For Vonnegut, nothing is serious. At the same time, these not serious parts are what most of us view as supremely important. When Vonnegut writes about the solution to overpopulation, for instance, it is really funny, but just how we adapt to a changing world is something we need to grapple with.
Vonnegut has a hilarious solution! I tried to imagine the evolutionary changes a million years in the future Vonnegut was describing. I even tried to figure out what was happening on the nature cruise of the century circa AD. So I enjoyed reading Galapagos, but I can't say just what happened.
When I read it again sometime in the future , I might or might not understand more. View all 11 comments. Rewritten after rereading in July Most of the story is Rewritten after rereading in July Like all good dystopias if that's not an oxymoron , the individual steps to it don't really stretch credulity few of them are very original , but the final destination is more startling - and even somewhat positive.
He even prefixes the names of those about to die with an asterisk, at which point I went with the flow and stopped worrying about "spoilers" on rereading, this aspect became pure comedy. The narrator is Leon Trout, a long-dead man who helped build the cruise ship.
Kilgore Trout, the father of Leon, is a recurring character in Vonnegut: a prolific but not very successful writer of sci fi. They are either bizarrely obscure, like the Oracle at Delphi, or comically inappropriate. THEMES The main premise is that humans have evolved badly, though the reasons for this are never explained, which is odd, given how much weight is given to subsequent natural selection in the story.
Accepting the idea that our big brains are a handicap is a bit of a challenge, which Vonnegut backs up with typical bathos by suggesting alcohol is just a way to relax with a temporarily smaller brain. Outsourcing our skills and knowledge by developing machines to take over many brain tasks reduces the need for big brains, and indeed, for people. No more lies or deceit, and no hands to use for evil — it sounds positively Utopian. In addition to the above, it also touches on the nature of intelligence, eugenics voluntary and not , consent, disability, incest, contraception, mate selection, truth, marriage and alternatives to it, and all sorts of other things.
You could make a whole PSHE curriculum from this! And if they are human, then surely we should call ourselves apes, or even fish. I would hesitate to impose a New Testament analogy on a secular novel by a secular writer, but there are many Biblical allusions: creation, flood, an ark, Adam and Eve, the danger of knowledge, the power of belief, the existence of God, David and Goliath, souls, redemption, and… fish.
Vonnegut toys with why we are as we are and clearly doesn't think it's brain size or capacity that makes us human which is surely good, as otherwise, what would be the implication for those with learning difficulties and brain damage etc?
There is a clear message that most people are irrelevant; we can't know who the few important ones are, but they're probably the ones we least expect. Trout admits his prolonged observation was pointless: he was addicted to the soap opera qualities of the story, but accumulated knowledge rather than understanding. Mostly the latter, I think If Leon Trout is reading this, or any other discussion of the book, he is doubtless chuckling at how seriously people are taking it. Overall, not a long book, but one to savour, ponder, chuckle over and reread.
People had simply changed their opinion of paper wealth. View all 45 comments. The novel questions the merit of the human brain from an evolutionary perspective. The title is both a reference to the islands on which part of the story plays out, and a tribute to Charles Darwin on whose theory Vonnegut relies to reach his own conclusions. It was first published in by Delacorte Press. View 2 comments. Dec 15, Henry Avila rated it really liked it. A century and a half, later, things have drastically changed Big troubles, occur, an economic crisis engulfs the Earth, the inhabitants in many parts are starving, a virus is making them sterile too, and the long planned, "The Nature Cruise of the Century", to the Ecuadorian ocean province, from the Guayas River port of Guayaquil, threatened with cancellation.
The few who do arrive, at the guarded hotel, are the new widow, American, Mary Hepburn, despondent, with suicidal impulses, James Wait, an alias, he says he's Canadian, a con man, in reality, who takes money, you guessed it, from grieving women, Japanese Hisako Hiroguchi, pregnant wife of computer genius, Zenji, incompetent Captain Adolf von Kleist, of the ship, "Bahia de Darwin", that's right, the same one that will take them to the islands, if he can find the archipelago, billionaire Andrew Macintosh, he wants more, and his blind, loyal daughter, Selena, the ghost of Leon Trotsky Trout, is our narrator, son of the late, not so great, writer, Kilgore Trout, and six hungry little girls, unexpected passengers, natives of the nearby rain forest.
