What in the Vonnegat was this?! Harrison Bergeron has NOTHING on this play. Insane.

This was weird, even for Vonnegut. His only play, thankfully.

Felt rushed, and all characters were one-dimensional throughout. So at the end when the supposed breakthrough with Harold occurs, it comes across as forced and unrealistic.

Vonnegut’s first play, written in 1970, later became a film.

It revolves around Harold Ryan returning home after eight years missing and presumed dead when his plane went down over Africa.

Vonnegut based his character on Hemingway, of whom he was not a fan.

Ryan was a big game hunter, a womanizer, had a wife and three ex wives and calls women “daughter”.

There are also mentions of the snows of Kilimanjaro and the Spanish Civil War.

During the years in Africa, Ryan and his buddy, Colonel Looseleaf Harper shared some interesting experiences:

Blue soup?

An Indian narcotic we were forced to drink. It put us in a haze—a honey-colored haze which was lavender around the edge. We laughed, we sang, we snoozed. When a bird called, we answered back. Every living thing was our brother or our sister, we thought. Looseleaf stepped on a cockroach six inches long, and we cried. We had a funeral that went on for five days—for the cockroach! I sang “Oh Promise Me.” Can you imagine? Where the hell did I ever learn the words to “Oh Promise Me”? Looseleaf delivered a lecture on maintenance procedures for the hydraulic system of a B-36. All the time we were drinking blue soup. Blue soup all the time. We’d go out after food in that honey-colored haze, and everything that was edible had a penumbra of lavender.

We also get insight on what Heaven is like:

You know what happened in Heaven today? There was a tornado. I’m not kidding you—there was a ******* tornado. Tore up fifty-six houses, a dance pavilion and a Ferris wheel. Drove a shuffleboard stick clear through a telephone pole. Nobody got killed. Nobody ever gets killed. They just bounce around a lot. Then they get up—and start playing shuffleboard again.

Also learned:

Don’t ever fight a guy when you’ve got on roller skates.

……What’s this? A cake? “Happy Birthday, Wanda June”? Who the hell is Wanda June?