Player Piano: A Novel

By Kurt Vonnegut

“A funny, savage appraisal of a totally automated American society of the future.”—San Francisco Chronicle

Kurt Vonnegut’s first novel spins the chilling tale of engineer Paul Proteus, who must find a way to live in a world dominated by a supercomputer and run completely by machines. Paul’s rebellion is vintage Vonnegut—wildly funny, deadly serious, and terrifyingly close to reality.

Praise for Player Piano

“An exuberant, crackling style . . . Vonnegut is a black humorist, fantasist and satirist, a man disposed to deep and comic reflection on the human dilemma.”—Life

“His black logic . . . gives us something to laugh about and much to fear.”—The New York Times Book Review

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Sep 30, 2009
• ISBN: 9780307568083

Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut was a master of contemporary American Literature. His black humor, satiric voice, and incomparable imagination first captured America's attention in The Siren's of Titan in 1959 and established him as ""a true artist"" with Cat's Cradle in 1963. He was, as Graham Greene has declared, ""one of the best living American writers.""

Reviews for Player Piano

[nkmunn · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

my favorite Vonnegut so far during my 2016 campaign season blitz

[csdaley-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Have decided to reread all Vonnegut books in the order of publication. I still love this book. I was amazed at how relevant it still is. Haven't read it since which school and I am sure I got a lot more out of it now.

[reblacke · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Classic Vonnegut. Wonderful.

[dandelionroots · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The race to produce weaponry during WWIII pushed humans out of the manufacturing field - they're too inefficient and unreliable. Machines left engineers the elite of society relegating/separating the rest of the population to mere existence in little boxes, all the same with IQ absolutely determining one's fate."What have you got against machines?""They're slaves.""Well, what the heck - I mean, they aren't people. They don't suffer. They don't mind working.""No. But they compete with people.""That's a pretty good thing, isn't it - considering what a sloppy job most people do of anything?""Anybody that competes with slaves becomes a slave."A promising engineer begins to question the morality of life subservient to the efficiency of programmed machines (the segregation of society into useful and dependents) and ponders pursuing an alternate life trajectory."It was an appalling thought, to be so well-integrated into the machinery of society and history as to be able to move in only one plane, and along one line."Written in 1952, it seems Vonnegut will always be relevant: "He stared at the President and imagined with horror what the country must have been like when, as today, any damn fool little American boy might grow up to be President, but when the President had had to actually run the country!"Plus, igniting or enhancing daily questioning of the absurdity of society.

[brian3gunderson · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Wow! This book is well-told and predictive of many of the struggles with mechanized life that have occurred in the half century since it was written. He nails many things right on the head, even home decorating fads a la Etsy, HGTV, etc. Great book.

[juliecarlsen · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When considering the "best" dystopian novel, a contest typically pitted between Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World, my vote goes to Player Piano. On one hand, Orwell presents a police state that is too reminiscent of Nazi Germany to seem like a plausible future - the result of a worst case scenario, perhaps, but not a viable everyday situation. Huxley presents a much more compelling dystopian society where free will has been sacrificed for a vapid psuedo happiness, an increasingly realistic situation in today's technological world, but the comparative relate-ability of Huxleyan society in juxtaposition with the Christlike savage diminishes the novel's overall effect. Vonnegut's Player Piano, on the other hand, tells the story of a mechanical society in which humanity has become secondary to progress. It has enough of the fear that Orwell evokes in order to seem threatening and enough of Huxley's plausibility to drive the fear home. Every character in Player Piano is relate-able in his or her own way. We can see ourselves on both sides of the river, which makes the dystopia seem all the more real. Early Vonnegut, but I'm impressed!

[catfantastic_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I love Kurt Vonnegut but Player Piano, his first novel, just did not grab me. It's the old story of "machines and technology are evil and we would all be happier if we gave it all up and lived in rustic log cabins in the woods" and I have to say, no writer has ever sold me on that, not even Vonnegut. It's also a very slow novel, Vonnegut paints a detailed portrait of his dystopian future (although frankly it doesn't seem all that bad to me) but not much actually, really, happens.Anyways, the gist of Player Piano is that, in this future/alternate timeline only the really clever and educated people have jobs (programming and running machines, mostly) and the poor people who used to work in factories are "reduced" to being in the army, which is boring because there aren't any wars going on (how tragic!) or doing maintenance/construction work, which for some reason is a million times more horrible than working in a factory. Everyone gets a house and has all sorts of nifty robotic gadgets to help them with the chores, but this is really a bad thing because it is slowly corroding their souls, or something. I mean, what do women need free time for? Housework gives them a reason for being alive! (That, at least, appears to be the underlying message of Chapter 17.) The protagonist, Doctor Paul Proteus, a young man with a brilliant career following in his father's footsteps, begins to have doubts about their way of life. His friend, Finnerty is a non-conformer who takes things further than Paul is willing to and is much more interesting to read about. Finnerty also manages to make the only really valid argument against their society - that they have become prisoners to it and are incapable of acting out. He urges Paul to really shake things up, but Paul is only wants to buy a rundown farm with no electricity. "You shouldn't let fear of jail keep you from doing what you believe in.""Well, it doesn't." Paul reflected that the big trouble, really, was finding something to believe in. (p. 143)Anyways, I still love Kurt Vonnegut, but not this particular book. If this is your first Vonnegut book, do yourself a favor and pick up Slaughterhouse-Five instead.

