In 1000 words, respond to the following:

In the introduction to his 1961 novel, Mother Night, Kurt Vonnegut gives his reader three morals the
story may contain. As the tale of American spy Howard W. Campbell Jr. unfolds, we see examples and
executions of each of these morals, but are they true, or simply Vonnegut in retrospect?

They are as follows:

We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.

When you’re dead, you’re dead.

Make love when you can. It’s good for you.

The last is more Vonnegut wit than anything else, so setting that one aside, think about the first two. Are
we what we pretend to be? And when you’re dead, are you dead? How does Howard W. Campbell
reinforce or avoid these morals? Is Vonnegut right to tell his reader this, or is it a misdirection; a lens
through which the reader peers, only to miss a broader picture?

General Educational Competencies of Assignment

Written Communication

Reading Fluency

Critical Thinking

Information Literacy

First Steps of Assignment

What is your thesis? That is, what are you trying to prove to your reader about your stance on what the
moral of Mother Night really is. Do you agree with both, with only one, or is there another moral you
want to argue?

Think of examples in the text (excerpts attached below) that reinforce your argument, whether they be
plot-based, character, or Vonnegut’s language.

Strategize how you will present your argument in a way that will best convince your reader.
 Writing Your Essay

Your essay will culminate in a proposal of no less than 1000 words.

Introduction: Problem and broad overview of your argument.

Introduce the question

Briefly describe problems this raises.

State your thesis (solution)

Examples, make your argument.

Bring in concrete evidence from the text. You should have different ways Mother Night proves or
disproves your point. How does this prove your thesis? You must quote from the text.

Conclusion: Highlight implications of your argument.

How does what you argue extend beyond the text?

NB: MAKE SURE TO USE DIRECT QUOTES FROM THE EXCERPTS ATTACHED BELOW TO SUPPORT YOUR
ARGUMENTS IN THE ESSAY. FOLLOW UP EACH QUOTE WITH AN EXPLANATION

“LAST FULL

MEASURE ...”

I, TOO, knew Rudolf Hoess, Commandant of Auschwitz. I met him at a

New Year’s Eve party in Warsaw during the war, the start of 1944.

Hoess heard that I was a writer, and he got me to one side at the party,

and he said he wished he could write.

“How I envy you creative people—” he said to me. “Creativity is a gift

from the gods.”

Hoess said he had some marvelous stories to tell. He said they were all

true, but that people wouldn’t be able to believe them.

Hoess could not tell me the stories, he said, until the war was won. After

the war, he said, we might collaborate.

“I can talk it,” he said, “but I can’t write it.” He looked to me for pity.

“When I sit down to write,” he said, “I freeze.”

What was I doing in Warsaw?

I had been ordered there by my boss, Reichsleiter Dr. Paul Joseph

Goebbels, Head of the German Ministry of Popular Enlightenment and

Propaganda. I had a certain amount of skill as a dramatist, and Dr. Goebbels

wanted me to use it. Dr. Goebbels wanted me to write a pageant honoring

the German soldiers who had given their last full measure of devotion—

who had died, that is—in putting down the uprising of the Jews in the

Warsaw Ghetto.

Dr. Goebbels had a dream of producing the pageant annually in Warsaw

after the war, of letting the ruins of the ghetto stand forever as a setting for

it.

“There would be Jews in the pageant?” I asked him.

“Certainly—” he said, “thousands of them.”

“May I ask, sir,” I said, “where you expect to find any Jews after the

war?”

He saw the humor in this. “A very good question,” he said, chuckling.

“We’ll have to take that up with Hoess,” he said.

“With whom?” I said. I hadn’t yet been to Warsaw, hadn’t yet met with

brother Hoess.

“He’s running a little health resort for Jews in Poland,” said Goebbels.
“We must be sure to ask him to save us some.”

Can the writing of this ghastly pageant be added to the list of my war

crimes? No, thank God. It never got much beyond having a working title,

which was: “Last Full Measure.”

I am willing to admit, however, that I probably would have written it if

there had been enough time, if my superiors had put enough pressure on

me.

Actually, I am willing to admit almost anything.

About this pageant: it had one peculiar result. It brought the Gettysburg

Address of Abraham Lincoln to the attention of Goebbels, and then to the

attention of Hitler himself.

Goebbels asked me where I’d gotten the working title, so I made a

translation for him of the entire Gettysburg Address.

He read it, his lips moving all the time. “You know,” he said to me, “this

is a very fine piece of propaganda. We are never as modern, as far ahead of

the past as we like to think we are.”

“It’s a very famous speech in my native land,” I said. “Every schoolchild

has to learn it by heart.”

“Do you miss America?” he said.

“I miss the mountains, the rivers, the broad plains, the forests,” I said.

“But I could never be happy with the Jews in charge of everything.”

“They will be taken care of in due time,” he said.

“I live for that day—my wife and I live for that day,” I said.

“How is your wife?” he said.

“Blooming, thank you,” I said.

“A beautiful woman,” he said. “I’ll tell her you said so,” I said. “It will

please her immensely.”

“About the speech by Abraham Lincoln—” he said.

