An existence based on Form (harmless falsehoods)“No wonder children grow up crazy. A cat's cradle is nothing more than a band of Xs in someone's hands and a child's gaze and look at all those titled A Cat's Cradle is a string trick that we all grew up learning and seeing, and it's just as Vonnegut described, nothing like a cat's cradle; we base our lives on. We base and change our lives on things that have no real meaning. Kurt Vonnegut's novels Cat's Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five demonstrate the inability of the human race to base our lives and our happiness on intricate lies. and intertwined or on a single point of view. Kurt Vonnegut was born in the United States, in Indianapolis, however he was sent to Europe to fight in the "Battle of the Bulge" in December 1944, as a battalion scout. He was taken prisoner and transported to Dresden, Germany; here it was kept in an abandoned meat warehouse beneath a slaughterhouse. Vonnegut saw humanity at its worst during his involvement in World War II; he witnessed a real massacre in the air raids, the total annihilation, of Dresden. What does Vonnegut have to say about a massacre? “And what do the birds say? All there is to say about a massacre, things like 'Poo-too-weet?'" Vonnegut noted that humans argued over unimportant things: lies, half-lies, and altered perceptions, items that gained importance only because the people made them count. fight and kill for.'s Cradle was written in 1963. This novel is the story of how and why the world ends. middle of paper... ice go to God!" "No one but you could have done it, God. I certainly couldn't!" “I feel very unimportant compared to you, God!” “The only way I can feel a little important is to think of all the mud that couldn't sit down and look around” “Thank you God!” (Cat's Cradle 196)Works CitedBloom, Harold, comp. Kurt Vonnegut. Philadelphia, PA: Chelsea House, 2000. 89-128. Hile, Kevin and Diane Telger, eds. Novels for students. vol. 3. Detroit, MI: Gale, 1998. 264-271.Lundquist, James. Kurt Vonnegut. New York, New York: Ungar, 1977. 75.Vik, Marek. "The Themes of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five." Geocities. March 11, 2002. March 12, 2007 .Vonnegut, Kurt. The cat's cradle. New York, New York: Dell Publishing, 1957.Vonegut, Kurt.. Slaughterhouse-Five. New York, New York: Dell Publishing, 1966.