Page 36 - Writes of Passage
P. 36
from GOD BLESS YOU, MR ROSEWATER
Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies:
“God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”
Kurt Vonnegut
These words are from the American author Kurt Vonnegut’s adult novel God BlessYou, Mr Rosewater, published in 1965. It is part of a speech that the protagonist – Eliot Rosewater, a millionaire who helps those in need – says that he is planning to give at the baptism of twins.
He has got to the heart of things here about what is important.
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