Latest / Classic Science Fiction Audiobooks: Free Public Domain Sci-Fi Stories / 🟡 2 B R 0 2 B (Dramatic Reading) (Full Audiobook) | Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

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🟡 2 B R 0 2 B (Dramatic Reading) (Full Audiobook) | Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. · Classic Science Fiction Audiobooks: Free Public Domain Sci-Fi Stories

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: To be Are Not to Be. This is a LibriVox recording.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, visit LibriVox dot org. To Be
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Are Not to Be? By Kurt Vonnegut Junior, narrated by
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Dennis Sayers.
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: The Hospital Orderly played by Mark Smith.
• 0:31
  Speaker 3: Painter read by Alan Drake.
• 0:35
  Speaker 4: Leora Duncan read by Laurie Ann Walden.
• 0:39
  Speaker 5: Doctor Hints read by Michael Yard.
• 0:42
  Speaker 6: The Voice of Wailing read by Julian Jamison.
• 0:47
  Speaker 7: Federal Bureau of Termination Hostess read by Kara Shallenberg.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Everything was perfectly swell. There were no prisons, no slums,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: no insane asylums, no cripples, no poverty, no wars. All
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: diseases were conquered. So was old age.
• 1:13
  Speaker 6: Death.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: Barring accidents was an adventure for volunteers. The population of
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: the United States was stabilized at forty million souls. One
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: bright morning in the Chicago lying in hospital, a man
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: named Edward K. Welling Junior waited for his wife to
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: give birth. He was the only man waiting. Not many
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: people were born a day anymore. Welling was fifty six,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: a mere stripling in a population whose average age was
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: one hundred and twenty nine. X rays had revealed that
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: his wife was going to have triplets. The children would
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: be his first. Young Welling was hunched in his chair,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: his head in his hand. He was so rumpled, so still,
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: and colorless, as to be virtually invisible. His camouflage was perfect,
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: since the waiting room had a disorderly and demoralized air too.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: Chairs and ash trays had been moved away from the walls.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: The floor was paved with spattered drop cloths. The room
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: was being redecorated. It was being redecorated as a memorial
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: to a man who had volunteered to die. A sardonic
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: old man about two hundred years old sat on a
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: step ladder painting a mural he did not like. Back
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: in the days when people aged visibly, his age would
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: have been guessed at thirty five or so. Aging had
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: touched him that much before the cure for aging was found.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: The mural he was working on depicted a very neat garden.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: Men and women in white doctors and nurses turned the soil,
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: planted seedlings, sprayed bugs, spread fertilizer. Men and women in
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: purple uniforms pulled up weeds, cut down, plants that were
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: old and sickly, raked leaves carried refuse to trash burners. Never, never, never,
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: not even in medieval Holland nor old Japan had a
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: garden been more formal, been better tended. Every plant had
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: all the loam, light, water, air, and nourishment.
• 3:52
  Speaker 6: It could use.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: A hospital Orderly came down the corridor, singing under his breath,
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: a popular.
• 4:02
  Speaker 8: If you don't like my kisses, honey, he's what I
• 4:06
  Speaker 8: will do. I'll go see a girl in purple kiss
• 4:11
  Speaker 8: this sad world too, lou If you don't want my
• 4:16
  Speaker 8: love him, why should I take up all this space.
• 4:20
  Speaker 8: I'll get off this soul planet. Lets some sweet baby
• 4:24
  Speaker 8: have my place.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: The Orderly looked in at the mural, and the muralist.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: Looks so real, he said, I can practically imagine I'm
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: standing in the middle of it.
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: What makes you think you're not in it, said the painter.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: He gave a satiric smile.
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: It's called the happy Garden of life. You know.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: That's good of doctor Hits, said the Orderly.
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: He was referring to one of the male figures in white,
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: whose head was a portrait of doctor Benjamin Hits, the
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: hospital's chief obstetrician. Hits was a blindingly handsome man.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: Lots of faces still to fill in.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: Said the orderly. He meant that many of the faces
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: in the mural were still blank. All blanks were to
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: be filled with portraits of important people on either the
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: hospital staff or from the Chicago office of the Federal
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: Bureau of Termination.
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: Must be nice to be able to make pictures that
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: look like.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: Something, said the orderly. The painter's face curdled with scorn.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: You think I'm proud of this dab, he said. You
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: think this is my idea of what life really looks like.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: What's your idea of what life looks like?
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: Said the orderly. The painter gestured at a file dropcloth.
