“2BRO2B” by Kurt Vonnegut

On the surface, 2BRO2B is an incredibly dark satire portraying a bleak future where death is militantly maintained by the government. As we are introduced to a futuristic society in which death and aging has been cured, and the population is strictly controlled at 40 Million citizens, the scene is ironically set with the words “Everything was perfectly swell.” The main crisis of the story comes from the main character Wehling, whose wife has just given birth to triplets, which means that he must now find three people who are willing to die so that the new children may live.

A reference to Hamlet, the title itself is pronounced 2-B-R-nought-2-B, and like Shakespeare’s play, this story also ends in tragedy for most of the players involved. Although many readers may focus on the bleak outlook portrayed by the surface of the story, Vonnegut also has, like the great bard, an incredible knack for sneaking in a glimmer of hope and humor into an otherwise distressing situation. In this story, most of the humor comes from a cheeky artist who has been commissioned to paint an idealistic mural entitled “The Happy Garden of Life.” The ridiculous mural is meant to memorialize to a man who volunteered to die, although instead it immortalizes the doctors and staff members who assisted him in the process.

Credit: Wikipedia

The main action of the story comes from the artist as he paints the faces of the staff. While the irony falls on blind eyes to the contented hospital staff, it is not lost on the sardonic artist and the distraught new father, who are obsessed with the knowledge that for someone else to live, they must die.

While the metaphor is incredibly dark in this context, in many ways it is not far from the truth in our current world. The sadness of parting from a loved one can be large and terrible, but even in our own lives our elders must make hard decisions and sacrifices as they raise us into adulthood. Our strength and survival depends wholly on the shoulders of those who come before us. As we age, or have aged into adulthood, it is then our turn to take their place. We do this by starting families of our own, or by returning the favor and taking care of our parents in turn.

The last line in this novel comes from the telephone operator, after our artist has called the 2BRO2B hotline to volunteer his death. In a pleasant voice, the hostess tells us “Your city thanks you; your country thanks you; your planet thanks you. But the deepest thanks of all is from future generations.” Perhaps this ending demonstrates that the bleak nature of this future does not come from the sacrifices that the characters have made in the story, but from the absence of recognition for the sacrifices that their own families have made for them.

For those who are interested, “2BRO2B” is available in it’s entirety as an eBook at The Project Gutenberg.

Related SevenPonds Articles:

• The Role of Bargaining
• God, Death, Happiness and Misfortune
• Book Review: God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian by Kurt Vonnegut