A man aspiring to be an optometrist is given his own practice and works hard until World War II breaks out and he is drafted. At one point he is fighting in the war and at another, his is back at home in New York mourning the death of his wife. On the other hand, the allied powers are advancing their technology understandings and planning their attack on Germany using their incendiary bombs. Vonnegut captures both sides, combining them to make a story about the war and the lack of control humans have in society. In the novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut condemns the brutality of war and argues that the modern, callous, man-made, technological world renders human beings helpless.
Vonnegut condemns war due to its brutality. In the
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beginning of the novel when Vonnegut is explaining his motive for writing the story he states, “I have told my sons that they are not under any circumstances to take part in massacres, and that the news of massacres of enemies is not to fill them with satisfaction or glee” (Vonnegut 19). By adding this tidbit of information in the first chapter of the novel, Vonnegut reveals that he is against war. By explaining his sons are not allowed to find pleasure in massacres or participate in them (Vonnegut 19), he insinuates the brutality of war circumstances. According to Candace Anne Strawn, another reason Vonnegut is against war is due to the “unnecessary demolition of Dresden” (39) even though in the novel Vonnegut quoted the Englishmen saying “You needn't worry about bombs, by the way. Dresden is an open city. It is undefended, and contains no war industries or troop concentrations of any importance” (Vonnegut 146). It makes sense that Vonnegut would make his protagonist, Billy Pilgrim, who relives his World War II stories, would be perturbed about being bombed that has no significance to the war. The bombing basically was used to show the superiority of the United States over the Germans when they “had been defeated and all need of bombing any city had disappeared” (Strawn 39). Through the thoughts and actions of Billy Pilgrim, Vonnegut portrays to the reader that his overall idea of war is unpleasant. In addition to Vonnegut condemning the brutality of war, he constructs a novel to anti-glorify it as well. In the chapter before the story commences, Vonnegut explains how he came to write the book with the help of his old war buddy, O’Hare, while facing disapproval from his wife. Macy O’Hare scolds Vonnegut: You were just babies in the war—like the ones upstairs!... But you're not going to write it that way, are you... You'll pretend you were men instead of babies, and you'll be played in the movies by Frank Sinatra and John Wayne or some of those other glamorous, war-loving, dirty old men. And war will look just wonderful, so we'll have a lot more of them. And they'll be fought by babies like the babies upstairs... So I held my right hand and I made her a promise: “Mary,” I said, “I don’t think this book is ever going to be finished... If I ever do finish it, though, I give you my word of honor: there won’t be a part for Frank Sinatra or John Wayne.” (Vonnegut 14-15) Vonnegut makes it very clear before the story even starts that he will not glorify war. That was Macy’s biggest fear and due to his hatred of the destructive events, he promised her he would not do so. According to Brucker, “he [Vonnegut] consciously wanted to avoid writing a novel that glamorizes the brutality of war” (3898) so he “approached the narration of his war experiences cautiously” (3899). Vonnegut talks about war throughout the novel and displays his war experiences as the main character’s being careful not to glorify it due to the experiences of being bombed by his home country and many other unpleasant aspects. To add, “Slaughterhouse-Five” states, “For Vonnegut war is not an enterprise or heroism, but an uncontrolled catastrophe for all involved, and anyone who seeks glory and heroism in war is deluded” (265). Anyone who reads the story knows that the language that Vonnegut uses is anything but glorifying war. When explaining Billy’s journey to Dresden as a Prisoner of War, Vonnegut stated, “The theater was paved with American bodies that nestled like spoons. Most of the Americans were in stupors or asleep. Their guts were fluttering, dry” (144). Language like this exposes to the readers that Vonnegut adds details that make the war experience undesirable. By constructing an anti-glamorization war novel, Vonnegut further condemns the brutality of war. Another main component of Slaughterhouse-Five is the advancements in technology that continue to threaten humans. Vonnegut views technology of the twentieth century and “finds it tragically absurd, a world which actually encourages its scientists to find better and faster methods of destroying it” (Strawn 45). Vonnegut clearly voices his opinion and weaves it throughout his novel with examples like the bombing of Dresden and his disapproval of that event. Another example, according to Strawn, is that Vonnegut believes “giving man the products of science knowledge is comparable to give a child a loaded gun--neither one is wise enough to use his new possession prudently” (20). Advancements in technology are a growing phenomenon that is causing more detrimental harm to human existence than good. Its use in World War II was highly avoidable and unnecessary. According to “Slaughterhouse-Five”, “the destruction of World War II would not have been possible without “advances” in technology” like “the long-range bombers that destroyed Dresden” (266). The power of the technology only continues to grow with time and causes wars to become “much more dangerous than those in the past” due to weapons like atomic bombs (Strawn 37). Rather than blaming the allied countries of World War II, Vonnegut believes that America, as a whole, specifically is “becoming more and more a nation of machines since today nearly all government operations, big business, and industrial installations depend on computers and other mechanized gadgetry” (Strawn 29). Technology is slowly taking over every aspect of life and it is becoming scary the lack of control humans actually have nowadays. Now, to take a personal approach, Vonnegut tells his sons never to work for a business that makes “massacre machinery, and express contempt for people who think we need machinery like that” (Vonnegut 19). With this advice to his sons, Vonnegut further disapproves of technology and does not understand its job in society. Whether humans want it or not, technology is only going to become more dangerous. Lack of human control is prominent in the novel.