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: There's a good picture of it, he said. Frame that
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: and you'll have a picture a damn sight more honest
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: than this one.
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: You are a gloomy old duck, aren't.
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: You, said the orderly. Is that a crime, said the painter.
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: The orderly shrugged.
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: If you don't like it, here grandpa.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: He said, And he finished the thought with the trick
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: telephone number that people who didn't want to live anymore
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: were supposed to call the zero in the number he
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: pronounced not the number was to be or not to be.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: It was the telephone number of an institution whose fanciful
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: sobriquets included automat Birdland, Cannery, catbox, d Lausser, Easy Go, goodbye,
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: Happy hooligan, kiss me quick, lucky Pierre, sheep dip wearing blendor,
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: weep no more? And why worry? To be or not
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: to be? Was the telephone number of the municipal gas
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: Chambers of the Federal Bureau of Termination. The painter thumbed
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: his nose at the Orderly.
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: When I decide it's time to go, he said, it
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: won't be at the sheep Dip.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: I'd do it yourself or a said the Orderly, messy
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: business Grandpa, Why don't you have a little consideration for
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: the people who have to clean up after you?
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: The painter expressed with an obscenity his lack of concern
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: for the tribulations of his survivors.
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: The world could do with a good deal more mess
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: if you ask me.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: He said. The Orderly laughed and moved on wailing. The
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: waiting father mumbled something without raising his head, and then
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: he fell silent again. A coarse formidable woman strode into
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: the waiting room on spike heels. Her shoes, stockings, trench coat, bag,
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: and overseas cap were all purple. The purple the painter
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: called the color of grapes on judgment day. The medallion
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: on her purple mussette bag was the seal of the
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: Service Division of the Federal Bureau of Termination. An eagle
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: perched on a turnstile. The woman had a lot of
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: facial hair and unmistakable mustache. In fact, a curious thing
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: about gas chamber hostesses was that, no matter how lovely
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: and feminine they were when recruited, they all sprouted mustaches
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: within five years or so.
• 9:03
  Speaker 4: Is this where I'm supposed to come?
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: She said to the painter.
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: A lot would depend on what your business was. He said,
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: you aren't about to have a baby, are you.
• 9:16
  Speaker 4: They told me I was supposed to pose for some picture.
• 9:19
  Speaker 4: She said, my name's Leora Duncan.
• 9:23
  Speaker 9: She waited, and you dunk people. He said, what she said,
• 9:32
  Speaker 9: skip it?
• 9:33
  Speaker 4: He said that sure is a beautiful picture. She said,
• 9:37
  Speaker 4: looks just like heaven or something or something.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: Said the painter. He took a list of names from
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: his smock.
• 9:46
  Speaker 9: Pocket, Duncan. Duncan, duncan, he said, scanning the list.
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: Yes, here you are. You're entitled to be immortalized. See
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: any faces here you'd like me to stick your head on.
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: We've got a few choice ones left.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: She studied the mural bleakly.
• 10:09
  Speaker 4: Gee, she said, they're all the same to me. I
• 10:13
  Speaker 4: don't know anything about art.
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: A body's a body, eh, he said, all right, as
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: a master of fine art, I recommend this body here.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: He indicated a faceless figure of a woman who was
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: carrying dried stocks to a trash burner. Well, said Leora Duncan.
• 10:35
  Speaker 4: That's more the disposal people, isn't it. I mean, I'm
• 10:38
  Speaker 4: in service. I don't do any disposing.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: The painter clapped his hands in mock delight.
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: You say you don't know anything about art, and then
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: you prove in the next breath that you know more
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: about it than I do. Of course, the sheave carrier
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: is wrong for a hostess, a snipper, a pruner. That's
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: more your lawe mine.
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: He pointed to a figure in purple who was sawing
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: a dead branch from an apple tree.
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: How about her?
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: He said?
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: You like her at all?
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: Gosh, she said, and She blushed and became humble.
• 11:16
  Speaker 4: That that puts me right next to doctor Hits. That
• 11:20
  Speaker 4: upsets you, he said, good grating, No, she said, it's
• 11:26
  Speaker 4: it's just such an honor.
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: Ah, you would admire him, eh.
• 11:31
  Speaker 9: He said, who doesn't admire him?
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: She said, worshiping the portrait of Hits. It was the
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: portrait of a tanned, white haired, omnipotent zeus two hundred
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: and forty years old.
• 11:48
  Speaker 4: Who doesn't admire him?
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: She said? Again?
• 11:51
  Speaker 4: He was responsible for setting up the very first gas
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: chamber in Chicago.
