Kurt Vonnegut's casual style is effective for his message. His writing sounds very conversational. He starts sentences with “because” in “Cold Turkey.”
“Because power corrupts us, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Human beings are chimpanzees who get crazy drunk on power.”
“When you get my age, if you get my age, which is 81, and if you have reproduced, you will find yourself asking your children, who are themselves middle-aged, what life is all about. I have seven kids, four of the, adopted.”
Vonnegut speaks like a grandfather speaking to his grandchild about life.
“Many of you reading this are probably the same age as my grandchildren.”
Vonnegut expresses a strong confidence when he writes like this to his audience. He lets the reader know that he is aware.
In “Teaching the Unteachable” this confidence is present as well. He starts, “You can't teach people to write well.”
Vonnegut places “so it goes” on its own line in the first page of the text. This is a move a poet would make. The “So it goes” allows a pause. It works as a breath to let the reader take in what they've just read.
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