Still a war breaks out with a fierce neighboring nation, bombs falling, bullets flying, food riots erupting, the survivors of this group, must get away, quickly, to the cruise ship, there is safety only in the Galapagos, just forty hours from the lawless city. Captain Adolf von Kleist, is constantly amusing, a good looking, well spoken gentleman, a notable storyteller , who doesn't know how to steer a boat , without any nautical knowledge, whatsoever, his crew has deserted him, he must pretend A fun read by the always entertaining Mr.
Kurt Vonnegut, those who like his style, which can seem rather childish, to some, the uninformed , he knows his targets, though, they, his fans will greatly enjoy this satire, about the stupidity of the human race, not realizing there are consequences for every action, life is not only for them, they must share the planet with other living creatures, who deserve to be unharmed, and able to prosper, too View all 33 comments.
Oct 24, Kevin Ansbro rated it really liked it Shelves: modern-fable , sci-fi , parable , recommended-by-cecily , nature , tongue-in-cheek , allegory , awesome-premise , wry-humour. Trout recounts a sequence of evolutionary events that begin in , as a bunch of bipedal misfits gather in Ecuador for 'The Nature Cruise of the Century.
Also, because our brains were the size of fat mangoes and not yet atrophied by evolution, a discussion between a husband and wife under stress could end up like a fight between blindfolded people wearing roller skates.
I can assure you that the story is better read than explained. I'm a latecomer to Vonnegut and fell in love with his writing quicker than you could say "woolly mammoth. And, in keeping with the 'circle of life' theme, there are fish metaphors aplenty.
For no reason other than authorial whimsy, he anoints any character who is about to die with an asterisk so we know in advance that they are going to pop their clogs , and he mischievously over-explains things that are blindingly obvious to anyone bar our tiny-brained human descendants, one million years into the future. Vonnegut has a droll sense of humour that I found immediately enjoyable and fans of Monty Python are sure to like his style.
But of course, there is a great deal of sagacity to be found in his eccentricity. It should come as no surprise to anyone, least of all Vonnegut, that we humans are the architects of our own downfall. Despite our hefty brains, we are somehow ignorant to the perils of war, financial crashes, global viruses, world overpopulation, climate change and meteorites hitting our planet.
Aren't we just? The only carp I have with Vonnegut is that he has a scattergun approach to plot lines. The story staggers backwards and forwards like a drunken sailor in a hall of mirrors and I felt that the philosophical quotes interrupted, rather than enhanced, the narrative.
View all 52 comments. I can imagine Kurt Vonnegut Jr. And of course, with small brains they are no longer capable of carrying out the elaborate and monstrous and extremely wicked acts of their big-brained warmongering ancestors. Even if their pea brains could muster up the idea of building weapons of mass destruction, or even your basic shiv, could you imagine trying to do this with slippery flippers I can imagine Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
Even if their pea brains could muster up the idea of building weapons of mass destruction, or even your basic shiv, could you imagine trying to do this with slippery flippers and a beak? On the surface we have a band of misfits assembled to take the 'the nature cruise of the century' before everything starts to go belly up, but Vonnegut Jr. It's a really clever novel narrated by a ghost from a point a million years in the future—who also happens to be a Vietnam veteran—and I actually preferred this to his classic anti-war novel Slaughterhouse-Five.
Got me thinking of Pynchon in some sense, but this was so much easier to read—more fun and less frustrating. View all 17 comments. The narrator of the tale is a ghost existing for a million years and witnessing everything from the beginning to the end. A broken field of black basaltic lava, thrown into the most rugged waves, and crossed by great fissures, is everywhere covered by stunted, sun-burnt brushwood, which shows little signs of life.
The dry and parched surface, being heated by the noon-day sun, gave to the air a close and sultry feeling, like that from a stove: we fancied even that the bushes smelt unpleasantly.