[ikeman100 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the first Vonnegut book I've read since Slaughterhouse-Five 30 years ago. Apparently it's an early work and not considered his best. I liked it. Early into the book I was disappointed with his cynical view of society and the future. By the end I had great respect for what he was trying to say. His characters are often caricatures rather then real people but he is an acute observer of who we are and who we are in danger of becoming.I'll read more of his works.

[aug3zimm-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Giving up on this one. I get the point of it (and it’s a good point still relevant today) but it’s just boring. Not a quirky/funny as the others of his I’ve read.

[dlmorrese · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A society in which everyone's' basic needs are met, in which machines perform the most difficult and boring jobs, sounds pretty idyllic, doesn't it? But in this book Vonnegut asks what role people would play in such a world. What challenges them? What can they strive to achieve? What gives them a sense of purpose? Do they even need one? These and other questions posed by this story are as meaningful today as they were when it was first published over 60 years ago. It's still a good read.

[rajivc_18 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Some books sail above your head, and "Piano Player" by Kurt Vonnegut is one of them. The scene is set in New York and is dystopian. Two groups rule the world - engineers and managers. Machines and the corporate machine rule these people. Then, the rest of the people live on the other side of the river. Paul, a man headed for great things, revolts. In the process, his marriage breaks up. What happens in the end? I am unsure. As I said, the book sailed above my head and flew into the great distance.

[valzi-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I had heard this science fiction novel was funny, but it is instead a largely serious look at a dystopic America. There is skillful, biting satire, but not of a humorous nature.

I enjoyed the book, but not until I was at least 1/4th of the way in - Vonnegut took a long time to establish the personalities of his characters, and I read for characters more than I do for dystopian setting details, which are rich and fairly dense.

Overall, interesting, good read.

[bdgamer-669415 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Easily one of the best books I've ever read. I believe great art makes you think, rather than telling you what to think. Player Piano is a brilliant example of great art, showing you what it means when your autonomy, your freedoms are taken away, replaced with pre-programmed choices that have the best intentions behind them. It shows you what it means to be a man in a world where men are no longer needed. It shows you what might happen... or has already happened.

It makes you think. And, ultimately, that's what matters.

[stillatim · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Solid, and very smart, but also very clunky and nowhere near as concise as the later books. Well worth reading.

[billycongo · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Unfortunately, this was a bit heavy handed to be effective satire. Yes, the machines are coming to kill us. I welcome that deep slumber.

[jayeless-698797 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Apparently this is Vonnegut's first novel, and of those of his I've read so far it's by a long margin his best. It's the only one with characterisation deep enough to get invested in anyone's storyline. It has some really funny satire of corporate culture.

It includes a pertinent and important critique of capitalism, in the sense that increasing levels of mechanisation should liberate humanity from increasing amounts of unpleasant work (which is what the ruling class here claims has happened), but under capitalism this is impossible, because you need money to pay for life's necessities and the only way to get it is by working – pretty hard, when almost all the jobs are being done by machines! While under socialism you would have the ever-decreasing amount of work being shared between everyone capable, under capitalism you get a steadily-growing group of unemployed workers, who are therefore destitute. Vonnegut's protagonist, Paul Proteus, gets a little misdirected and blames the machines themselves instead of the economic system, but you can easily identify the real problem ;)

The novel is really weak on the inclusion of females; it seems that almost every woman is a housewife (presumably because there are not enough jobs for even just a fraction of the male population…) but not actually everyone because Paul's secretary is a woman. At any rate, it seemed bizarre that a novel so concerned with how men should spend their lives would just ignore women completely.

While that was unsatisfying, I really enjoyed this overall. As you can see, four stars.

[aliceanna-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Interesting to go back and re-read Vonnegut's first novel. It's not my favorite, but he really established himself with this one. You can see the beginning of certain recurring themes that continue throughout his lifetime of work. The humor is a bit more subtle than his later works, but there are some lovely hidden nuggets. Overall, a wonderful debut!

