Surviving Loneliness, Depression, and Death The themes of Kurt Vonnegut's short stories are based upon his struggles with depression, loneliness and death. Kurt Vonnegut's influences came from the Great Depression, family deaths, and also, in part, from being a prisoner of war (Bleile...

John Updike and Kurt Vonnegut both weave social commentary into their short stories. In "A&P," Updike focuses on the dehumanizing elements of menial jobs such as the bag-boy job occupied by the story's protagonist Sammy. Sammy is coming of age; he has finished high school and is taking his first st...

Conditions for Growing Society There is a Korean saying: "If the water does not flow, it will be contaminated.?This means that if people just stay in a place without developing, there will not be progress, and finally, it will cause a set-back. This saying says that society is similar to wate...

Harrison Bergeron In the short story "Harrison Bergeron," by Kurt Vonnegut, the characters are all made equal. In this story there are many good examples of why nobody should be exactly alike. The government tries to get everyone to be the same inequality and they succeed. I thin...