Adam, By Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Growing up I was always told to be grateful for what I was given because some people aren’t as fortunate as I was, which has helped to mold me into the person I am today. In the short story, Adam by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. shows one of the happiest moments in Heinz Knechtmann’s life, the birth of his child. He and his wife were in concentration camps during the Holocaust and had already lost their first child which had devastated them. We are also introduced to Mr. Sousa whose wife has also given birth but gives birth to another girl when Sousa wanted a boy because this would be the seventh girl. Heinz and Sousa’s different attitudes throughout the story show that it’s more important to be grateful for what’s given than focus on what could’ve been.

Sousa isn’t as grateful for what he is given. Sousa is onto his seventh child and all seven are girls. Instead of appreciating the miracle of life, he wishes he was given a boy instead. When Sousa asks Heinz what gender the baby was, Heinz responds with, “Boy” (Vonnegut 1128). Where Sousa replies bitterly with, “Never knew it to fail” (1128). The key word in that is “bitterly” which shows how he is jealous of what someone else was given, rather than happy and joyous for what he was given. Even at the beginning of the story, it shows how ungrateful Sousa is with having seven daughters, “Girl! Seven, now. Seven girls I got now. A houseful of women. I can beat the stuffings out of ten men my own size. But, what do I get? Girls” (1124). This further proves the point on because of how focused he is on what he could’ve had, he is unhappy with what he was given.

Additionally, the setting of any story is very important to understand the past of a character and how that setting has affected a person as they get older. Heinz and his wife Avchen met each other in concentration camps during the Holocaust. During the explanation of Heinz’s backstory it mentions that, “He and his wife, Avchen, had grown up behind barbed wire” (Vonnegut 1124). Showing that the setting of where Heinz grew up had most likely shown him how grateful and spectacular of a life he was given now, compared to a concentration