Mother Night

 Mother Night

By Kurt Vonnegut

This is another entry in the Anthony Jeselnick book club. It's a new Vonnegut for me that I'd never heard
of.

Like all Vonnegut, it's an absurd tale. The main character, Howard Campbell Jr., was born in the United States but moved to Germany soon after with his family. By the time the Nazis took over, he had built a life there as a playwright and had married a German woman. So while his parents moved back to upstate New York, he stayed. Since his wife was a well-known actress and he a well-known author, his social circle included the upper echelon of Nazi leadership, and soon he was recruited as a propagandist.

But he was also recruited by the Americans, who convinced him to use well-timed pauses in his broadcasts to convey secret information to their leadership. He never knew what information he was passing along, and no one ever suspected his involvement. And, after the war, no one on the American side would acknowledge it, either. They kept him out of jail through behind-the-scenes maneuvering. Still, Nazi hunters still regarded him as an enemy that needed to be brought to justice.

They came knocking on his door one day after Howard's new friend, who himself was an agent of the Russians, learned of his true identity and tipped off a group of neo-Nazis, who published a celebration of news of Campbell's being alive and well, which, in turn, tipped off Nazi hunters. Fleeing for his life, he is embraced by a rag-tag but rich group of neo-Nazis, which include the "Black Fuhrer" and a former priest defrocked for his bigotry (and drunkenness).

It's all told as a memoir written in an Israeli jail as Campbell waits for his trial. So the whole book, we, the reader, are wondering: How did he get there? The twist -- spoiler alert -- it was Campbell who turned himself in. When he receives a letter from the American who recruited him as a spy saying he will testify at the trial and save him, Campbell holds himself accountable for his misdeeds with a rope.

Ah, Vonnegut. It was all so much more humorous than I related above. Somehow, he still seems so radical in his absurdity. We need another Vonnegut for these times.