“Sir—?” I said.

“There are phrases in here that might be used most impressively in

dedications of German military cemeteries,” he said. “I haven’t been happy

at all, frankly, with most of our funeral oratory. This seems to have the extra

dimension I’ve been looking for. I’d like very much to send this to Hitler.”

“Whatever you say, sir,” I said.

“Lincoln wasn’t a Jew, was he?” he said.

“I’m sure not,” I said.

“It would be very embarrassing to me if he turned out to be one,” he said.

“I’ve never heard anyone suggest that he was,” I said.

“The name Abraham is very suspicious, to say the least,” said Goebbels.

“I’m sure his parents didn’t realize that it was a Jewish name,” I said.

“They must have just liked the sound of it. They were simple frontier

people. If they’d known the name was Jewish, I’m sure they would have

called him something more American, like George or Stanley or Fred.”

Two weeks later, the Gettysburg Address came back from Hitler. There

was a note from der Fuehrer himself stapled to the top of it. “Some parts of

this,” he wrote, “almost made me weep. All northern peoples are one in

their deep feelings for soldiers. It is perhaps our greatest bond.”

Strange—I never dream of Hitler or Goebbels or Hoess or Goering or

any of the other nightmare people of the world war numbered “two.” I

dream of women, instead.

I asked Bernard Mengel, the guard who watches over me while I sleep

here in Jerusalem, if he had any clues as to what I dreamed about.

“Last night?” he said.

“Any night,” I said.

“Last night it was women,” he said. “Two names you said over and over.”

“What were they?” I said.

“Helga was one,” he said.

“My wife,” I said.

“The other was Resi,” he said.

“My wife’s younger sister,” I said. “Just their names—that’s all.”

“You said ‘Goodbye,’” he said.

“Goodbye,” I echoed. That certainly made sense, whether I dreamed or

not. Helga and Resi were both gone forever.

“And you talked about New York,” said Mengel. “You mumbled, and

then you said ‘New York,’ and then you mumbled some more.”

That made sense, too, as do most of the things I dream. I lived in New

York for a long time before coming to Israel.

“New York City must be Heaven,” said Mengel.

“It might well be for you,” I said. “It was hell for me—or not Hell,

something worse than Hell.”

“What could be worse than Hell?” he said.

“Purgatory,” I

15

THE TIME MACHINE …

IF THE PALE, ringless hand on the railing below was the hand of my Helga, it

was the hand of a woman forty-five years old. It was the hand of a middleaged woman who had been a
prisoner of the Russians for sixteen years, if

the hand was Helga’s.

It was inconceivable that my Helga could still be lovely and gay.

If Helga had survived the Russian attack on the Crimea, had eluded all

the crawling, booming, whistling, buzzing, creeping, clanking, bounding,

chattering toys of war that killed quickly, a slower doom, a doom that killed

like leprosy, had surely awaited her. There was no need for me to guess at

the doom. It was well-known, uniformly applied to all women prisoners on

the Russian front—was part of the ghastly routine of any thoroughly

modern, thoroughly scientific, thoroughly asexual nation at thoroughly

modern war.

If my Helga had survived the battle, her captors had surely prodded her

with gun muzzles into a labor gang. They had surely shepherded her into

one of Mother Russia’s countless huddles of squinting, lumpy, hopeless,

grubbing ragbags—had surely made of my Helga a digger of root crops in

frosty fields, a lead-footed, splay-fingered clearer of rubble, a nameless,

sexless dragger of noisy carts.

“My wife?” I said to Jones. “I don’t believe you.”

“It’s easy enough to prove I’m a liar, if I am a liar,” he said pleasantly.

“Have a look for yourself.”

My pace down the stairs was firm and regular.

Now I saw the woman.

She smiled up at me, raising her chin so as to show her features frankly,

clearly.

Her hair was snow-white.

Aside from that, she was my Helga untouched by time.

Aside from that, she was as lithe and blooming as my Helga had been on

our wedding night.

18

WERNER NOTH’S

BEAUTIFUL BLUE VASE …

HELGA AND I were finally left alone.

We were shy.

Being a man of fairly advanced years, so many of the years having been

spent in celibacy, I was more than shy. I was afraid to test my strength as a

lover. And the fear was amplified by the remarkable number of youthful
characteristics my Helga had miraculously retained.

“This—this is what’s known as getting to know each other again,” I said.

Our conversation was in German.

“Yes,” she said. She had gone to the front window now, was looking at

the patriotic devices I’d drawn on the dusty window-panes. “Which one of

these is you now, Howard?” she said.

“Pardon me?” I said.

“The hammer and sickle, the swastika, or the Stars and Stripes—” she

said, “which one do you like the most?”

“Ask me about music,” I said. “What?” she said.

“Ask me what kinds of music I like these days,” I said. “I have some

opinions on music. I have no political opinions at all.”

“I see,” she said. “All right—what music do you like these days?”

“‘White Christmas’—” I said, “Bing Crosby’s ‘White Christmas.’”

“Excuse me?” she said.