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: Nothing would please me more, said the painter, than to
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: put you next to him for all time, sawing off
• 12:06
  Speaker 3: a limb that strikes you as appropriate.
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: That is kind of like what I do, she said.
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: She was demure about what she did. What she did
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: was make people comfortable while she killed them. And while
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: Leora Duncan was posing for her portrait, into the waiting
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: room bounded Doctor Hits himself. He was seven feet tall,
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: and he boomed with importance, accomplishments, and the joy of living.
• 12:40
  Speaker 5: Well, Miss Duncan, Miss Duncan.
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: He said, And he made a joke.
• 12:46
  Speaker 5: What are you doing here?
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: He said?
• 12:49
  Speaker 5: This isn't where people leave This is where they come in.
• 12:53
  Speaker 4: We're going to be in the same picture together.
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: She said, shyly.
• 12:59
  Speaker 5: Good, said doctor Hurtz heartily, and say, isn't that some picture?
• 13:06
  Speaker 4: I sure am honored to be in it with you,
• 13:08
  Speaker 4: she said.
• 13:11
  Speaker 5: Let me tell you, he said, I'm honored to be
• 13:14
  Speaker 5: in it with you. Without women like you, this wonderful
• 13:18
  Speaker 5: world we've got wouldn't be possible.
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: He saluted her and moved toward the door that led
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: to the delivery rooms.
• 13:28
  Speaker 5: Guess what was just born?
• 13:30
  Speaker 9: He said, I can't. She said, triplets.
• 13:36
  Speaker 4: He said triplets.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: She said she was exclaiming over the legal implications of triplets.
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: The law said that no newborn child could survive unless
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: the parents of the child could find some one who
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: would volunteer to die. Triplets if they were all to live,
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: called for three volunteers.
• 14:01
  Speaker 4: Do the parents have three volunteers?
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: Said Leora Duncan. Last I heard, said doctor Hits They
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: had one and were trying to scrape another two up.
• 14:15
  Speaker 4: I don't think they made it, she said. Nobody made
• 14:18
  Speaker 4: three appointments with us. Nothing but singles going through today
• 14:22
  Speaker 4: unless somebody called in after I left.
• 14:24
  Speaker 6: What's the name whaling?
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: Said the waiting father sitting up, red eyed and frowsy.
• 14:32
  Speaker 5: Edward K.
• 14:34
  Speaker 6: Whaling Junior is the name of the happy father to be.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: He raised his right hand, looked at a spot on
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: the wall, gave a hoarsely wretched chuckle.
• 14:49
  Speaker 5: Present he said, Oh, mister Whling.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: Said Doctor Hits.
• 14:56
  Speaker 5: I didn't see.
• 14:56
  Speaker 6: You, the invisible man, said Whaling.
• 15:03
  Speaker 5: They just phoned me that your triplets have been.
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: Born, said doctor Hits.
• 15:09
  Speaker 5: They're all fine, and so is the mother. I'm on
• 15:13
  Speaker 5: my way in to see them now.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: Hooray, said Whaling emptily. You don't sound very happy, said
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: doctor Hits.
• 15:25
  Speaker 6: What man in my shoes wouldn't be happy.
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: Said Whaling. He gestured with his hands to symbolize care
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: free simplicity.
• 15:36
  Speaker 6: All I have to do is pick out which one
• 15:38
  Speaker 6: of the triplets is going to live, then deliver my
• 15:42
  Speaker 6: maternal grandfather to the happy hooligan, and come back here
• 15:46
  Speaker 6: with a receipt.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: Doctor Hits became rather severe with Whaling towered over him.
• 15:54
  Speaker 5: You don't believe in population control, mister Whaling.
• 15:59
  Speaker 6: He said, I think it's perfectly keen, said Whaling.
• 16:05
  Speaker 5: Totley, would you like to go back to the good
• 16:09
  Speaker 5: old days when the population of the Earth was twenty
• 16:12
  Speaker 5: billion about to become forty billion, then eighty billion, then
• 16:19
  Speaker 5: one hundred and sixty billion. Do you know what a
• 16:23
  Speaker 5: druple it is, mister Welling, said Hits. Nope, said Whaling sulkily.
• 16:31
  Speaker 5: A druplet, mister Welling, is one of the little knobs,
• 16:35
  Speaker 5: one of the little pulpy grains of a BlackBerry, said
• 16:39
  Speaker 5: doctor Hits. Without population control, human beings would now be
• 16:44
  Speaker 5: packed on this surface of this old planet like druplets
• 16:48
  Speaker 5: on a BlackBerry. Think of it.
