KVHP00-99 Kurt Vonnegut - Hocus Pocus.nfo
General Information
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Title: Hocus Pocus
Author: Kurt Vonnegut
Read By: George Ralph
Copyright: 1990
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Abridged: No
Original Media Information
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Media: Downloaded
Source: usenet
Condition: Good
Ripped By: Indy
File Information
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Number of MP3s: 99
Total Duration: 6h51m
Total MP3 Size: 189.35 MB
Parity Archive: y
Encoded With: FhG
Encoded At: CBR 64 kbit/s 44100 Hz Joint Stereo
ID3 Tags: Set, v1.1, v2.3
Book Description
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Though HOCUS POCUS continues to riff on Kurt Vonnegut's favorite themes--the
breakdown of society, the inexorable doom of mankind, and the pathetic
comedy of life on Earth--it stands out from the majority of his work
in that it utilizes fewer fantastical and science-fictional elements
to deliver its hilariously cynical judgment on civilization and the
human race. The novel's protagonist and narrator, Eugene Debs Hartke,
is imprisoned. Writing on random scraps of paper, he simultaneously
tells his life story and reveals his philosophy. A Vietnam veteran with
countless deaths to his name, Hartke returns to the United States in
the 1960s and gets a job in upstate New York teaching the mentally disabled
children of the rich. However, after he tells them to expect only failure
in their lives, he is fired, and finds work at the nearby Japanese-owned
all-black prison. There, he teaches English, which only leads to an
increase in anti-Semitism and masturbation. Finally, the convicts escape
and wreak bloody havoc on the nearby school--all of which is blamed
on Hartke. Typically of Vonnegut's fiction, the tone is light and witty,
but the subject matter is viciously pessimistic. Since HOCUS POCUS moves
the closest to reality of any of Vonnegut's works, it is liable to disappoint
fans of his more outlandish conceits, but appeal to those who have always
craved more substance to his pyrotechnical imagination.
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