[sweetiegherkin · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Dr. Paul Proteus is an esteemed position in an alternate reality 1950s America and on the line for a potential promotion when he starts to question whether the society he and his father helped to form - one increasingly reliant on machines for all labor - is not detrimental to humanity.Player Piano is Kurt Vonnegut's first novel and a great first one at that. While his writing isn't quite as sharp and succinct as it is Cat's Cradle (the only other Vonnegut I've read), he still shines with a great deal of wit and wisdom. In particular, I found the scenes between the American ambassador and his guests to be cruelly funny as he attempts to explain American grandeur and innovation to foreigners who "mistake" many of these triumphs. Vonnegut's characters are incredibly vivid - I found myself becoming deeply invested even minor characters who only appear for one scene. While some of these characterizations were perhaps a little bit of caricatures, the overall effect was of compelling, well-rounded people who I was interested in reading more about.Vonnegut is particularly visionary in this novel - while the actual mechanics may be somewhat different, his prediction of a world run by machines with displaced people trying to find their place in society is eerily on the nose. Of course, in his world, the government provides for those people whose labor is replaced by machinery by finding them albeit incredibly menial jobs, whereas in our world we end up with places like Detroit. This is definitely a novel, that while incredibly readable and fast paced enough, gives the reader plenty to chew over in their thoughts during and after reading it. I highly recommend it.

[the7ken7petersen · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

My admiration for Vonnegut holds no bounds: how could he write this book in the early 1950's? It is almost 65 years later and the scenario which he paints is just coming to pass. I feel that I am doing well to have a vague grasp on what is happening now!I will not spoil the story by explaining it in detail, suffice to say that Kurt Vonnegut uses his tale to look at the way in which machines, far from bringing a halcyon future of happiness and egalitarianism for all, lead to a two state society between those people that have a function and those that are merely tolerated. It is always interesting in these futuristic pieces to see what has been predicted and what missed. Vonnegut's future has missed the explosion of media devices that keep us informed of the prescribed view and tracks our every movement, but does understand that the poor will not be eradicated, either by raising their living standards, or by social engineering as many have proposed. He also has the understanding of human nature to grasp that many of the oppressed will cling to the safe world that they know, rather than risking a 'brave new world', even though the new one offers them so much more.We have seen Vonnegut's prophesy come true and the really big question now, is the next stage: artificial intelligence is almost ready to take, not just the labouring jobs, but now, the intellectual careers away from humans...

[ariahfine-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book took me a while to get into. I do like that Vonnegut never follows a traditional storyline, you never know what to expect. That being said, I have a hard time getting through his longer works. I really liked Welcome to the Monkey House, his short story collection. I might try and read more of those.

[aguynamedcarl · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Player Piano was Vonnegut's first novel, and while many of the themes that populate his work are present here the execution is lacking. Actually, less "lacking" and more "nonexistent." Probably the greatest problem with the work is that it is dystopian fiction, but the dystopia presented is not so much terrifying or brutal as boring and soul-sucking, populated with characters that are superficial and uninteresting. Well, it is hard to write an interesting plot about such an uninteresting society. Even in his greatest works, Vonnegut was never spectacular with characterization, relying instead on fantastical places and plot points. Lacking the fantastical, Player Piano just spins its wheels in place for pages and pages, with little action and nothing but the bland ruminations of Dr. Paul Proteus to attempt to entertain us. There are some amusing aside chapters about the tour of one Shah of Bratpuhr through the dystopian United States, but they don't have much to do with anything and end up repeating themselves before long. In the last 60 or so pages, Vonnegut attempts to pull together something resembling a plot, but it is far too late and everything comes together far too fast to seem plausible, and even then it ends not with bang but a whimper. I can only recommend Player Piano to the Vonnegut fan who must read everything. Everyone else should probably stay away.

[saretta7l · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

2.5/5

Trovo che Vonnegutt abbia scritto dei romanzi fantastici, questo suo primo lavoro, però, non raggiunge le vette toccate da Cat's Cradle etc..
L'idea: in una America del dopo guerra la società è retta dagli ingegneri che, ideando macchine di ogni genere, hanno reso facile la vita dell'uomo medio. Talmente facile che l'uomo medio non fa nulla, ci pensano le macchine. Vonnegut affronta l'aspetto sociologico di questo possibile futuro seguendo diverse figure: quella ricorrente di Paul, ingegnere senza attaccamento per il proprio lavoro, e altre, alcune sovversive, altre conservative.
L'idea è buona, però rispetto a altri romanzi dello scrittore la narrazione è sotto tono: manca l'enfatizzazione delle assurdità umane.

---
I think that Vonnegut wrote amazing novels, however this one is not good as Cat's Cradle etc..
The idea is that in a post-war America society is ruled by engineers who, creating every kind of machines, allowed an easy life to the whole population. In fact people do nothing at all since the machines provide to every need. Vonnegut analyses the sociologic point of view of this setting following various characters: Paul, an engineer who does not love his work anymore, and others, some subversive, some conservative.
The idea is good, but the narration could be much better: it lacks the emphasis on human absurd behavior.