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: Whaling continued to stare at the same spot on the wall.
• 16:57
  Speaker 5: In the year two thousand, said doctor Hits, Before scientists
• 17:02
  Speaker 5: stepped in and laid down the law, there wasn't even
• 17:06
  Speaker 5: enough drinking water to go around, and nothing to eat
• 17:10
  Speaker 5: but seaweed. And still people insisted on their right to
• 17:14
  Speaker 5: reproduce like jack rabbits, and their right, if possible, to
• 17:19
  Speaker 5: live forever.
• 17:22
  Speaker 6: I want those kids, said Wailing quietly. I want all
• 17:28
  Speaker 6: three of them, of course you do, said doctor Hits.
• 17:33
  Speaker 5: That's only human.
• 17:36
  Speaker 6: I don't want my grandfather to die either.
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: Said Waaling.
• 17:41
  Speaker 5: Nobody's really happy about taking a close relative to the cat.
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: Box, said doctor Hits gently, sympathetically.
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: I wish people wouldn't call it.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: That, said Leora Duncan. What said Doctor Hits.
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: I wish people wouldn't call it the cat box and
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: things like that. She said, It gives people the wrong impression.
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: You're absolutely right, said Doctor Hits. Forgive me, he corrected himself.
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: Gave the Municipal gas Chambers their official title, a title
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: no one ever used in conversation.
• 18:23
  Speaker 5: I should have said ethical suicide Studios.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: He said.
• 18:29
  Speaker 9: That sounds so much better, said Leora Duncan.
• 18:34
  Speaker 5: This child of yours, whichever one you decide to keep,
• 18:37
  Speaker 5: mister Whaling, said Doctor Hits. He or she is going
• 18:42
  Speaker 5: to live on a happy, roomy, clean, rich planet, thanks
• 18:46
  Speaker 5: to population control, in a garden like that mirror there.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: He shook his head.
• 18:54
  Speaker 5: Two centuries ago, when I was a young man, it
• 18:58
  Speaker 5: was a hell that nobody thought could last another twenty years. Now,
• 19:03
  Speaker 5: centuries of peace and plenty stretch before us, as far
• 19:07
  Speaker 5: as the imagination cares to travel.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: He smiled luminously. The smile faded as he saw that
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: Wailing had just drawn a revolver Whaling shot Doctor Hits dead.
• 19:23
  Speaker 6: There's room for one, a great, big one.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: He said, and then he shot Leora Duncan. It's only death,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: he said to her as she fell. There room for two,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: and then he shot himself, making room for all three
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: of his children. Nobody came running. Nobody seemingly heard the shots.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: The painter sat on the top of his step ladder,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: looking down reflectively on the sorry scene. The painter pondered
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: the mournful puzzle of life, demanding to be born, and
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: once born, demanding to be fruitful, to multiply, and to
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: live as long as possible, to do all that on
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: a very small planet that would have to last forever.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: All the answers that the painter could think of were grim,
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: even grimmer surely then a cat box, a happy hooligan,
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: an easy go. He thought of war, He thought of plague,
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: He thought of starvation. He knew that he would never
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: paint again. He let his paint brush fall to the
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: drop cloths below, and then he decided he had had
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: about enough of life in the happy garden of life too,
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: and he came slowly down the ladder. He took Waaling's pistol,
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: really intending to shoot himself, but he didn't have the nerve.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: And then he saw the telephone booth in the corner
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: of the room. He went to it, dialed the well
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: remembered number to be are not to.
• 21:21
  Speaker 7: Be Federal Bureau of Termination.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: Said the very warm voice of a hostess.
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: Ah, how soon can I get an appointment?
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: He asked, speaking very carefully.
• 21:37
  Speaker 7: We could probably fit you in late this afternoon, sir,
• 21:40
  Speaker 7: she said. It might even be earlier if we get
• 21:44
  Speaker 7: a cancelation.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: All right, said the painter.
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: Fit me in if you please, and he gave.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Her his name, spelling it out.
• 21:56
  Speaker 9: Thank you, sir, said the hostess.
• 21:59
  Speaker 7: Your city thing, thanks you, your country, thanks you, your planet.
• 22:03
  Speaker 7: Thanks you. But the deepest thanks of all is from
• 22:07
  Speaker 7: future generations and.
• 22:11
  Speaker 5: Of to be or not to be. By Kurt Vonnegut
• 22:14
  Speaker 5: Junior