I am grateful for this, thank you for sharing. My late father -in- law knew Kurt- they were contemporaries working at GE in the publicity dept. He related a story to me about Kurt that went like this: On one occasion, while at Cornell, Vonnegut was taking an end of term exam in one of the large lecture halls on campus. The proctor called time, and the students came forward ,and, one by one, deposited their test papers in a stack on his desk. Vonnegut- however, stayed in his seat and continued to write. The proctor called him out, saying time had been called, and that he would not accept his test.
Vonnegut got up, approached the desk with his exam papers in hand, and asked the proctor,
"Do you know who I am?" The proctor answered that no, he did not, and with that Kurt picked up the pile of exams from the desk, quickly inserted his own somewhere in the middle of the stack, and then set them all back down on the desk, smiled, wished the proctor a good day, and walked out... ;)
I've seen that video before but I have to queue it up as I suspect it bears repeating. That man was a treasure. One of my favorite passages of writing from him was from Player Piano. A young mand is at a party and a very successful friend of his father grabs him the the arm and offers him life advice that we all need to hear. The short of it is don't be bluffed by anyone. Noone is so damn smart you can't learn 80% of what they know in a week. Show me a specialist and I'll show you a coward who found a corner he could hide in. Don't be bluffed by anyone. I'll have to track it down at some point.
I am grateful for this, thank you for sharing. My late father -in- law knew Kurt- they were contemporaries working at GE in the publicity dept. He related a story to me about Kurt that went like this: On one occasion, while at Cornell, Vonnegut was taking an end of term exam in one of the large lecture halls on campus. The proctor called time, and the students came forward ,and, one by one, deposited their test papers in a stack on his desk. Vonnegut- however, stayed in his seat and continued to write. The proctor called him out, saying time had been called, and that he would not accept his test.
Vonnegut got up, approached the desk with his exam papers in hand, and asked the proctor,
"Do you know who I am?" The proctor answered that no, he did not, and with that Kurt picked up the pile of exams from the desk, quickly inserted his own somewhere in the middle of the stack, and then set them all back down on the desk, smiled, wished the proctor a good day, and walked out... ;)
I've seen that video before but I have to queue it up as I suspect it bears repeating. That man was a treasure. One of my favorite passages of writing from him was from Player Piano. A young mand is at a party and a very successful friend of his father grabs him the the arm and offers him life advice that we all need to hear. The short of it is don't be bluffed by anyone. Noone is so damn smart you can't learn 80% of what they know in a week. Show me a specialist and I'll show you a coward who found a corner he could hide in. Don't be bluffed by anyone. I'll have to track it down at some point.