Is this from a Kurt Vonnegut book?

[megglesface]

Hello all,

 

some time ago i read a book in which there were a race of beings who had a country so small they spent their time walking in single file around the perimeter of it, stopping for biscuit breaks, then turning round and walking back the other way, i have a feeling it was one of vonneguts books but cannot find it anywhere, has anyone else read this?

 

Megan

[~Andrea~]

Its slightly reminiscent of LineLand in Edwin Abbott's Flatland. However I don't remember the biscuit breaks so it's probably not that.

[megglesface]

thanks, yeah i dont think i have ever read that, doesnt ring a bell anyway. guess ill just have to wade my way through all of vonnegus books until i find it, what a shame!

[Freewheeling Andy]

It's a long time since I read any Vonnegut, but it doesn't seem familiar.

[megglesface]

no i could be wrong, i just cant seem to place it, so annoying! i treated myself to some new books today off amazon, ordered galapagos, thats by vonnegut but i have never read it. what kind of things do you like to read?

[Freewheeling Andy]

I really enjoyed Galapagos, although other people I know don't rate it so highly. It plays with ideas that I'm fond of and fascinated by. What I normally read? Modern literary fiction, I guess. I've just started on Vineland by Thomas Pynchon. I do like the stuff that plays with the edges of SF (but isn't SF), like David Mitchell or Haruki Murukami or JG Ballard; and which Vonnegut sort of falls into.

[megglesface]

im also a fan of the slightly sci fi books, im writing my dissertation on douglas adams and the way he uses comedy to discuss colonial discourse, have really enjoyed writing it. Also ordered one of italo calvinos books today, have you read any of his?

[Freewheeling Andy]

I've never read Calvino, although he's another who's come fairly highly recommended.

[Philip Stein]

The story which megglesface describes at the start of this thread sounds a little like The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil by George Saunders, though that country (Little Horner) was so small that it couldn't contain all its inhabitants at once, and every time one of them went over the edge, Greater Horner (the country that surrounded them) considered it an act of invasion... I don't remember the biscuit breaks though.

 

I've read all but one of Vonnegut's novels and the scenario doesn't sound familiar from them. It could be one of his stories, which are numerous and I haven't read most of them.

[sib]

Hello all,

 

some time ago i read a book in which there were a race of beings who had a country so small they spent their time walking in single file around the perimeter of it, stopping for biscuit breaks, then turning round and walking back the other way, i have a feeling it was one of vonneguts books but cannot find it anywhere, has anyone else read this?

 

Megan

 

Haha..that