“My favorite piece of music,” I said. “I love it so much, I have twenty-six

copies of it.”

She looked at me blankly. “You do?” she said.

“It—it’s a private joke,” I said lamely.

“Oh,” she said.

“Private—” I said. “I’ve been living alone so long, everything about me’s

private. I’m surprised anyone’s able to understand a word I say.”

“I will,” she said tenderly. “Give me a little time—not much, but some—

and I’ll understand everything you say—again.” She shrugged. “I have

private jokes, too—”

“From now on—” I said, “we’ll make the privacy for two again.”

“That will be nice,” she said.

“Nation of two again,” I said.

“Yes,” she said. “Tell me—”

“Anything at all,” I said.

“I know how Father died, but I haven’t been able to find out a thing about

Mother and Resi,” she said. “Have you heard a word?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“When did you see them last?” she said.

I thought back, was able to give the exact date on which I’d last seen

Helga’s father, mother, and her pretty, imaginative little sister, Resi Noth.

“February 12, 1945,” I said, and I told her about that day.

That day was a day so cold that it made my bones ache. I stole a

motorcycle, and I went calling on my in-laws, on the family of Werner

Noth, the Chief of Police of Berlin.

Werner Noth lived on the outskirts of Berlin, well outside the target area.

He lived with his wife and daughter in a walled white house that had the

monolithic, earthbound grandeur of a Roman nobleman’s tomb. In five

years of total war, that house had not suffered so much as a cracked

window-pane. Its tall, deep-set windows on the south framed an orchard

within the walls. On the north they framed the jagged monuments in the

ruins of Berlin.

I was wearing a uniform. At my belt was a tiny pistol and a big, fancy,

ceremonial dagger. I didn’t usually wear a uniform, but I was entitled to

wear one—the blue and gold uniform of a Major in the Free American

Corps.

The Free American Corps was a Nazi daydream—a daydream of a

fighting unit composed mainly of American prisoners of war. It was to be a

volunteer organization. It was to fight only on the Russian front. It was to

be a high-morale fighting machine, motivated by a love of western

civilization and a dread of the Mongol hordes.

When I call this unit a Nazi daydream, incidentally, I am suffering an

attack of schizophrenia—because the idea of the Free American Corps

began with me. I suggested its creation, designed its uniforms and insignia,

wrote its creed.

That creed began, “I, like my honored American forefathers, believe in

true freedom—”

The Free American Corps was not a howling success. Only three

American P.W.’s joined. God only knows what became of them. I presume

that they were all dead when I went calling on my in-laws, that I was the

sole survivor of the Corps.

When I went calling, the Russians were only twenty miles from Berlin. I

had decided that the war was almost over, that it was time for my career as a

spy to end. I put on the uniform in order to dazzle any Germans who might

try to keep me from getting out of Berlin. Tied to the back fender of my

stolen motorcycle was a parcel of civilian clothes.

My call on the Noths had nothing to do with cunning. I really wanted to

say goodbye to them, to have them say goodbye to me. I cared about them,

pitied them—loved them in a way.

The iron gates of the great white house were open. Werner Noth himself

was standing beside them, his hands on his hips. He was watching a work

gang of Polish and Russian slave women. The women were lugging trunks

and furniture from the house to three waiting horse-drawn wagons.

The wagon drivers were small, gold Mongols of some sort, early prizes

of the Russian campaign.

The supervisor of the women was a fat, middle-aged Dutchman in a

shabby business suit.

Guarding the women was a tall and ancient man with a single-shot rifle

from the Franco-Prussian War.

On the old guard’s ruined breast dangled the Iron Cross.

A woman slave shuffled out of the house carrying a luminously beautiful

blue vase. She was shod in wooden clogs hinged with canvas. She was a
nameless, ageless, sexless ragbag. Her eyes were like oysters. Her nose was

frostbitten, mottled white and cherry-red.

She seemed in danger of dropping the vase, of withdrawing so deeply

into herself as simply to let the vase slip away.

My father-in-law saw the vase about to drop, and he went off like a

burglar alarm. He shrieked at God to have pity on him just once, to make

sense just once, to show him just one other energetic and intelligent human

being.

He snatched the vase from the dazed woman. Close to unashamed tears,

he asked us all to adore the blue vase that laziness and stupidity had almost

let slip from the world.

The shabby Dutchman, the straw boss, now went up to the woman and

repeated to her, word for word and shriek for shriek, what my father-in-law

had said. The antique soldier came along with him, to represent the force

that would be used on the woman, if necessary.

What was finally done with her was curious. She wasn’t hurt.

She was deprived of the honor of carrying any more of Noth’s things.

She was made to stand to one side while others continued to be trusted

with treasures. Her punishment was to be made to feel like a fool. She had

been given her opportunity to participate in civilization, and she had muffed

it.

“I’ve come to say goodbye,” I said to Noth.

“Goodbye,” he said.

“I’m going to the front,” I said.

“Right over that way,” he said, pointing to the East. “An easy walk from

here. You can make it in a day, picking buttercups as you go.”

“It isn’t very likely we’ll see each other again, I guess,” I said.

“So?” he said.