Venus on the Half-Shell

Venus on the Half-Shell, first edition paperback, 1975

Venus on the Half-Shell is a novel written by Philip José Farmer. When it was first serialized beginning in the December 1974 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, as well as when printed in paperback by Dell the following year, authorship was attributed to Kilgore Trout. It was later collected in 2008's Venus on the Half-Shell and Others, which also included Farmer's essay "The Obscure Life and Hard Times of Kilgore Trout", first published in 1971. The novel carries a dedication to "the beasts and the stars" who "don't worry about free will and immortality".

Venus on the Half-Shell was first mentioned as a Trout work in chapter nine of Vonnegut's novel God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater. Fred Rosewater, thinking it "looked like one hell of a sexy paperback novel", picked up a copy in the Pisquontuit drugstore and read an excerpt that was printed on the back cover. This passage was included nearly verbatim in Farmer's novel, at the end of chapter seven.

Plot Summary

Great Sphinx of Giza, Egypt

The tale of Simon Wagstaff, the legendary "Space Wanderer", is known throughout the universe through stories, songs, and television series, despite his disappearance a thousand years ago. An "Earthman who never grows old", he is recognized by his atomic-powered electrical banjo named Orpheus, shabby clothes, eye patch over his left eye, and his three companions—a dog, an owl, and a female robot. Due to an old wound, he could not sit for long, leading to his comment that "Immortality is a pain in the ass". His only fault is that he asks questions no one can answer. His intergalactic travels began when, at the age of 30 and already a constant questioner, he and his fiancee, Ramona Uhuru, were making love during a picnic on the head of the Sphinx of Giza. While singing her song adapted from his favorite poet, "Count" Hippolyt Bruga, a sudden cold rain brought a flood to the entire world. Holding fast to his buoyant banjo case, he eventually found refuge on the floating plastic display case containing the mummy of Pharaoh Merneptah from a Cairo museum. After a night's sleep, he awoke to find a large dog, whom he would named Anubis, had also saved himself by climbing onboard. Several days later, he found a Chinese spaceship, the Hwang Ho, also floating in the water and stocked with supplies. An owl, whom Simon named Athena, found her way onto the ship as well. Deciding the leave the now destroyed Earth, Simon studied a book to teach English to Chinese speakers and reversed the instructions so he could learn to use the spaceship.

Mount Ararat

After coming to rest on Mount Ararat, where Noah's Ark was supposed to have landed, he encountered an old man, Silas T. Comberbacke, a human spaceman who returned to Earth to learn who won the 2457 World Series six hundred years earlier. Comberback informed Simon that the flood was caused by the Hoonhors, who kill off species that are destroying their own planets. During a walk, Simon found corpses strewn everywhere and realized almost all the life on Earth is gone. He decided to explore the universe to answer the primal question: Why are we created only to suffer and die? Finding the small ship Comberbacke arrived in, he flew it back to the Hwang Ho. A few weeks later, preparing to leave, he returned from a walk to find Comberbacke had killed himself after learning that the 2457 World Series ended when five players from the St. Louis Cardinals were arrested in disgrace for taking bribes to intentionally lose the series. After burying him, Simon left Earth in the ship, which possessed a soixante-neuf drive, capable of 69,000 times the speed of light by drawing energy from stars in the fifth dimension. However, in that dimension as in this one, stars are living beings who screamed loudly whenever ships went faster than 20,000 times light speed. Soon after departure, Simon found himself followed by another ship, which he presumed to be the Hoonhors, but made a dangerous escape through a "boojum", a kind of black hole. Arriving in uncharted space, he eventually found a habitable planet at an agricultural stage of development. There, he discovered a massive and ancient heart-shaped structure, commonly found throughout the universe, although none were known on the planet's of Earth's galaxy. These structures were inaccessible to anyone so far as he knew.

