臺灣博碩士論文加值系統

摘要
本論文旨在探討馮內果如何利用寫作略中，作者對小說的權力/無力來表達「五號屠宰場」和「冠軍早餐」兩書的主題思想。也就是說，作者的無力正是馮內果所賦予作者的權力。
馮內果透過對寫實和現代主義的傳統中，作者全知全能的懷疑和放棄，打破完整敘述方法，自暴寫作過程並坦承身為作者的困境和挫折，矮化作者角色，放棄傳統作者對語言的控制。以上種種後設小寫作策略雖使作者相對於傳統作者而言，顯得無權無力，但也幫助馮內果避免受限於寫實傳統的不適用和不足之處。更重要的是，馮內果藉此以型式和內容相互呼應的模式，傳達人生荒謬無常，個人自由意志的受限，死亡如影隨形等訊息。也因此，馮內果荒誕不羈的寫作風格，正是他以黑色幽默的態度來面對人生的最好證明，並非消極頹廢，不在乎世事的虛無主義者。再者，兩書的寫作策略雖是以後設小說為主，但馮內果所關懷的主題不外乎社會的問題，人類的歷史和生存，並非永無止境的虛構故事，或僅以敘述來探討寫作本身的問題。
在「五號屠宰場」中，作者緊密結合戰爭與死亡並呼應寫作一主題，藉由敘述者的自白中，揭露作者寫作過程的困境與個人能力的限度等後設小寫作策略，以及採用黑色幽默的寫作風格來呈現戰爭死亡之間的關係。馮內果將此三主題複雜，難以用言詞形容的特質緊密結合，也因此轉化作者之無力成為另一種作者之權力。
同樣的，在「冠軍早餐」中，作者放棄傳統敘述中對文字、情節和結構的控制來表達對美國文化社會的批判，以及作者身受其中卻欲表達反抗的困境，進而闡述人類生存並非完全由個人的自由意志所能控制，而是此意志與外在內在無法控制的複雜因素和力量所共同造成。身為作者，必須自覺身處的環境，了解人類存在的本質，才能避免陷入人云亦云的思想窠臼中。

Abstract
The thesis is an examination of Kurt Vonnegut's use of authorial power and its relationship with his thematic concerns in Slaughterhouse-Five and Breakfast of Champions. The author is presented as a powerless one as Vonnegut abandons some of the realist and modernist authorial controls over the text. He challenges the omniscient and omnipotent power of the author by presenting a belittled writer figure, exposing the writing process, and renouncing his control over language, plot and structure. However, all these apparently negative strategies help Vonnegut successfully present the absurd and paradoxical nature of his subject matters in both novels. Consequently, the author is actually a powerful one since the seemingly powerless aspects are Vonnegut's strategic arrangements in presenting his unusual themes without falling into the inadequacy of the writing modes of realist and modernist traditions. Historically, Vonnegut's writing strategies respond actively to the metafictional writers and the spirits of black humor.
The first chapter defines the paradoxical ideas of the authorial power/powerless. The following two chapters discuss separately about how the powerless author strategies empower the author in Slaughterhouse-Five and Breakfast of Champions. In both novels, Vonnegut connects his main issues with the subject of writing, which reinforces the presentation of his concerns and the conveying of his messages. In Slaughterhouse-Five, the incomprehensibility and absurdity of war and death echo to the revelation of the failure and frustration of the author in writing, while in Breakfast of Champions, the author's inability actually help reflect the social, cultural problems in American society and the those of human existence.

Introduction 1
Chapter one The "Loss" of Authorial Power in Slaughterhouse-Five and Breakfast of Champions 11
Chapter Two Power/lessness of the Author in Slaughterhouse-Five 24
Chapter Three Power/lessness of the Author in Breakfast of Champions 52
Conclusion 77