Vonnegut, throughout the novel, “repeatedly demonstrates the human aptitude for cruelty” (Brucker 3898). One of the examples is when Pilgrim “was in Dresden” (Vonnegut 193) while “the city, a cultural center of no military values, was destroyed by Allied incendiary bombs” (Brucker 3898). With the creation of the incendiary bombs, the Allied countries were able to “destroy 135,000 people in two hours” (Brucker 3898). Due to the city having no military value or causing any threat, there was no need for the bombing of Dresden. The allied forces presented a lack of control by dropping the bomb on an innocent city. Vonnegut, having the strong feeling he does about war, explains the lack of human …show more content…
control: He believes that war makes animals out of the defeated and cruel tyrants out of the winners. Devastated Dresden illustrates the lengths to which men will carry their victories over their victims: “There were hundreds of corpse mines [burned-out bomb shelters] operating by and by. They didn't smell bad at first, were wax museums. But then the bodies rotted and liquified, and the stink was like roses and mustard gas. So it goes” (Vonnegut 185). (Strawn 40) Strawn further explains the lack of control humans have and shows the aftermath of the bombing and the devastation it left behind.
Another example is when Vonnegut reveals, “I have told my sons that they are not under any circumstances to take part in massacres, and that the news of massacres of enemies is not to fill them with satisfaction or glee” (Vonnegut 19). Vonnegut knows that finding joy in killing enemies is a part of the war experience and does not allow his sons to subject themselves to that option and, in turn, lose their sense of control. Throughout the novel, the lack of human control plays a major role in the development of the
story. Vonnegut exposes the brutality of war and the lack of control that humans have in today’s society. His work, Slaughterhouse-Five, still remains extremely popular ever since its release at the escalation of the Vietnam War. Through Vonnegut disguising his war experiences as those of the protagonist, Billy Pilgrim, the reader is taken through what it was like to be in Dresden during the bombing and also experiences some fun along the way with the mention of the Tralfamadorians and time travel. Through literature, Americans are taken on adventures through history that shapes them for the future.
Slaughterhouse-Five is a story of Billy Pilgrim 's capture by the Nazi Germans during the last years of World War II. Throughout the narrative, excerpts of Billy’s life are portrayed from his pre-war self to his post-war insanity. Billy is able to move both forward and backwards through his life in a random cycle of events. Living the dull life of a 1950s optometrist in Ilium, New York, he is the lover of a provocative woman on the planet Tralfamadore, and simultaneously an American prisoner of war in Nazi Germany. While I agree with Christopher Lehmann-Haupt that Slaughterhouse-Five effectively combines fact and fiction, I argue that the book is more centralized around coping.
In Slaughterhouse Five written by Kurt Vonnegut, war and life are two very important aspects. The war that is taking place during this time period in Slaughterhouse Five is World War II. Being in the war can affect many different people in different ways for the good, or for the bad. The war has an affect on two men named Billy Pilgrim, and Eliot Rosewater.