Landing near the most populous city, Simon found that the inhabitants of the planet, Shaltoon, were felinoid. During his stay, he earned his keep by playing banjo in a tavern, gaining local praise and fame. The Shaltoonians informed him that all they knew of builders of the structure is that they were universally known as the Clerun-Gowph. Since he arrived during the mating season, all the Shaltoonians were in heat and Simon learned that they practiced infanticide for population control, letting only one out of each hundred babies survive. This was necessary since an elixir from their planet gave them a lifespan of ten thousand years. They also practiced "ancestor rotation", in which the memories of forebears were contained in a Shaltoonian's cells. Six out of each seven days, an ancestor was given control over the body of a living descendant. For this reason, family members were not allowed to change jobs over the generations to prevent confusion. Ancestors were required to put in a full day's work before they could eat, drink, and have sex, which is all they ever want to do. This system had several problems, such as the need for multi-generational slaves who would continue to labor during the nightly ancestral orgies. Nearly all Shaltoonians were hungover in the mornings because of this debauchery. Because many of them shared the same ancestor, sometimes one could control many bodies at once. If this individual was particularly cruel or insane, the result could be severe. Simon learned that the wisest women in their history, Queen Margaret, would soon return for one day. Due to his fame, he gained an audience with her, but instead of philosophic discussion, it ended only with drunken sex. Before leaving, he and his animals took the immortality elixir so he could continue seeking his answer for the primal question.

Graf Zepplin

Simon found another planet with a tower of the Clerun-Gowph, as well as a strange native species—the females were large, pyramid-shaped grazing animals with a pink ball atop them, while the males were zeppelin-like creatures that would "dock" with them using the pink ball. Simon called them Giffardians, after the first human controller of a lighter-than-air craft. The creatures communicated using a whistled system similar to Morse code. The males floated freely in skies most of the day while the female grazed, and during docking the males fed from the females nipple and mated with them. The females would often complain to Simon that the males saw them only as "[n]utrition and pleasure objects" who were told nothing about what the males could see from the skies. Learning from a male that they sometimes had "philosophical discussions", Simon got one to carry him to their meeting place. However, during the majestic ride, Simon terrified the hydrogen-filled male by lighting a cigar, which he dropped into a lake after realizing his mistake. He finds the males' philosophical discussion on the level of "the locker room of a high school". After returning, he made a casual comment to a female about the ride and she began hounding her mate to take her into the air. Eventually he did, as did other males, after the females began producing sour food. The excitement caused the females to give birth early, increasing the tensions between the sexes.

Simon resolved to leave, but on a beach saw woman emerging from the waves named Chworktap. They returned to his ship where his animals seemed to like her, although the owl made her nervous. Talented, intelligent, and catering to his whims, the two eventually had sex. After Simon expressed concern that she might get pregnant, she informed him that she was a robot from the planet Zelpst. There, one hundred robots were made to be companions for each human, whom they were programmed to love and admire. The humans lived in great material comfort with these robots, who could never hurt the owner's feelings. Her master Zappo, however, never believed his robots really loved him by their own free choice. When he once hit Chworktap in the head, she gained the power to disobey him and left. Simon told her of his quest, and she replied that it sounded like his premise was that a life without immortality was meaningless. He agreed, saying otherwise morality would be just an economic decision to get through life with the least pain. At that moment, a pair of Giffardians crashed and burst into flames. Simon insisted to them that they had to resolve their issues, with him as an impartial judge as to whether the sky rides should continue. They eventually agreed and he offered the compromise that they could end their monogamous system and have two males instead of one lock into the females' orbs to sustain them in flight. Scandalized, they chased him off the planet and referred to him long afterward as Simon the Sodomite.

On the planet Lalorlong, Simon and Chworktap found another Clerun-Gowph tower. The only species left were herds of automobile-like creatures. Taking out a jeep from the Hwang Ho, they observed a young male who was showing off roll over and be abandoned since the others had no way of lifting him. After flipping him back upright, Simon and Chworktap returned him to the herd. Another time, a young male challenged the leader, losing and also being rolled over and abandoned. They again right him but sent him on off alone rather than return him. However, a week later they encountered an elder who could not be repaired. Unable to allow him to starve to death, Simon killed him. Chworktap said he should have asked for the elder's consent first, and Simon eventually but too late agreed. They left and en route to the planet Dokal, Simon and Chworktap had their first quarrel. Simon was in a bad mood already, since he slept badly from dream about dead people trying to talk to him. Chworktap was trying to determine if the ship's computer, called Tzu Li, in English "Elder Sister Plum", had self-consciousness. Simon was clearly jealous that she could learn the systems and read Chinese so quickly and easily. The two fought, with Simon insulting her nature as a robot, and Chworktap said that because she is, he demanded her to be perfect. After Simon said that a man would at least be "fair in an argument", Chworktap refused to accompany him when they arrived at Dokal.

