After a fall in his NYC home two weeks ago that resulted in some brain injuries, the best-selling author died yesterday. Vonnegut, widely known for books like “Slaughterhouse 5,” “Breakfast of Champions,” and “Welcome to the Monkey House,” was 84.

What will be missed most by many was Vonnegut’s intelligent and biting satire about the absurdity of war and the questionable advancements of science in the modern age. He relished his significant role as a social critic and lectured widely. A self-professed skeptic of religion and freethinking humanist, Vonnegut claimed, “I will say anything to be funny, often in the most horrible situations.”

Vonnegut served in WWII and was captured by Germans during the Battle of the Bulge. He was being held when the Americans firebombed Dresden and freed him, along with numerous other POWs. Vonnegut had been held in a meat locker named “Slaughterhouse 5,” which later became the title for his most famous novel. Vonnegut attempted suicide in 1984 using pills and alcohol. He later joked about how he’d botched the job.

Vonnegut was a vocal critic of aspects of American society and government. A book published late in his life, “A Man Without A Country,” lampooned the Bush Administration (”upper-crust C-students who know no history or geography”) and questioned the fate of the planet. Vonnegut was a timeless voice whose literary and socio-cultural shoes will be hard to fill, especially at a time when the country needs more outspoken detractors of an incompetent and misguided administration.

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