And instead of evolution Kurt Vonnegut depicts a devolution. Back when childhoods were often so protracted, it is unsurprising that so many people got into the lifelong habit of believing, even after their parents were gone, that somebody was always watching over them — God or a saint or a guardian angel or the stars or whatever.
People have no such illusions today. Nowadays, with all the consumerism, conformism and hypocrisy surrounding us, individuals just lose their true identity and the devolution has probably already begun.
View all 7 comments. Humans, one million years in the future What would happen if, due to a virus that prevents women from reproducing, all but a handful of humans die out? In which direction would evolution go if we suddenly had to live without modern technology? This is something I sometimes wonder about. If a virus suddenly wiped out nine-tenths of us, or some idiot wannabe dictator slammed his tiny hands on that big red nuclear weapon button because someone hurt his feelings and tweeting a childish tantrum just wa Humans, one million years in the future What would happen if, due to a virus that prevents women from reproducing, all but a handful of humans die out?
If a virus suddenly wiped out nine-tenths of us, or some idiot wannabe dictator slammed his tiny hands on that big red nuclear weapon button because someone hurt his feelings and tweeting a childish tantrum just wasn't enough to show how yugely pissed he was Even if humans don't suddenly have to start over with just a handful of us, what will we be like a million years from now?
That is, provided we don't entirely kill ourselves off through greed or stupidity. Whether or not you've ever pondered these questions, Kurt Vonnegut has some answers. He envisioned a virus that kept women from reproducing. At this time to be exact, so don't worry. It didn't happen , a small number of humans were isolated and marooned on one of the Galapagos Islands and were the only ones to whom this virus didn't spread. The women of this island were the only ones able to reproduce, passing on their DNA from one generation to the next.
If you know anything about how evolution works, you should have no problem understanding why Vonnegut saw humans, stranded on this island, becoming seal-like. He writes Galapagos with his usual dry wit and critical view of humanity.
He decides our big brains are responsible for our suffering, and we would be much happier without them. And if we had flippers instead of hands, we could no longer enslave our fellow human beings, or build weapons to destroy our world and each other.
It's a fun book and if you've enjoyed any of Vonnegut's other works, you don't want to miss this one. The characters are all too-human with their flaws and wants and dislikes and likes and big brains and everything else that makes us the complicated beings we are.
View all 48 comments. Mar 07, Darwin8u rated it really liked it Shelves: I haven't read much since those years between 13 and 18 when I seemed to burn through Vonnegut books again and again.
He was one of those few writers I ever read twice Dickens, Shakespeare, and Hugo are a few others. So, now as an adult I am approaching these books again. God I love this man. I love his hopeful, "In this era of big brains, anything which can be done will be done -- so hunker down. I love his hopeful, resigned cynicism about the modern era.
He writes as an outsider, but also as a friend -- if that makes any sense. This novel is so brilliant in its simplicity. Kilgore Trout's son Leon Trotsky Trout narrates a tale that covers one million years. That is the basic arc. The almost end of man, and his rebirth. Using evolution as a key, Vonnegut shows that like the Irish Elk, with its large, heavy, awkward, and almost unadaptive giant antlers, man is burdened with a giant brain that seems to cause endless trouble for our species.
So, the accidents of genetics and the isolation of some famous islands West of Ecuador allow for our species to be reborn. Compose Beethoven's Ninth Symphony?
View all 10 comments. Jul 06, Brian rated it really liked it Shelves: fiction. Often times he would do this in the same sentence. It is a skill that only the best satirists possess. It is an intriguing motif, which Vonnegut weaves the book around. Get it? It is intriguing. I am not sure the novel makes a case for its being the entire focus of a book.
Many of the usual suspects one assumes would be in a Vonnegut novel are addressed in this tale, and he makes a biting connection between sex and warfare that is a nice touch.
It is satirical, and yet perfectly apropos at the same time. Among those items: having the capacity to reason, to be motivated by selfish desires over the greater good, to laugh at farts…these are traits of most people. I think that is what makes it good. View all 5 comments. Stephen Jay Gould used to assign this novel to his students at Harvard.
