Clancy's view of Tralfamadore

a homage to Kurt Vonnegut and other intervals of time

In my last newsletter there was a photo of one of my handmade books completely unfolded. I hadn't had time to tell about it before my exhibit and one of my subscribers

Gloria Horton-Young

asked me to tell more about it now. So here goes:

It's called "Clancy's View of Tralfamadore: a homage to Kurt Vonnegut and other intervals of time".

Tralfamadore is one of Vonnegut’s fictional planets mentioned in Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut.¹ In Vonnegut's book the Tralfamadorians don't view time linearly and they teach a “so it goes" philosophy regarding death and things outside ones control. The teachings by the Tralfamadorians help Billy Pilgrim deal with his PTSD and anxiety.

My artist book is about my own perception of time and various things that help me cope: I list some of my favorite authors and the intervals of time they were alive, I list the time required to make various kinds of soup, the time required for various kinds of plants to grow ... I tried to write and illustrate my book so that the time required to view my book itself could use different intervals of time.

This book is currently at the Caplan Art Designs Gallery available for sale. Here are some readable (I hope) photos of it.

Here's a video look at it so you can get a sense of the span of it.

It's a one-of-a-kind artist book measuring 7.5 inches tall and 4.75 inches wide when closed. It opens out to 36 inches long. It was created with ink and gouache on folded handmade paper.

My homage includes the timespans of other authors who wrote about time as well as the durations to grow flowers or cook soup because I felt that reflected the “layered non-linear thoughts unfolding” feeling I get when I read Vonnegut as well as reflecting the “so it goes" philosophy.

Here are several photos that hopefully enable you to see it all.

On the back cover I wrote all of my sources.

I hope you had a pleasant interval of time just now.

I'll add this book to my index list of ebooks when I get a minute and bring the ebooks available count up to 21…

And so it goes.

💚💚 Thank you, to all of you, for your ongoing patronage and support of my work! I appreciate every one of you! If you're a newly paid subscriber please feel free to download any or all of the 20 ebooks that I've written and illustrated which you can download and access anytime you wish from this index page.
Thank you again for being here!! 💚💚

1. Slaughterhouse Five by Vonnegut is on the banned-books lists and I've been using the banned lists as a suggested reading list!!!!! Read banned books!!!! You can see other banned-books I've read and recommend here.