Özet
The Sources of Inspiration for Happy Birthday, Wanda June by Kurt Vonnegut: Odyssey and Ernest Hemıngway
Happy Birthday, Wanda June is one of the few plays the American author Kurt Vonnegut tried his hand at. It is very well-known that, as the writer himself openly confesses, Homer’s Odyssey is the source of inspiration for the play. The influence of Ernest Hemingway in terms of forming characters, notably the hero, is another fact revealed by the author as well. In this paper taking these two points as discrete items of focus, the attention is drawn to Vonegut's parodying Odysseus’ homecoming after some twenty years and Hemingway's portrayal of war heroes who could kill many people pitilessly and have macho attitudes towards women. This paper seeks to analyze the writer’s ongoing reference to Odysseus and Ernest Hemingway on the basis of the main character in terms of intertextuality in the satiric comedy Happy Birthday, Wanda June.
Anahtar Kelimeler
Kurt Vonnegut, Ernest Hemingway, Intertextuality, Odyssey, Happy Birthday, Wanda June.