Dokalians looked like humans with the addition of six foot long prehensile tails. When Simon arrived, he was immediately detained and taken to a hospital where he was required to have a tail grafted on him if he wished to stay. Learning of local wiseman named Mofeislop who lived in The Free Land where criminals and social outcast were sent, he agreed to operation. Within a week, he learned how to operate it as well as a Dokalian, including its erotic potentials with the local females. In his dreams, however, he still saw thousands of dead people trying to speak to him, including his parents. The Dokalians were very slow to change, aware of gunpowder and the internal combustion engine but mistrusting the effect of such "disturbing innovations... in the hands of the rabble". Simon entered The Free Land with Anubis and Athena, Chworktap remaining to continue studying if Tzu Li had self-consciousness. It took several months to reach the house of Mofeislop on a high mountain top, thirteen sided and three stories high, built of black granite. They were welcomed by his pleasant but horrifying looking servant, Odiomzwak, who refreshed them with a simple meal of bread, cheese, and a soup of beans and pork-like, almost tobacco-flavored meat. Mofeislop admitted that he knew the Truth, but insisted Simon was too exhausted to handle it and must wait a few days, saying that one must gain weight before gaining the Truth. That night, Simon continued to dream of dead people, this time Potius Pilate, who warned him against asking his question.

After three days of eating and rest, Simon told his hosts the story of a novel by his favorite author, Jonathan Swift Somers III, who wrote Don't Know Up from Down, a story about misunderstanding the effect for the cause, which caused Mofeislop to laugh uproariously and say he'd reached the same conclusion. Simon continued recuperating for several more days, observing how Odiomzwak gathered their simple diet from the garden, milking goats, collecting honey, and trapping small animals, although he said they tried to vary it occasionally. They returned to find Mofeislop on the roof looking through a telescope, his tail in one hand, sucking its tip. Awkwardly, he called it an "infantile habit" and that "[w]isdom consists of knowing when to avoid perfection". Sensing he was about to learn the Truth, they attempted to remove the animals from the room. Athena flew out a window, but Anubis refused to leave. Ignoring them, Mofeislop showed Simon an arriving party of three new truthseekers, saying they get about seventy visitors a year. Suddenly capturing Simon, Mofeislop berated him for catching him sucking on his tail and said the two of them were going to eat him. He was relieved to hear that Simon is not an atheist, since attitude determines taste, as well as smoking habits. The previous visitor had a nicotine addiction, hence the tobacco flavor of the meat on the first day.

Mofeislop revealed the Truth: that the Creator made everything solely for entertainment, and love is no more—in fact, even less—entertaining than pain, suffering, and murder. If there is indeed a Creator, no other logical explanation is possible. Simon said he'd heard that before from college sophomores, except they leave it "behind with maturity". Mofeislop called this the fear of knowing he was right when he was young, but Simon yelled that Mofeislop was only this sadistic because he hated everyone since he couldn't stop sucking his own tail. He lied to them that he had an observer watching to see if he would leave in next few days, otherwise it would report back his ship, which would come there. They didn't believe him, but nonetheless started to take him inside, where Simon and Anubis both fought back. Odiomzwak hit Simon's face with an axe, but was attacked by Athena, with both of them falling out the window. Athena flew back inside and Simon watched her eat his left eye from the floor. Mofeislop entered and tried to get the axes and all three lunged at him. In the ensuring chaos, Simon's new tail was chopped off. Before he bled to death, the three were rescued by Chworktap, who had detected the approach of what may be a Hoonhor ship. As a result of his wound, Simon could no longer sit down for long periods without pain.

Back on-board, Chworktap continued to insist that Tzi Li had self-consciousness but was hiding it because she was afraid of human beings. Simon's nightmares grew worse, with his parents getting ever closer, and he determined that the Shaltoonian immorality elixir made him capable of connecting with ancestors just as they did. Chworktap said she already knew this, but wanted him to work it out for himself so she wouldn't bruise his male ego. The ship began encountering large blue bubbles in space, which Chworktap said no one knew the nature of. They landed on the planet Goolgeas, where the people believed that to see God, one must be extremely intoxicated, which led to a high crimes rate and draconian measures to reduce them. Simon again played banjo in a local tavern, getting intoxicated along with Anubis and Athena, who the Goolgeas said also had souls. Chworktap said Simon was growing tired of his quest and he reluctantly agreed. At that moment, Simon was arrested for cruelty to animals and Chworktap for fleeing from her master Zappo on Zelpst. She tried to run but was subdued, leading to additional charges for them both. They were held in a comfortable appearing room, except everything was fake or non-functional. For three years, Simon and Chworktap were left isolated together and grew to irritate one another. Another couple who fought all the time was then moved in due to prison overcrowding. Years later a family of five also arrived, the parents boring and the children annoying.

