Mr. Rosewater is incredibly rich - specifically, he is chairman of Rosewater foundation. It was founded by his father to avoid taxes and it administrates all of Rosewaters wealth. Their wealth was formed as any other - via stealing privileges from other people. It's so easy in democratic country! The chairman of Rosewater foundation is always the oldest member of family and can be set off only in case if he is found insane.
Young lawyer who works in Rosewater's attorney's office comes up with a plan how to get to the money. He'll help Mr. Rosewater's distant relatives to get him pronounced insane. It shouldn't be hard: Mr. Rosewater is a good person, who tries to help other people. And most of them find it quite irrational.
This novel presents grotesque portraits of people of different social origin and how are they affected by money. Everybody is - somehow. And they are mostly unhappy.
History tells us this, my dear young Mr. Buntline, if it tells us nothing else: Giving away a fortune is a futile and destructive thing. It makes whiners of the poor, without making them rich or even comfortable. And the donor and his descendents become undistinguished members of the whining poor.”
There are many ideas about relationship between rich and poor people that I find very inspiring. It's not presenting rich as bad people and poor as good. No, both groups are portrayed in their "best".
“You know, I think the main purpose of the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps is to get poor Americans into clean, pressed, unpatched clothes, so rich Americans can stand to look at them.”
...
Poverty is a relatively mild disease for even a very flimsy American soul, but uselessness will kill strong and weak souls alike, and kill every time.
And Mr. Rosewater, the purest soul with good intentions and loving all mankind is being cured from his philanthropy.
These words were cut into the fountain rim: “Pretend to be good always, and even God will be fooled.”
...
“It seems to me,” said Trout, “that the main lesson Eliot learned is that people can use all the uncritical love they can get.”
One can say, that this book is about money. Yes, it definitely is. And it is about the price of man aswell.
“Kilgore Trout once wrote a whole book about a country that was devoted to fighting odors. That was the national purpose. There wasn’t any disease, and there wasn’t any crime, and there wasn’t any war, so they went after odors.” “If you get in court,” said the Senator, “it would be just as well if you didn’t mention your enthusiasm for Trout. Your fondness for all that Buck Rogers stuff might make you look immature in the eyes of a lot of people.” The conversation had left the area of peace again. Eliot’s voice was edgy as he persisted in telling the story by Trout, which was called Oh Say Can You Smell? “This country,” said Eliot, “had tremendous research projects devoted to fighting odors. They were supported by individual contributions given to mothers who marched on Sundays from door to door. The ideal of the research was to find a specific chemical deodorant for every odor. But then the hero, who was also the country’s dictator, made a wonderful scientific breakthrough, even though he wasn’t a scientist, and they didn’t need the projects any more. He went right to the root of the problem.” “Uh huh,” said the Senator. He couldn’t stand stories by Kilgore Trout, was embarrassed for his son. “He found one chemical that would eliminate all odors?” he suggested, to hasten the tale to a conclusion. “No. As I say, the hero was dictator, and he simply eliminated noses.”
...
The problem is this: How to love people who have no use? “In time, almost all men and women will become worthless as producers of goods, food, services, and more machines, as sources of practical ideas in the areas of economics, engineering, and probably medicine, too. So—if we can’t find reasons and methods for treasuring human beings because they are human beings, then we might as well, as has so often been suggested, rub them out.”
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