Cats Cradle – Review ****
This novel by Kurt Vonnegut was translated into German as “Katzenwiege” in 1987, but unfortunately it is out of print everywhere and can only be bought in antiquarian bookshops at ridiculous prices. That’s why I bought the English version. The first edition is from 1963, but this edition from Penguin is more recent.
The cover is pretty, colourful and certainly well thought out in detail. Nevertheless, it is confusing at first glance until you discover all the incorporated subtleties and allusions. It takes too long to make a quick purchase decision. You have to want to read the book.
So, why did I want this book in particular?
A few years ago, I wrote the short story Ice XXIX based on an intense dream. It is about a modification of frozen water that is denser than water and only melts at over 80°C. It escapes into the environment and triggers an apocalypse.
A few months away from now, I came across a text excerpt on the Internet about a modification called “Ice 9”, which had similar characteristics to my Ice 29. I did some research and found this novel.
I bought it because I was worried that I had – knowingly or unknowingly – copied content from another work. Fortunately, as I read it, I realised that this was clearly not the case. Both stories are very different and no passage of the novel triggers even a hint of a déjà vu feeling in me.
It’s just that two people had a similar idea and realised it very differently.
But now to the present novel. At roughly 200 pages, it is the size of what was being written in science fiction at that time. The content:
The scientist Dr Felix Hoenikker helped develop the atomic bomb. At the time of the story, he has already died. An unnamed journalist, who wants to be called Jonah, tries to interview the descendants of this scientist as a first-person narrator in order to collect material for a book.
To do this, he travels to a fictitious Caribbean island called San Lorenzo. If it were in Europe, it would probably pass for an tin-pot little country. There he meets the three descendants of Dr Hoenikker. One of them, Franklin “Frank”, is a “general”, in reality vice president of the dictator “Papa” Monzano. The other two, Angela and Newton, live in a luxurious estate outside the city.
In the course of his investigations, Jonah discovers that Dr Felix Hoenikker has left the world something far more deadly than the atomic bomb: a water modification called “Ice 9” with a melting point of 55°C. It is invasive and freezes liquid water instantly. Each of the three children has a sealed vial containing a few crystals of this substance.
The name-giving Cat’s Cradle is a game of skill with strings stretched over the fingers that have to be removed by a second person according to certain rules. We used to play it a lot when I was a child and I was fascinated by the patterns that could be created by creatively interpreting the rules.
It appears in several places in the story. For instance, Newton “Newt” Hoenikker paints a picture that he has named this way. However, the cat’s cradle does not play a key role in the story.
More influential on the story is a cult of the islanders called Bokomonism. In addition to some exotic rituals, such as playing footsie, there is a book that is often quoted from and which, in my opinion, essentially consists of mutually contradictory phrases.
Well, some world religions can do that as well. But unlike them, the Bokomonists live in peace with each other and even the conflict between the cult founder Bokomon and the dictator “Papa” Monzano is merely celebrated without anyone getting hurt. I find the frequent quotations from the Bokomon book rather humorous and often had to smile.
In the end, human stupidity triumphs. If three people possess a substance that can extinguish the world, what will inevitably happen?
The author does not dwell on the depths of physics. The origin of ice 9 is “only-God-knows-where”. That’s what it says in the novel. The freezing process – instantaneous, according to the story – also contradicts the laws of physics, especially when it involves something like the Earth’s oceans.
However, this only bothered me a little while reading the story. I enjoyed myself and am happy to award four out of five stars for this prophetic masterpiece. The bitter irony, especially at the end, is exactly how I see things. I just wish I had a better understanding of English so that I could appreciate more of the subtleties of the content.
Finally, I have just one question: why are there no more Bokomonists? The world would be a nicer place with them.