Works Cited
Allen, William Rodney, ed. Conversations with Kurt Vonnegut. Jackson and
London: U P of Mississippi, 1988.
---. Understanding Kurt Vonnegut. South Carolina: U of South Carolina P, 1991.
Berryman, Charles. "After the Fall: Kurt Vonnegut." Critique: Studies in Modern
Fiction 26.2 (1985): 96-102.
Blackford, Russell. "Physics and Fantasy: Scientific Mysticism, Kurt Vonnegut, and
Gravity's Rainbow." Journal of Popular Culture. 19.3 (1985): 35-44.
Bradbury, Malcolm. The Modern American Novel. Oxford/New York: Oxford U
P, 1992.
Broer, R. Lawerence. Sanity Plea: Schizophrenia in the Novels of Kurt Vonnegut
Tuscaloosa and London: The U of Alabama P, 1989.
Currie, Mark. Metafiction. London/New York: Longman, 1995.
Edelstein, Arnold. "Slaughterhouse-Five: Time Out of Joint." Collage Literature.
1 (1974): 128-139.
Geyh, Paula, et al eds. Postmodern American Fiction: A Norton Anthology.
New York: Norton, 1997.
Greiner, Donald J. "Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five and the Fiction of Atrocity."
Critique 14.3 (1973): 38-51.
Hilfer, Tony. "Postmodernism as Black Humor." American Fiction Since 1940.
London/New York: Longman, 1993.
Hipkiss, Robert. The American Absurd: Pynchon, Vonnegut and Barth. N Y:
National University Faculty P, 1984.
Hutcheon, Linda. "Theorizing the Postmodernism." A Poetics of Postmodernism. New York/London: Routledge, 1988.
John, Barth. "The Literature Exhaustion." The Novel Today: Contemporary
Writers on Modern Fiction. Bradbury, Malcolm, ed. Britain: Fontana
Paperbacks, 1973.
--- "The Literature of Replenishment." The Friday Book: Essays and
Other Nonfiction. New York: Putnam, 1984.
Klinkowitz, Jerome. Literary Disruptions: The Making of a Post-Contemporary
American Fiction. Urbana: U of Illinois P, 1980.
---. Kurt Vonnegut. New York: Methuen, 1982.
---. Slaughterhose-Five: Reforming the Novel and the World. Boston: Twayne,
1990.
Lodge, David. "Postmodernist Fiction." The Modes of Modern Writing:
Metaphor, Metonymy, and the Typology of Modern Literature. London:
Arnold, 1977.
Matheson, T. J. " 'This Lousy Little Book': The Genesis and Development of
Slaughterhouse-Five as Revealed in Chapter One." Studies in the Novel. 16
(1984): 228-240.
McGinnis, Wayne D. "The Arbitrary Cycle of Slaughterhouse-Five: A Relation of
Form to Theme." Critique. 17.1 (1975): 55-67.
McHale, Brian. Postmodernist Fiction. New York: Routledge, 1987.
Meeter, Glenn. "Vonnegut's Formal and Moral Otherworldliness: Cat's Cradle and
Slaughterhouse-Five." The Vonnegut Statement. Klinkowitz, Jerome and
John, Somer. eds. New York: Delacorte/Seymour Lawrence, 1973.
Merrill, Robert. Critical Essays on Kurt Vonnegut. Boston: G. K. Hall,
1990.
Merrill, Robert and Scholl, Peter A. "Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five: The
Requirements of Chaos." Studies in American Fiction. 6 (1978): 65-76.
Meyer, William E. H, Jr. "Kurt Vonnegut: The Man with Nothing to Say."
Critique. 29.2 (1988): 95-109.
Morse, Donald E. "Thinking Intelligently about Science and Art: Kurt Vonnegut's
Galapagos and Bluebeard." Extrapolation 38.4 (1997) 292-303.
Mustazza, Leonard, ed. Forever Pursuing Genesis: the Myth of Eden in the Novels
of Kurt Vonnegut. Lewisburg: Buncknell U P, 1990.
---. The Critical Response to Kurt Vonnegut. Westport: Greenwood P, 1994.
Reed, Peter J. and Leeds, Marc, ed. The Vonnegut Chronicles: Interviews and
Essays. Westport: Greenwood P, 1996.
Scholes, Robert. Fabulation and Metafiction. Urbana: U of Illinois P, 1979.
Vonnegut, Kurt. Mother Night. New York: Dell, 1962.
---. Cat's Cradle. New York: Dell, 1963.
---. God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater. New York: Dell, 1965.
---. Slaughterhouse-Five. New York: Dell, 1969.
---. Breakfast of Champions. New York: Dell, 1973.
Waugh, Patricia. Metafiction: The Theory and Practice of Self-Conscious Fiction.
London/New York: Routledge, 1984.