Probably for some introductory paleontology course or other. Second, Vonnegut uses a relentless list of referents—in this book, big human brains, natural selection, marine Stephen Jay Gould used to assign this novel to his students at Harvard.
Second, Vonnegut uses a relentless list of referents—in this book, big human brains, natural selection, marine iguanas, blue-footed boobies, etc. This makes for a text that is highly self-referential yet not one cut off from world events. The time is one million years from now. Humans have devolved into sea-going creatures with flippers where their hands used to be and much smaller brains, since a streamlined body is more likely to be successful in the hunt for fish.
The world as we know it is long gone. As with whales, once land animals, probably some type of ruminant, humans are now seagoing, and once again part of the food chain. Now humans have devolved to the states of musth and rut like most other mammals. The narrator is a ghost. Apr 25, Dan Schwent rated it liked it Shelves: , books. One million years in the future, a man recounts humanity's origins in the Galapagos islands.
This was the third Kurt Vonnegut book I've read and my third favorite. Actually, it reminds me of one of Grandpa Simpson's rambling stories that circles back on itself, only with novel-y bits like themes and messages and such. Galapagos is part satire, part cautionary tale. There's a shipwreck on Galapagos and it turns out those people are the only ones who can reproduces. I'm pretty sure this is mentioned One million years in the future, a man recounts humanity's origins in the Galapagos islands.
I'm pretty sure this is mentioned in the first two pages. Anyway, one million years in the future, humanity is a whole other species. Galapagos deals in evolution, environmentalism, and anti-war. Also, humanity's "big brains" are blamed for most of their problems. The world of Galapagos is in a global economic crisis. Yeah, a lot has changed since The book is actually pretty funny with Vonnegut's dark absurdist humor being the star of the show.
I didn't like it as much as Cat's Cradle or Slaughterhouse-Five, however. I think it was the circular nature of the narrative that got me. If Galapagos was a road trip, it would have been thousands of left turns in order to go fifty miles in a straight line. Jun 17, Dave Schaafsma rated it it was amazing Shelves: fictionth-century , books-loved , environment. Very old tortoises! Finches galore! I know Charles Darwin was the guy that catapulted the place to international fame, and that it is still much written about and researched and visited.
Since "The only true villain in my story: The oversized human brain. Since I own a copy of this book that I had thought I had read decades ago; maybe I did! Spoiler alert: We don't, at least not most of us, in anything like our current configurations, at least according to the narrator, looking back from a million years forward.
From the author who personally survived the horrific bombing of Dresden and was never quite the same after who could be? But he also did his science homework, too. Of course many people want to get rich on the occasion, including a guy who preys on rich widows and another guy who wants to develop billion-dollar corporations out of it.
The cruise never comes off, as a worldwide recession affecting Ecuador and thus, worldwide hunger, an the hint of global class revolution and war makes it problematic for rich celebrities to travel to places of extreme poverty. As long as they did not use nuclear weapons, it appeared, nobody was going to give the right name to all the killing that had been going on since the end of the Second World War, which was surely World War Three.
One girl bears a child with seal-like fur, pointing to early shifts in evolution. Evolution happens, but what if survival of the fittest just means the survival of the powerful and greedy?
The book seems eerily prescient, and relevant to today in so many ways. Vonnegut in this book is most clearly the twentieth century Twain. Highly recommended! Darwin took, among other things, a few giant tortoises back with him when he left the islands, including Harriet, who died in at true story! I did! View all 9 comments. Jul 07, Jason rated it it was ok Shelves: for-kindle , , reviewed.
But this book was missing all of that. There were a few genius quips about Charles Darwin and his theory of natural selection, but for the most part this book was a bit of a let down. View all 19 comments. Dec 17, Apatt rated it it was amazing Shelves: undefined. Though I believe Vonnegut means something more subtle than that. The story is mainly set in and sometimes fast forward one million years to 1,,? Still, the narrative is easy to follow because Vonnegut knows what he is doing and there is method to his madness.
