So it goes . . .

American literary idol Kurt Vonnegut, best known for such classic novels as "Slaughterhouse-Five" and "Cat's Cradle," died on Tuesday night in Manhattan at age 84, The New York Times reported on Wednesday.

Longtime family friend, Morgan Entrekin, who reported Vonnegut's death, said the writer had suffered brain injuries as a result of a fall several weeks ago, the newspaper reported.

Vonnegut, born in Indianapolis in 1922, also wrote plays, essays and short fiction. But his novels -- 14 in all -- became classics of the American counterculture. He was a literary idol, particularly to students in the 1960s and 1970s, the Times said.

The defining moment of Vonnegut's life was the firebombing of Dresden, Germany by Allied Forces in 1945, an event he witnessed as a young prisoner of war, the newspaper said.

On a day when there is so much to write about, and so much to think about saying before it is said, there is this.

Vonnegut, as much as any one man could, helped us navigate the horrors that made up so much of the 20th century by reminding us that it's not necessary to love all of humanity.

You just have to love those members of it who happen to be standing next to you at the time. "There's only one rule that I know of, babies," he wrote in God Bless You Mr. Rosewater, "'God damn it, you've got to be kind.'"

Poo tee-weet.