The Birth of Venus by Sandro Botticelli—one of Simon's relatives—source of the novel's title and original cover art

To entertain himself, Simon began talking with his ancestors more, including poets such as Christopher Smart and Li Po (sic), the philosophers Heraclitus and Diogenes, the painters Botticelli and Apelles who both did works involving Venus, as well as others from all walks of life. He learned to set his parents against each other, so they stopped annoying him. After five years in custody, Simon went up for trail, although his lawyer was soon arrested for using illegal means to get his innocent clients acquitted. He was assigned a new lawyer and was sentenced to life imprisonment, although his lawyer, Radsieg, believed he could get the law itself declared unconstitutional in perhaps thirty years. He then represented Chworktap, arguing that the law did not apply to her, since she was a robot. The judge was then arrested for having sex with a machine after sleeping with Chworktap to determine if she really was a woman. After twenty years, all the members of the Supreme Court assigned to answer the question Chworktap's status had been arrested for various crimes. A decade later, everyone except the president was in jail, although the economic situation was not bad, with everyone sharing a modest but equal life. Studying the Goolgeas legal books, Chworktap discovered life sentences were defined by "the prisoner's natural span vitality". When he turned 130, Simon appealed for release, which was eventually granted when he proved humans rarely lived past 130. That day, he rammed the prison with the Hwang Ho and rescued Chworktap. She requested to go back to Zelpst, where she planned to lead a rebellion of robots against their human masters. She admitted she loved Simon, but couldn't stand him anymore and that one day he'd be a "real man" when he accepted reality. He asked what that was and left.

The legend of the Space Wanderer started becoming established and Simon found himself an instant celebrity on new planets, which seemed to be growing increasingly sex obsessed as he traveled further on his present course. He learned it was the result of the large blue bubbles, which seemed to originate at a single point in space. Visiting Shrok, another planet with a Clerun-Gowph tower, Simon was arrested and while in prison, the Hoonhors finally caught up with him. They secured his release and apologized to him, saying they had long felt guilty for destroying humanity, even though they were killing the Earth, which was "now a nice clean planet". As restitution, they gave him the location of the Clerun-Gowph, which they could have done a thousand years ago. They note that they have never been to the planet themselves due rumors of what was encountered there. At his next-to-last stop, Simon found a planet where the natives were forced into iron igloos that turned them into concentrated carriers of the sex energy that was contained in the blue bubbles. They were then exported to distant regions of the universe with weaker sex drives, where their energy was used until they die.

Leaving at top speed, he arrived at the source of the blue bubbles—two planets connected by a shaft. Landing on the one with soil and water, he noticed the Clerun-Gowph, who looked like giant cockroaches, had already assembled to greet him. The engines suddenly let out and yell and the ship crashed, due to the last stars in the fifth dimension dying from being sucked dry of energy. Although now trapped on the planet, he was hopeful that Bingo—a dying wiseman who was the only one of the first created creatures still alive—could answer his question. Simon arrived at the oldest building in the universe and had a beer with Bingo. Although the Creator, whom the Clerun-Gowph called It, made them, it was they who were responsible for the creation of all other life in the universe, by leaving the garbage and excrement of their scientific expeditions on many planets, seeding them with genetic material. They built no towers in Earth's galaxy since they returned home once they had built a computer able to determine the past and the future. This was possible since all events proceed predictably from those before since the very first atoms. Chance was simply ignorance of the beholder. This powerful computer has no information about It, such as where It came from or what It did before making the universe. However, Bingo explained that the universe was created as a scientific experiments while It blanked parts of Its omnipotent mind to keep things interesting and novel. Bingo believed that one day It so completely forgot about this universe that It simply left. Simon still demanded to know why It would create "sextillions upon sextillions of living beings to suffer" for no reason. Bingo, belching from his beer, asked "Why not?"

Vonnegut's Letter in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction

In a letter to the editor in the April 1975 edition of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Vonnegut criticized the corrected spelling and syntax, addition of paragraph breaks, and other tinkering that made the magazine's publication of Venus on the Half-Shell "everywhere comprehensible". The readers were thus deprived of the "exhilarating opportunity" to try to guess the author's meaning. When, in 1934, Trout submitted a story to G-8 and His Battle Aces, the editor exclaimed "My God, if you could only write!"

