Slapstick: Or, Lonesome No More! Summary
Kurt Vonnegut

Slapstick: Or, Lonesome No More! Summary

A pseudo-autobiography of how the author imagines his future, Slapstick takes place in an apocalyptic future as Wilbur Daffodil-11 Swain, a former pediatrician and President of the United States, writes a memoir of his life at 100 years old. The story skips around to different periods but is generally told chronologically to explain his current existence in the Empire State Building on the solitary island of Manhattan.

Wilbur's childhood is unusual. Born in a set of physically deformed twins, he and his sister Eliza are assumed mentally retarded with short life expectations. Their very wealthy parents fix up an old mansion in Vermont and the locals and a family practitioner care for the children while the parents visit once a year and on birthdays. Wilbur and Eliza quickly educate themselves through the many books in the mansion. While Eliza never grasps reading and writing, she is a creative problem-solver, while... View more of the Slapstick: Or, Lonesome No More! Summary