For a novel to be considered a Great American Novel, it must contain a theme that is uniquely American, a hero that is the essence of a great American, or relevance to the American people. Others argue, however, that the Great American Novel may never exist. They say that America and her image are constantly changing and therefore, there will never be a novel that can represent the country in its entirety. In his novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut writes about war and its destructiveness. Vonnegut tells the story of Billy Pilgrim, an unlikely hero, mentally scarred by World War Two. Kurt Vonnegut explains how war is so devastating it can ruin a person forever. These are topics that are reoccurring in American history and have a relevance to the American people thus making Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five a Great American Novel.
This independent reading assignment is dedicated to Slaughterhouse-Five, written by Kurt Vonnegut. Vonnegut experienced many hardships during and as a result of his time in the military, including World War II, which he portrays through the protagonist of Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy Pilgrim. Slaughterhouse-Five, however, not only introduces these military experiences and the internal conflicts that follow, but also alters the chronological sequence in which they occur. Billy is an optometry student that gets drafted into the military and sent to Luxembourg to fight in the Battle of Bulge against Germany. Though he remains unscathed, he is now mentally unstable and becomes “unstuck in time” (Vonnegut 30). This means that he is able to perceive
"In Slaughterhouse Five, -- Or the Children's Crusade, Vonnegut delivers a complete treatise on the World War II bombing of Dresden. The main character, Billy Pilgrim, is a very young infantry scout* who is captured in the Battle of the Bulge and quartered in a Dresden slaughterhouse where he and other prisoners are employed in the production of a vitamin supplement for pregnant women. During the February 13, 1945, firebombing by Allied aircraft, the prisoners take shelter in an underground meat locker. When they emerge, the city has been levelled and they are forced to dig corpses out of the rubble. The story of Billy Pilgrim is the story of Kurt Vonnegut who was captured and survived the firestorm in which 135,000 German civilians perished, more than the number of deaths in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. Robert Scholes sums up the theme of Slaughterhouse Five in the New York Times Book Review, writing: 'Be kind. Don't hurt. Death is coming for all of us anyway, and it is better to be Lot's wife looking back through salty eyes than the Deity that destroyed those cities of the plain in order to save them.' The reviewer concludes that 'Slaughterhouse Five is an extraordinary success. It is a book we need to read, and to reread.' "The popularity of Slaughterhouse Five is due, in part, to its timeliness; it deals with many issues that were vital to the late sixties: war, ecology, overpopulation, and consumerism. Klinkowitz, writing in Literary Subversions.New American Fiction and the Practice of Criticism, sees larger reasons for the book's success: 'Kurt Vonnegut's fiction of the 1960s is the popular artifact which may be the fairest example of American cultural change. . . . Shunned as distastefully low-brow . . . and insufficiently commercial to suit the exploitative tastes of high-power publishers, Vonnegut's fiction limped along for years on the genuinely democratic basis of family magazine and pulp paperback circulation. Then in the late 1960s, as the culture as a whole exploded, Vonnegut was able to write and publish a novel, Slaughterhouse Five, which so perfectly caught America's transformative mood that its story and structure became best-selling metaphors for the new age. '"Writing in Critique, Wayne D. McGinnis comments that in Slaughterhouse Five, Vonnegut 'avoids framing his story in linear narration, choosing a circular structure.
a prisoner of war (POW) in Dresden, Germany. During that time he experienced the firebombing of Dresden, which affected him greatly. This event had around 135,000. casualties, which is about twice the number killed in Hiroshima by the atomic bomb (1969 Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse (Five) -.. Many claim that his involvement in the war is what made him write Slaughterhouse Five.
The entire city was annihilated while 135,000 people were killed. The number of casualties is greater than those of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. The bombing of Dresden, Germany is why it took Kurt Vonnegut so long to write this book. The human pain and suffering is still fresh in the mind of the author twenty-three years later.