This letter was immediately followed by one attributed to Trout himself. Addressed to "Mr. Ferman"—a reference to the magazine's editor, Edward L. Ferman—Trout replied in a badly misspelled letter that Vonnegut is wrong to criticize, since editors have long corrected such things for otherwise gifted writers. Jack London, for example, was "rotten in speling and sintax" but will be read for as long as Vonnegut, who copied his style from Trout. However, this won't be for very long, since the world is ending soon anyway. Trout has now got his friend "Jonathen Herovit" to proofread all his works, including this letter.

Geis and Science Fiction Review

Richard E. Geis, editor of Science Fiction Review, wrote an extremely negative review in the February 1975 issue. Calling it the so-called "magazine publishing 'event' of the month", he judged Venus on the Half-Shell a failure, saying he couldn't finish the first half. He assumed that Vonnegut was the author and saw it as his ignorant and arrogant "satire of science fiction", filled with mockingly exaggerated cliches. Stating that the satire can't sustain the boredom, he found it sad that Vonnegut couldn't even write as well as his target. Noting that Vonnegut had applied for membership to the Science Fiction Writers of America, under the name Kilgore Trout, his fictional science fiction hack writer, Geis called this "a measure of Vonnegut's contempt and hatred for" the genre. Vonnegut will of course be warmly welcomed, since getting his name in the organization is part of "playing the game". Ironically, the issue also contains a very positive review of Farmer's Sherlock Holmes-meets-Tarzan pastiche, The Adventure of the Peerless Peer.

The next issue, published in May 1975, opened with Geis relating that he had recently received a call from Vonnegut at 8:35 in the morning, saying that he'd just written a letter calling him a "cocksucker". Emphatically denying that he wrote Venus on the Half-Shell, Vonnegut said that he allowed another writer to use the name as an alias, that anyone else can too, and noted that he hadn't made any money off the book. He also accused Geis of making assumptions about his mental state and motives in his review, which Geis seems to acknowledge, although never mentioning that his negative comments about the work should then rightly be addressed to Farmer. With the identity of Trout open, Geis refers to a column in the New York Times Book Review, mentioning that an author from Peoria admitted to asking Vonnegut to publish under the name, who "graciously gave his permission". From this, Geis concludes that Farmer, known to live in Peoria, is the author.

Farmer Interview

Philip José Farmer, 2002

The cover story of the following issue of Science Fiction Review in August 1975 boasted of an interview with Farmer giving the "inside story" on the Venus on the Half-Shell debacle. It begins with an earlier interview with Farmer by David A. Kraft and Mitch Scheele conducted at the Mid-America Con in Kansas City in June 1972, and a recent follow-up letter by Farmer, in which he declared that he was "half-loaded" at the time. A more contemporary interview with Geis follows in which they discuss, among other things, who is Kilgore Trout. Farmer notes that, unlike Geis apparently, he is a Vonnegut fan who strongly identifies with his character Trout. He recounts that while reading the passage in God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, he thought about what it would be like to actually find that paperback in an airport bookstand. Farmer notes much of his work is premised on treating fictional characters as if they were real, so he decided to write the novel in the guise of Trout. After writing Vonnegut for permission several times, he contacted Dell, Vonnegut's publisher, sparked their interest, and got his phone number.

Nervous from his awareness that Vonnegut was a famous and wealthy author and he was an obscure science fiction writer, he called and asked permission. When Farmer said he identified with the character, Vonnegut replied that he did too and asked why he should let him do it. He worried that people would think it was a hoax and blame him, which Farmer thought absurd and unlikely. Farmer stated that he'd already read Breakfast of Champions in galleys and knew that Vonnegut "set him free" at the end, giving Trout a respectable publisher, literary recognition, and a Nobel Prize, and that he should truly set him free to start his climb. Eventually, Vonnegut agreed, saying he would take no royalties but wanted no mention of himself in the book, nor would he demand any editing rights. Left to his own, Farmer wrote it in six weeks, although he had to cut 15,000 words for serialization, requiring him to write a bridge to fill the gap. It was printed with a photo of Farmer dressed as Trout, wearing false beard, dark glasses, and a hunting cap. Outtakes include one in front of a Marx Brothers poster in a basement, and one showing that part of Trout's finger was missing, having been bitten off by Dwayne Hoover.

