proved to be a reliable crystal ball. These novels are far more reflective of the times they were written and the author's commentary on those times, than of any actual or likely future.
  
  Player Piano is far from Vonnegut's best. Cat's Cradle and Slaughter House Five are two of the best novels ever written and there are close to a half dozen other Vonnegut novels (he wrote 14) I would recommend before Player Piano, but it's still worth reading.
  
  3 ½ stars (almost four).
  Score: 3
• Posted on 2008-02-28
  My first look at corporate america
  
  I had the pleasure of reading this book while I was studying Computer Science at Rensselaer Polytechnic. This book is very well written and the story is fantastic. One of my favorite parts of the book is when the engineer engineers himself out of his own job. Classic! kind of remind me of my last IT project.
  Score: 5
• Posted on 2008-02-12
  Player Piano
  
  Very funny. Not quite as good as Cat's Cradle or Slaughterhouse-Five but hilarious just the same.
  Score: 4
• Posted on 2007-08-19
  Shocking through and through
  
  This book is a 5-star book for engineers and technologists, particularly those working for big corporations, but probably only a 3-star book for anybody else. (You can guess from my rating what I do.) Vonnegut creates hybrid eu/dystopia brought about by the ultimate success of American ingenuity and capitalism. Dr. Proteus is brilliantly and complexly written as a successful technologist desperately aware of his relationship to his corporation and of the corporate's relationship to the world. Feels more like Terry Gilliam's "Brazil" than Orwell's "1984," but is more humane and sad and beautiful both in its hope and despair in humanity than either of them.
  Score: 5
• Posted on 2007-07-05
  Really cool book
  
  I got this book for a class but I ended up really enjoying it. Reading about a possible future written in the 50's about the 60's is always kind of hard to swallow but we live in a world like the book. Most American's don't work in factories anymore and in the book that is because of machines and for us it's because of overseas labor. Although the reasons are different some of the reactions are the same and is a good read and relevant to today's world.
  Score: 4