Kurt Vonnegut was a prolific American author, who wrote the novel “Slaughterhouse Five” (1969). The novel is one of the arguments against war that exists even today. The reason for this is because the novel deals with the effects of war on a person when they return home. This is because for many people it is hard to truly leave the battlefield behind due to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. As PSTD was not a recognizable diagnosis at the time of Vonnegut’s writing, he used Billy’s inability to connect with reality as a representation of the potential effect of war on an individual’s psyche
Like the character Billy Pilgrim in the novel, Vonnegut survived the Allied bombing at Dresden (Sayre pg. 501), which occurred after he had been taken prisoner by the German Army. He was able to do this by hiding in a meat locker that was locate three stories below ground (Boomhower para.3). After the bombing ceased Vonnegut along with the other American prisoners were made to clear the bodies from the debris (Boomhower para. 4). Once he had been discharged from military service he married. Soon he began writing short stories for various magazines. In the late 50’s early 60’s he begins to write satirical science fiction novels and short stories such as “Harrison Bergeron”. Vonnegut’s stories tend to deal with topics of death, imagination or the loss of reality and the chaos and destruction of war, especially on the individual. In “Slaughterhouse Five” he incorporated lots of word play and black humor. Such examples of the black humor in the book are in chapter 2 when the narrator begins thinking of a joke about an old man and a penis, while his cab driver is taking about the death of his mother and communism.
In 1969, “Slaughterhouse Five” the novel that would establish Vonnegut as part of the anti-war movement was released (Sayre pg.501). The novel which is subtitled The Children’s Crusade: A Duty Dance with Death” tells the story of Billy Pilgrim, a character based on Vonnegut himself. (Sayre pg. 501) Like Vonnegut Billy was a former World War II GI, who also finds himself a survivor of the Dresden bombing (Sayre pg. 501). The non-linear narration has Billy being kidnapped by extraterrestrials and being taken to the planet Trafalmadore where he is placed in a zoo. While in the zoo Billy is taught lessons by the Trafalmadoreans regarding things such as fate and free will and the inevitability of war. At one point in the book Billy cries when he sees that the horse’s bodies and hooves are covered in bloody wounds from the debris that had hit them from the bombs. This is in direct opposition to Billy’s normal reaction to the death that surrounds him during the war, which is “so it goes” (Vonnegut). This is because the horses are innocent and are being caused pain by human actions. The horses seem to also represent both the innocent civilians of Vietnam and the young men who were new to the fight and had not yet become jaded by death. In the novel Billy says, “so it goes” (Vonnegut) over one hundred times and it quickly became the mantra for a generation coming of age in the late 60’s. Billy’s resignation in the novel emulated the sense of bleakness the permeated the cognizance of countless individuals in regards to the Vietnam war (Sayre pg. 501).
The book not only speaks of Billy’s experiences during the war, but the struggles he faces as he tries to return to his former life as an optometrist. Vonnegut uses Billy as a mirror to reflect the difficulty of many soldiers when it comes to returning to civilian life. Billy is unable to fully adjust to his return to civilian life as the war has had too deep of an impact on him. This causes him to escape into periods of fantasy where he imagines that he has been abducted by extraterrestrials. As the character of Billy deals with the effects of the war as he struggles to return to civilian life. The book quickly became popular with many college students that were part of the anti-war movement. This was probably because many of the college students in 1969 had been born right after World War II had ended, and had seen the effect of the war on their family members. Especially as they would have seen it give rise to the Cold War, which instilled panic and fear about communism into not only the American government, but into individuals as well.
Works Cited
Boomhower, Ray. "Kurt Vonnegut." — Indiana Historical Society. N.p., 1994. Web. 24 Apr. 2016.
Sayre, Henry M., and Henry M. Sayre. Discovering the Humanities. Boston: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2013. Print.