Fast forward one million years and humanity has evolved, entirely from this group of survivors on Santa Rosalia, into semi-aquatic people with flippers instead of hands; and much smaller brains which prevent them from making the same mistake as their ancestors from the 80s. A point frequently reiterated throughout the book. However, it is important to distinguish between what Leon Trout thinks and what Kurt Vonnegut thinks.
Eventually, such misuse is likely to be the cause of our downfall. There are numerous subplots and flashbacks, initially, I did not find the narrative particularly compelling because of the jumbled timeline which seems to prevent any kind of momentum from developing. However, as I said, Vonnegut knows what he is doing and the disparate plot strands are gradually woven together into one cohesive story. The book is often very funny, full of whimsical nonsequiturs and sharp satire.
However, Vonnegut is not Wodehouse , he wants to do more than tickle your funny bones, sometimes his disgust is made quite plain. It is a satire about humanity, what we have been doing, what we are still doing to eff up the world we live in. More of a cautionary tale than spec fic, IMO. What chain of events in evolution should we thank for our mouthfuls of rotting crockery? The logical explanations for his actions, invented at leisure, always came afterwards.
Vonnegut puts to use a hyper imagination with Galapagos. This book is about big brains. Big brains, like big boobies, regularly get in peoples way. Fortunately, I have neither. They are in peoples way when riding a crowded bus, or crowded elevators or when actively engaged in a sport. And evolution. This book is about big brains, boobies and evolution. That's about all a person needs to know before reading Galapagos View all 3 comments.
Absolutely adored the central conceit of this novel: In the midst of the death of the human species, a pocket of "humanity" manages to trundle on for at least another million years into the future, but the caveat being that these far-flung descendants are forever marooned on an ashy isle of the Galapagos where they have devolved into furry small-brained creatures with flippers--and the species and the planet couldn't be better off for it!
The conceptual remove from its characters will probably t Absolutely adored the central conceit of this novel: In the midst of the death of the human species, a pocket of "humanity" manages to trundle on for at least another million years into the future, but the caveat being that these far-flung descendants are forever marooned on an ashy isle of the Galapagos where they have devolved into furry small-brained creatures with flippers--and the species and the planet couldn't be better off for it!
The conceptual remove from its characters will probably trouble readers with conventional hearts, not to mention the very grim tone this novel takes toward the worth of the human race. But I loved the ruthlessly mordant satire that froths from every page of this novel.
More gloomy and acerbic takedowns of the human species, please! Jul 06, Jean-Luke rated it it was amazing. Have you heard of Charles Darwin?
Irish elk? Rudolf Nureyev? Jackie Kennedy Onassis? Blue-footed boobies? Vampire finches—the list goes on. As a fan of sarcasm, cynicism, pessimism, and nihilism yup, I'm fun at parties , as well as an absurdist plot, I'm a smitten-kitten when it comes to Vonnegut.
However, I'm not in love with Galapagos. In deep like? Yes, but, for me, the gold standard when it comes to Vonnegut is Cat's Cradle , followed by Mother Night. I did, however, like Galapagos better than Slaughterhouse-Five. Galapagos is set one million years after , when the world as we know it ended and, through a series of fluke even As a fan of sarcasm, cynicism, pessimism, and nihilism yup, I'm fun at parties , as well as an absurdist plot, I'm a smitten-kitten when it comes to Vonnegut.
Galapagos is set one million years after , when the world as we know it ended and, through a series of fluke events, one man and several women are stranded on the island of Santa Rosalia in the Galapagos. The end of civilization was brought about by mankind's "big brains" although not necessarily by man himself, as man is fundamentally good--just led astray by his inability to control his thoughts and his imagination , along with the help of a bacteria that leaves all the women of the world sterile.
However, on the secluded island of Santa Rosalia, the female castaways still young enough to produce are spared and, with an unwilling sire and a little help from a high school biology teacher, they are all impregnated. Thus, life continues to flourish on Santa Rosalia. If you see a Google Drive link instead of source url, means that the file witch you will get after approval is just a summary of original book or the file has been already removed.
Loved each and every part of this book. I will definitely recommend this book to science fiction, fiction lovers. Your Rating:. Your Comment:. Home Downloads Free Downloads Galapagos pdf.
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