Anyone reading Timequake by Kurt Vonnegut as a novel will quickly find that it isn't. Reason for alarm? Not if you've followed Vonnegut's career forwards - you'll find that every memory and every anecdote all fit in to some larger more complete puzzle that you've built with the author over time. Sure, the book jacket might trick you into believing that there is some sort of plot to the novel, and there is: some Vonnegut-esque rupture of time happens sometime in 2001, forcing everyone to relive their past 10 years. The problem is that everyone has to do exactly what they did for those 10 years all over again. They must make the same mistakes, say the same things, or, to use Vonnegut's words, "live life on auto-pilot." Kilgore Trout, a made-up character well known to readers, mans the helm once the world kicks back into "free will" mode, making sure people don't drive their cars off the road or stand in position indefinitely. This plot is mentioned in a few paragraphs here and there, and in dozens of references to 'Timequake One', the book Vonnegut wrote and then trashed in favor of these memoirs.
The Timequake isn't the story, as the title may imply - the Timequake is the means that Vonnegut takes to travel through time at his own pace, visiting his memories, his old friends and relatives, those who have passed away and those who are still with him. A clambake on the beach shortly after the Timequake lets everyone catch up again and serves as a party for Kilgore, Kurt, and various lookalikes of acquaintances past, whom Kurt refers to as doppelgangers. From this vantage point Vonnegut finally gets his answers out of Kilgore Trout that readers have always wanted, snippets of history, first hand accounts of the chaos of 'Post-Timequake Apathy', and dozens of two-paragraph story summations. It finally becomes clear what purpose Trout had all these years - a literary doppelganger of sorts to our own Mr. Vonnegut.
It doesn't take much to explain the literary significance of such an author, who has shown the world dozens of times over exactly how it works and what it shouldn't be doing. Far from preachy, each of his novels melds humour and an odd sense of reality to create a situation that, up until you read the page, could never have been thought up. We've got views of Darwinism, both social and biological, in Galapagos, religion meets military science in Cat's Cradle, and the Unabomer gets his manifesto written for him forty years early in Player Piano. Vonnegut's themes run from technology dulling society (he claims his brother and father forced him into engineering school) to putting the big picture in its rightful place. In the classic Sirens of Titan, Vonnegut calmly explains the purpose of the Earth and humanity, reducing our entire civilization and natural resources to mere convenience for an 'alien' who needed a part for his spaceship.
Instead of blasting Timequake for its lack of a plot and meandering narrative like so many critics have already done, we need to look at this book from its perspective - a cap on an amazing literary career. He has inspired countless people to look outside of their environment, and not only push but also tear up the envelope. In Timequake, the author leaves us to fend for ourselves with a message in our hands: treasure each other, communicate often, and most importantly, never use semi-colons. His last words in the book and possibly his career do more to sum up his life than anyone ever could:
"What a language!"