Week 14: Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut (5)

 Before Sirens of Titan, the only other Vonnegut book I’d read was the story of Billy Pilgrim, Slaughter House Five. The fact that Sirens of Titan has a central coherent narrative, comparatively, actually threw me for a loop at first. But Vonnegut’s unapologetically batshit creativity and meticulous dissection of social constructs and the human condition is a unifying element throughout his work, and if anything his total disdain for war is more hilariously satirical in Sirens of Titan, though that might have to do with the focus of the book being more on organized religion and it’s Gordian Knot of recursive implications than the bleak horrors of glorified conflict.

For the longest time, I was sure that Malachi Constant was our main character, but by the end it became clear that it was actually Rumfoord. This is because it isn’t like Malachi doesn’t have an arc we can sympathize with throughout the story, but that he’s not particularly someone who fights for his freedom of choice the way Rumfoord does. He’s a little like Rumfoord’s rag doll throughout this whole thing. And I say this while under the impression that Rumfoord is a Faustian influence on the story - the Mephistopheles to Malachi’s Faust, except that he’s also both like Lucifer and Jesus rolled into one, simultaneously raging against his roll in the universe and completing it to his own detriment in perfect awareness. Malachi is the prodigal son, the flock stray to lead readers through the story, Chrono is the unflinching nobility of someone with strength in their own convictions, and Beatrice is someone who comes closest to Rumfoord in being the protagonist, albeit a foil, in that she never compromised herself unless it was on her own terms. 

Every character contributes a unique life philosophy for Vonnegut to puzzle into the gray zone of destiny vs free will, but no character is as acutely aware of the line to be walked there more so than Winston Niles Rumfoord, and therefore, in his awareness, he puts the greatest amount of effort forward to both fulfill and break his destiny. Rumfoord is the true protagonist of Vonnegut’s tragi-comedy of human destiny.

In completing his role and achieving the sum total of humanity’s ‘purpose’, Rumfoord achieves his goal - being freed from his ‘destiny’. By giving up his on his ambition, he so achieves it, only to then be flung out into the universe without so much as his dog for company. He’s gone from man to God and he can’t even interact with the fruits of his labor. So it goes.