2br02b by Kurt Vonnegut Science Fiction Literary (Hardcover)

ID: GlVuLaWKj5

The title is pronounced 2 B R naught 2 B referencing the famous phrase to be or not to be from William Shakespeare s Hamlet Prince of Denmark. In this story the title refers to the telephone number one dials to schedule an assisted suicide with the Federal Bureau of Termination. The setting is a society in which aging has been cured individuals have indefinite lifespans and population control is used to limit the population of the United States to forty million. This is maintained through a combination of infanticide and government-assisted suicide - in short in order for someone to be born someone must first volunteer to die. As a result births are few and far between and deaths occur primarily by accident. Everything was perfectly swell. There were no prisons no slums no insane asylums no cripples no poverty no wars. All diseases were conquered. So was old age. Death barring accidents was an adventure for volunteers. Never never never -- not even in medieval Holland nor old Japan -- had a garden been more formal been better tended. Every plant had all the loam light water air and nourishment it could use. A hospital orderly came down the corridor and looked in at the mural and the muralist. Looks so real he said I can practically imagine I m standing in the middle of it. What makes you think you re not in it? said the painter. He gave a satiric smile. It s called The Happy Garden of Life you know.