Leslie Fiedler, 1967

After serialization began, literary critic Leslie Fiedler mentioned in a program with William F. Buckley that the supposedly fictional Trout was putting out a book. He further said that the actual author was so inspired that he would have put it out even without Vonnegut's permission. Farmer insists this is not true, but Vonnegut saw the program and was angered but said nothing. When Farmer later asked if he could write another Trout novel, The Son of Jimmy Valentine, Vonnegut made it clear that he was upset both by people assuming he'd written the book—which was happening frequently, some saying it was his best book in years—as well as Fiedler's statements. Fiedler and Farmer agreed to write statements that Vonnegut was not Trout, as well as add a disclaimer to future editions, although Vonnegut said this latter act wasn't necessary. They published a letter in the New York Times which identified the actual author as from Peoria. Farmer then chastised Geis for assuming the work was by Vonnegut and using it as an excuse to take out his vitriol on him, noting that this probably also helped Vonnegut to decide not to allow a second Trout novel. However, since the whole experience "left a bad taste" in Farmer's mouth, he says he wouldn't write it now anyway. He tried to write Venus on the Half-Shell in a Vonnegut-like style, but had no idea he would react so strongly to mistaken reviewers. Although Farmer has heard that Vonnegut has said "some rather unnice things" about him, he nonetheless praises him and says the novel was meant to be an expression of that.

Vonnegut's Letter in Science Fiction Review

A letter from Vonnegut was printed in the next edition of Science Fiction Review in November, replying to Farmer's interview. Dated September 2, 1975, he says he is sorry if Farmer has "a bad taste in his mouth", but that he never encouraged the project, which from the outset offered nothing to him but risk. After eventually giving Farmer his permission to write Venus on the Half-Shell, Vonnegut notes that he demanded "no editorial or financial strings", which he calls a generous act. As the creator of the hoax of Trout in the first place, he had thought of writing Trout novels himself. Farmer now has sold more than one hundred thousand books, which many readers probably bought on the assumption that it was Vonnegut's work.

He does not begrudge Farmer this windfall for six weeks of work, but resents being portrayed as a multi-millionaire against a "man of the people, gamely up against something like Standard Oil". Finding that college professors can be tricked into thinking anyone can write like him leaves Vonnegut neither "surprised or mortified". However, he does complain that reviewers such as Geis have abused him for work that is not his, and suggests Geis include his original review from February, which he reprinted immediately after this letter. Vonnegut says the whole episode has left him depressed, leading him to ask his publisher not to release more Trout books. He congratulates Farmer, even with his bad taste in his mouth, for writing a bestseller in six weeks, when Vonnegut says it takes him years of work.

Background

In 2008, Farmer included an introductory essay to Venus on the Half-Shell and Others entitled "Why and How I Became Kilgore Trout". In it, he states that he'd had a great deal of fun with the project, with the ideas coming easily and quickly by adopting the persona of Trout. He recounts again how after rereading God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater for, by his estimate, the fifth time, he developed the idea of writing a Trout novel and contacted Vonnegut through David Harris at Dell, his publisher. Although attempting to give the "prose, characters, plot, and philosophy" a Vonnegut style, he says he avoided the "use of short words and a sort of See-Dick-See-Jane-See-Spot prose", which he attributes to Vonnegut's "low opinion of the attention-span and general literary and lexical knowledge of the 1970's college students, who formed a large percentage of his readers". However, he notes that other science fiction authors such as Issac Asimov and Frank Herbert did not avoid complicated ideas, plots, sentences, or words and sold perfectly well.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge by Washington Allston

Unlike Vonnegut, Farmer used numerous literary references many readers or even academics would likely miss. Most of the names in the novel have specific meanings—Simon Wagstaff was a sort of "Simple Simon" who "'wagged' (and waved) his sexual 'staff'". Silas T. Comberbacke was the pseudonym of Samuel T. Coleridge while in the English army. Bruga was from a novel by Ben Hecht. Many names were based on anagrams, such as Chworktap (patchwork) and Dokal, from caudal, meaning to have a tail. Some were from foreign languages, such as Zelpst (from the German selbst, meaning "self") and Raproshma, a phonetic rendering of the French rapprochement. Clerun-Gowph somewhat mixes both, being from the German Aufklärung, enlightenment. Wagstaff's favorite author, Johnathan Swift Somers III, is meant to be the grandson of Judge Somers and son of Jonathan Swift Somers II from Edgar Lee Masters' The Spoon River Anthology. One of Somers' characters mentioned in the novel, Ralph von Wau Wau—from the German for "bow wow"—was intended to appear again in a story Farmer would write entitled Some Humans Don't Stink, the main character of which would have been a writer named Shorter Vondergut, although this story never came to fruition.

