18 Types of Repetition in Cat’s Cradle — Michael Dean

Summary

Michael Dean (editor-in-chief at Write of Passage) catalogued 18 distinct types of repetition used by Kurt Vonnegut in Cat’s Cradle. The thread pushes back against the dominant writing-school reflex — “don’t repeat yourself” — and argues that deliberate repetition is one of the oldest and most underused tools for creating rhythm, emphasis, and resonance in prose.

Original tweet: x.com/@MichaelDean_0 (234 likes, 327 bookmarks — June 23, 2023)

Why It Matters

Modern editing culture treats repetition as a bug. Vonnegut treated it as a feature. The 18 types include structural repetition (returning phrases, refrains), conceptual repetition (circling back to the same idea from different angles), and sonic repetition (rhythm and cadence at the sentence level).

The bookmark count matters: 327 people saved this for later. That’s a practitioner ratio — writers collecting craft ammunition.

For the Newsletter Pipeline

This is directly applicable to Sanity Check. Repetition as craft is the opposite of the SEO-optimization instinct (vary your words, use synonyms). Good newsletter voice often depends on signature phrases and recurring structures — they become the reader’s handhold.

The full list of 18 types is worth a dedicated study session. Flag this as a craft technique to work through against an existing draft using the draft-review and voice-match skills.

Pairs with: David Perell’s writing wisdom (conviction + mechanism), Ray’s writing thoughts (South Park’s “but & therefore” rule — structure at the sentence level).

Study Prompt

Take a published Sanity Check issue and annotate it: which of the 18 repetition types appear already? Which are absent but could add punch?