Slaughterhouse Five, written by Kurt Vonnegut is an anti war novel told by the narrator who is a minor character in the story. Slaughterhouse-Five is the story of Billy Pilgrim, a man who has come "unstuck in time. "The bombing of Dresden is what destroyed Billy. Dresden’s destruction shows the destruction of people who fought in the war: the all the people who died. Some people, like the main character, Billy Pilgrim, are not able to function normally like before because of what they saw, because of their experience. Throughout the book, Billy starts hallucinating about his experiences with the Tralfamadorians: he wants to escape the world which was destroyed by war, a war that he does not and cannot understand. Vonnegut uses the technique of repetition.. The main repetition is “so it goes” which is told after anything related to death, he also uses other repetitions throughout the book. The major theme of the story is the Destructiveness of War. Vonnegut uses repetition to reinforce the theme of the story.
However, the books present response to war in a contrasting way. The incorporation of repetition, balance, and the idea of little control of one’s fate display parallelism between Billy Pilgrim and the soldiers of The Things They Carried while still distinguishing the existing psychological and internal contrast between them. When Billy is leading a parade in front of the Dresdeners prior to the bombing, Vonnegut
Kurt Vonnegut uses a combination of dark humor and irony in Slaughterhouse-Five. As a result, the novel enables the reader to realize the horrors of war while simultaneously laughing at some of the absurd situations it can generate. Mostly, Vonnegut wants the reader to recognize the fact that one has to accept things as they happen because no one can change the inevitable.
Slaughterhouse Five is not a book that should be glanced over and discarded away like a dirty rag. Slaughterhouse Five is a book that should be carefully analyzed and be seen as an inspiration to further improve the well-being of mankind. Vonnegut makes it clear that an easy way to improve mankind is to see war not as a place where legends are born, but rather, an event to be avoided. Intelligent readers and critics alike should recognize Vonnegut’s work and see to it that they make an effort to understand the complexities behind the human condition that lead us to war.
In conclusion, Slaughterhouse-Five is an anti-war novel because Vonnegut, the character, says it is in the first chapter, the terrible damage it left on Billy, and how it exposes war's horrifying practices. Knowing these elements, one might wonder why people still have wars. Although these anti-war novels cannot completely stop wars, they are important. The role that such novels play is one of raising awareness of war's actions and wrongdoings. Since the role of the novels is important, authors should continue to write them to keep people informed and educated about a problem of such a huge magnitude.
Slaughterhouse Five and the Impact of War on the Individual War effects people in multiple ways, some worse than others. “Studies suggest that between twenty and thirty percent of returning veterans suffer, to varying degrees, from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, a mental-health condition triggered by some type of terror, or a traumatic brain injury, which occurs when the brain is jolted so violently that it collides with the inside of the skull, causing psychological damage (Finkel 36).” Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is the most common form of affect on an individual involved in warfare, whether it is the victim or the perpetrator. In Slaughterhouse Five, written by Kurt Vonnegut, Billy Pilgrim, the main character, is struggling with PTSD looking for a way to justify everything that occurred. This story reflects Kurt Vonnegut’s side effects from his war experience.
In Slaughterhouse Five, written by Kurt Vonnegut, the plot focuses on a man who tends to regress back to his childhood, and earlier life, using three important themes. These important themes are the destructiveness of war, the illusion of free will, and the importance of sight. In this novel, Kurt Vonnegut reflects on his experiences in the war in 1945 as a prisoner of war. This man is named Billy Pilgrim. Billy Pilgrim is a former prisoner of war who tends to be stuck in the same mindset as before.
Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Slaughterhouse-Five, uses the biblical allusion of Lot’s wife looking back on the destroyed cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to parallel the story of Billy Pilgrim during the war and his experience after, when he returns to the United States. Although the reference is brief, it has profound implications to the portrayal of America during World War II, especially the bombing of Dresden. Although Lot’s wife’s action dooms her to turn into a pillar of salt, the narrator emphasizes her choice to indicate the importance of being compassionate and having hindsight. Ultimately, Slaughterhouse-Five critiques the American social attitude to disregard the unjust nature of its actions in World War II. Furthermore, Vonnegut’s novel explicates this by elucidating the horrors of war—especially in regard to the massacre of innocence, how it leaves the soldiers stagnant when they return home, and leaves them empty with an American Dream that cannot be fulfilled. In order to combat violence, the novel stresses that one must hold human life to a higher value and be compassionate towards others; America must acknowledge its mistakes so that the soldiers who fought and died for her so that the soldiers may move on.