2BR02B Kurt Vonnegut Analysis

Imagine a life where everything seemed perfect. No wars, no diseases, no prisons, etc. This was life in “2BR02B” by Kurt Vonnegut. However with this perfect lifestyle, one flaw can be seen, which was population. The United States stayed at a stable forty million, killing off a person every time a child was born. The main theme in “2BR02B” is nothing in the world is perfect. In the beginning of 2BR02B, we are told that life was perfect, as on pg. 1 it states, “Everything was perfectly swell. There were no prisons, no slums, no insane asylums, no cripples, no poverty, no wars. All disease was conquered. So was was old age.” What we can gather from the text is that life seemed perfect, as Vonnegut introduces us to all of the things in life that

We can see that the introduction quickly contrasts the ideas of perfection and flaws to show that the United States was not perfect. Another quote to show that the United States wasn’t perfect is on pg. 4 as it says, “The painted pondered the mournful puzzle of life demanding to be born and, once born, demanding to be fruitful...to multiply and to live as long as possible… He knew he would never paint again… he decided he had had about enough of life in the Happy Garden of life too, and he came slowly down from the ladder.” This piece of text shows that some people weren’t happy with this way of living. The painter had been 200 years old, which means he lived before the law of overpopulation was issued. After seeing Wehling kill three people to make space for triplets, he reflects on life, knowing that he also wanted to get away from this kind of society, and schedules an appointment with the Federal Bureau to volunteer to kill himself. This also shows that life wasn’t perfect because people weren’t happy with the law of having only forty million people living, and killed themselves just like the painter