Imagery In Slaughterhouse-Five

Free Will: Playing the Game

Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of India, once said, “life is like a game of cards. The hand you are dealt is determinism; the way you play it is free will.” In the anti-war novel Slaughterhouse-Five, author Kurt Vonnegut takes a closer look at the ideas mentioned by Nehru through the protagonist Billy Pilgrim. Billy, a World War II veteran suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, struggles to adjust to post-war life. To distance himself from the horrid experiences of the war, he imagines that he can travel through time as well as go to the fictitious planet of Tralfamadore. Throughout the novel, the Tralfamadorians, the aliens that inhabit the planet, present Billy with the idea that everyone has a predestined fate and that free will does not exist. However, Vonnegut uses diction and imagery in Slaughterhouse-Five to

contradict this Tralfamadorian ideology and emphasize the theme that when people fail to use their free will, they also fail to develop the experiences that constitute a fulfilling life.

To show the importance of exercising free will, Vonnegut first employs descriptive imagery. In the scene where Billy is taken aboard the spaceship, the Tralfamadorians ask if Billy has any questions. To this, “Billy licked his lips, thought a while, inquired at last: ‘Why me?’” (97). Most people would be panicking if they were abducted by aliens, yet Billy’s calm demeanor suggests that he is very unconcerned with his situation and accepts the abduction as his fate. Vonnegut ridicules Billy’s apathetic perspective on life by showing how his unwillingness to change his situation leads to his isolation and senseless lifestyle. To answer Billy’s question, the Tralfamadorians ask him whether he has ever seen bugs trapped in amber. Billy responds yes: “Billy in fact, had a paperweight in his office, which was a blob of

polished amber with three ladybugs embedded in it” (97). Bugs embedded in amber cannot move or exhibit free will as they are frozen in time. By comparing the small ladybugs to Earthlings, the Tralfamadorians imply that humans are like the tiny helpless bugs, and nothing humans do can change anything in the moment. The Tralfamadorians continue this analogy by saying that they were “trapped in the amber of this moment. There is no why” (97). This quote exposes how futile it is for Billy to ask “why me” to the Tralfamadorians. The aliens imply that there is no moral, no effects and essentially no purpose to life. However, Tralfamadore is merely a fantasy world created by a disillusioned Billy. Through Billy’s seemingly lifeless existence, Vonnegut satirizes the Tralfamadorian beliefs to convince people to make decisions and live life to the fullest. Vonnegut’s use of imagery in this passage accentuates the overall message of the book by ridiculing Billy’s lifestyle and urging the readers to employ their free will in order to experience a meaningful life.
In addition to imagery, Vonnegut also uses straightforward yet descriptive diction to illustrate the theme. After Billy finishes watching a war movie, he goes out to the lawn, fully aware that a flying saucer from Tralfamadore is in the sky. He knows that “he would see it soon enough, inside and out, and he would see, too, where it came from soon enough-soon enough” (96). Repetition of the phrase “soon enough” stands out since Billy knows that the saucer will be here in time, yet he does not try to run away. Instead, he calmly waits for it on his lawn because he thinks this is how the event is supposed to be played out. Billy has the opportunity to make a decision as he waits, but he does not because he is under the impression that he has no free will. He is living just for the sake of living; he takes no action and waits for events to happen to him. Similarly, when a ladder snakes out from the saucer, “Billy’s will was paralyzed by a zap gun aimed at him from one of the portholes. It became imperative that he take hold of the bottom rung of the sinuous ladder, which he did” (96). Paralyzed is a word with strong connotation, and by describing Billy’s will as paralyzed, Vonnegut emphasizes the fact that Billy is unable to act on his free will. As a result, he lives confined by his own beliefs. The use of the word “imperative” indicates it is of utmost importance for Billy to act on the alien’s wishes and that there are no other options but to climb on the saucer. However, Billy is not being forced into doing anything. The only thing that is guiding his actions is his mindset that nothing can be altered, since all the happenings of life are predetermined. Thus, Billy carries out his actions with no real purpose. Another example of powerful diction that emphasizes the theme of the story is when the Tralfamadorians explain to Billy that they are in the “amber of the moment” (97). Using the phrase “the amber of the moment” as opposed to another phrasing like “stuck in the moment” leaves a more profound impact on the reader, as readers can visualize Billy and the Tralfamadorians helplessly entrapped in a blob of the hard resin. By writing in a satiric tone, Vonnegut is expressing that one should do the opposite of Billy as otherwise they will lead a purposeless life. Through the use of precise diction, Vonnegut again emphasizes the idea that free will should be exercised so that one can enjoy a rich and meaningful life.
Using both imagery and diction, Vonnegut expresses the theme that free will should be exerted in order to avoid a life without direction or memorable experiences. As Vonnegut explains through his novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, there are some things in life that can not be changed, but unlike Billy’s ideology, the past, present, and future are not all set in stone. We should use our free will to alter the things that we can because our attempts to better ourselves and the world around us are not futile. As Nehru explained, we must use the hand we are dealt to change the game.