I’m often asked who Kilgore Trout is.
This is because I put “Proud disciple of Kilgore Trout” in my email signature, my social media bios and on my website. In fact, it’s at the bottom left of this page. When people ask this, I am typically imbued with joy at being the person to introduce them to Kilgore Trout. If it takes place online, I then question their ability to use the Internet for its first intended function: to seek and share information. But I tell myself such is life and then try to imbue myself with joy.
Kilgore Trout is a fictional character from the mind of Kurt Vonnegut. Trout is a ‘failed’ science fiction writer whose name is allegedly inspired by the inventor of the cap gun (Kilgore) and Theodore Sturgeon. Sturgeon is one of Vonnegut’s friends who was also a failed science fiction writer for a while until he became a wildly respected science fiction writer and even contributed to a little television show called Star Trek. Vonnegut was tickled that someone’s last name could be a fish.
As Vonnegut’s many novels often cross reference each other, Kilgore Trout pops up a fair few times. My preferred instance of Mr. Trout is in Breakfast of Champions. It is my favorite of Vonnegut’s novels, though not his best writing. It is simply such a delight to read. If I’m completely honest about why I like Kilgore Trout so much, it’s because he doesn’t make sense. The timing of his death is weird and then doesn’t match up with his references in other books. His backstory is constantly changing — the only consistent fact being that he is a science fiction writer who has received absolutely no recognition despite a deep catalogue of supposedly profound work. As a character, he is sometimes the driving force in Vonnegut’s novels though he plays a minimal part. It’s almost as if Trout is the trick Vonnegut pulls from his hat to connect unconnectable dots. I’m sure many Vonnegut fans will disagree with me, but I’m also sure they have their own unread blogs elsewhere on this wild ride called the Internet.
For me, Trout delivers the heaviest hitters of Vonnegut’s pleas for humanity and understanding in the absurd world — and certainly the country — that he lives in. For instance, his motto in the novel Timequake is “You were sick. Now you are well again. And there is work to be done.” A phrase that he invents to pull other people out of a collective depression, malaise and shock at realizing the magnitude of their worst actions. The phrase evokes sympathy and empathy and support and, at the time of writing this, feels all too prescient. Another example: “Life’s no way to treat an animal.” That’s what Trout’s tombstone reads and is a sentiment that sneaks up on me almost weekly — particularly while waiting in the customs line at the airport or while reading the news on any given day.
The greatest Troutism of all and the one that inspired me to take on the self-inflicted title of a disciple is one found in Breakfast of Champions. A main character tells him about individuals who grab poisonous snakes during church services to demonstrate their belief in Jesus — he says this to get a rise out of Trout. His response? “Takes all kinds of people to make up a world.”
That sentiment, right there, is the reason I choose to follow in the path of Kilgore Trout. My life, too doesn’t really make any sense. I, too, have a wellspring of written works that absolutely no one reads (though they are by no means profound). My impact on other people’s stories and character development has no coherent pattern and oftentimes I seem to be the only thing that connects unconnectable dots. I’ve probably also been the only thing to disconnect very connectable dots (my apologies to a few past lovers, I hope your dots have found more accommodating harbors). Throughout the giant question mark that is my real life story, I want to employ the fictional Kilgore’s creed and understanding:
Life is tough, it’s unfair, and I am in no position to judge anyone else that is simply trudging through life the best way they know how. Knowing all of this will get me through as unharmed as possible.
Faith in a fictional being seems to bring their teachings into existence, after all. I’ll try to continue following in his path until I myself am a memory, my body lying in an ashen heap or beneath its own exacting epitaph. Just being one of a kind making up a world.
So it goes.