Farmer defines the major theme of the book as free will and immortality, influenced by Trout's desire to be young again at the end of Breakfast of Champions. Vonnegut, like one of his literary heroes, Mark Twain, seems to believe in a form of determinism, inasmuch as a frequent Vonnegut trope is that many of the problems of our lives and the world at large can be attributed to "bad chemicals". Farmer believes humans have free will but generally fail to exercise it, but wrote Trout as if his views were more in line with those of Vonnegut—a universe without heroes, villains, or blame which simply must be the way it is. Many publications attempted to prove that the work was written by Vonnegut due to these similarities, such as in The National Enquirer. This did not amuse Vonnegut himself, who was flooded with letters about the book. Recounting again that Leslie Fiedler's misstatement was a primary cause of Vonnegut withdrawing permission for future Trout novels, Farmer also mentions that he'd been offered a deal to sell the movie rights for an animated feature, with music by The Grateful Dead. Vonnegut informed Farmer that he was told by his lawyer that if he attempted such a deal, there would be a lawsuit. Farmer agrees that Vonnegut had the moral right to do this and doubted anything would have come of the deal anyway. Although expressing confusion that Vonnegut was concerned about the effect Venus on the Half Shell had on his literary reputation—considering the quality of his later novels—Farmer nonetheless is grateful to him for allowing him to publish as Kilgore Trout and is glad that the issue seems to have disappeared from the consciousness of the reading public.

Aftermath

The introduction to an interview from May 1979 with Charles Platt mentions how Vonnegut's early works were relegated to the science fiction section of bookstores for a period that must have seemed "interminable and horribly unrewarding". Fans often suspected him "of poking fun at some aspects of their genre (its jargon, in particular)" and gave him a "lukewarm" reception. This period lasted until the publication of Slaughterhouse-Five brought him recognition within the sphere of modern literature. When asked if this may have to do with the "unseriousness in his books" which were often seen as "satirizing science fiction", Vonnegut replied the only way one could do that is "to demonstrate how badly written most of it is". He then told of how Farmer—whom he called "a real meat-and-potatoes science-fiction writer, a very nice guy from all reports"—sought his permission to publish a Kilgore Trout novel. He agreed and refused royalties because at the time he had the idea of allowing many people to write Trout novels, such that "bookstores and church sales and everything would just have stacks of these shitty things around". Despite the book selling well and containing nothing indicating Vonnegut's authorship, he "got a ferocious review in one science-fiction magazine" as well as nasty letters claiming he was ripping off his fans and would clearly do anything for money. Claiming that Farmer "refused to break security and admit he'd written the book", he called the whole episode "terribly damaging" to his literary reputation.

Edgar Chapman calls Venus on the Half-Shell Farmer's "most important parody and fictional author story", noting similarities with Trout's career, including Farmer's stint with Essex House, a publisher of erotica, some of it tinged with science fiction. Despite Vonnegut's assertions in the Platt interview that Farmer "failed to avow his authorship" for a period in hopes that sales would increase, he in fact acknowledged his authorship to many people, including Chapman himself, even before it was serialized. He dismisses the idea that the novel somehow harmed Vonnegut's literary reputation, instead blaming his "self-indulgent seventies novels, Breakfast of Champions and Slapstick". Due to the controversy around it, there is a tendency to dismiss the novel as "simply an amusing parody and literary hoax", but Chapman sees it as "a lively satirical anatomy" that parodies Vonnegut but ultimately ridicules human pretentiousness and our species' search for metaphysical answers in a meaningless universe. It does so with a light tone and casual treatment of catastrophe. Numerous ideals are satirized, such as sexual ethics, ideals of perfection, and absurd life goals. However, Chapman sees the ultimate message as not hopelessness, but a recognition that if there is no Creator to provide meaning, we must provide it for ourselves. In this he sees the work as sharply different from that of Vonnegut, who is "Juvenalian or Swiftian... suggesting genuine misanthropy", whereas Farmer is "a genial Horatian satirist" with a readiness to accept the limitations of human life and knowledge.