[fuzzy_patters · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

In this, Vonnegut's first novel, Dr. Paul Proteus lives in a futuristic dystopia in which everything is automated so that humans no longer have to work or even think except for the engineers and managers who have become the second highest class of society second only to the machines themselves. Meanwhile, a group of revolutionaries are trying to bring down this system in order to bring back pride and human dignity to those who have been replaced by machines. Despite having been written sixty years ago, I found this book to be very timely in an era in which many Americans have lost jobs to either machines or foreign workers. In many ways, Vonnegut's book is a very prescient look at our world today. This prescience extends beyond the loss of meaningful work for many Americans. Vonnegut also foresees many of the advancements that have been made in the tools we use in our everyday lives. For example, the non-engineering/managing class has been made content in the novel through having 40 inch TVs in every room, and their lives have been made easier through having "radar ranges," which are basically microwave ovens. In the novel, these things are provided for the populace in order to keep them content in the new role that machines play in society. It brings to mind how many Americans today are more interested in American Idol than in current events. Despite being his first novel, this book also does not lack any of Vonnegut's trademark wit and satire. There are parts that are laugh out loud funny, and Vonnegut is such a good story teller that I found that I could not put the book down for want of finding out what would happen next. This is typical of a Vonnegut novel for me, and it seems that he possessed this trait way back in 1952. While this novel may not be as famous as later novels such as "Slaughterhouse Five" or "Cat's Cradle," I found this novel to be every bit as engaging as those two.

[shawse_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A very compelling read. Both sides of this conflict between "man" and "machine" are granted time represented in prose, situation, and character. I know many people consider this novel to be about dystopia resulting from the rise of machines (and that may have been the intent) but I think it is much more complicated than that. This book gives someone a lot to ponder beyond the advertised conflict; the mark of a good piece of fiction.

[dickmanikowski · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I recently embarked on a quest to read or re-read all of Kurt Vonnegut's fiction, in roughly chronological order.I hit the wall with the second novel. PLAYER PIANO features some interesting 1984-ish concepts and explores questions of personal freedoms. But its pace is just too damned glacial. Vonnegut doesn't know when to stop.But I did. Onto the next novel.

[owen1218 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This might be my favorite Vonnegut novel, although it loses something for the author's masculine posturing and the negative caricatures of female characters throughout the book.

[jennyo_587543 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I love Vonnegut, but this one was pretty dated. Didn't hold up as well as most of his other stuff.

[freddy_24 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I am a huge Kurt Vonnegut fan and have read a few of his works, Slaughter-House Five and The Sirens of Titan, and loved them. He is able to create stories that are, interesting, entertaining, and thought provoking. His style of writing rivals that of the best which only makes his works that much better. When given the opportunity to read a free choice novel in my English class and I found out one of the options was another book by Kurt Vonnegut, Player Piano, it was an easy decision. In Player Piano the main character Paul Proteus is stuck in the middle of a society divided into the rich and well educated and the poor and undereducated. Paul runs a factory in Ilium, New York and he reflects upon the factory and its transition to a modernized and industrialized assembly line that does not require the work of humans because all the machines can run themselves. While reflecting he begins to see the flaws of what society is becoming and joins a group called the Ghost Shirt Society which is an organization that fights against the society to try and reverse what the society is becoming. Vonnegut, much like Huxley, analyzes the impact industrialization on society through his satirical work Player Piano. He portrays his opinion on how if society does not take action quickly all hope will be lost and humans will no longer play a role in society whatsoever. Player Piano is a dystopia however through the society’s actions the reader can see what can be done to prevent it from happening. While I did enjoy reading Player Piano it is not my favorite Vonnegut novel. I was not as impressed with his writing in this one, I feel that it was lacking, however this is one of the first novels Vonnegut wrote so it was interesting to see how he evolved as a writer having read The Sirens of Titan and Slaughter-House Five. I would recommend Player Piano but with a warning to not be expecting too much. Don’t get me wrong it is a good book but, in my opinion, not the best of Vonnegut’s works.

[justjenniferreading · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was my first Kurt Vonnegut book (other than Man Without a Country) and I was as happy with the book as I thought I would be. His witting style was very easy for me to read. I literally couldn't put this one down. I like the idea of technology causing problems. Even as technology friendly as I am I can see that someday there could be a meltdown and technology will be at the center of it.Mr. Vonnegut's look into the future, from the past, was very interesting. More so to see what his idea of technology in the future would be like, and to compare it to what really exists today.Being that this was my first Kurt Vonnegut book I am looking forward to reading even more.

[stipe168 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The most realistic vision of the future i've read so far.