Plot Perspective The plot perspective of Slaughterhouse-Five is third person. The narrator speaks of Billy Pilgrim and knows what he is thinking and somewhat of his feelings, but the reader is not looking through the eyes of him. "Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time. Billy has gone to sleep a senile widower and awakened on his wedding day. He has walked through a door in 1955 and come out another one in 1941. He has gone back through that door to find himself in 1963. He has seen his birth and death many times, he says, and pays random visits to all the events in between." (p. 29) Theme The one main theme throughout Slaughterhouse-Five is similar to that of Catch-22. The absurdity of war is something that preoccupies Billy Pilgrim's mind with every page of the novel. As he lives his life, he is taken back to Dresden, and many of, and no memory or recollection of the incidents are positive. The repetition of "so it goes" is the one major piece of evidence, illustrating the many deaths of the war going unnoticed. "How the inhabitants of a whole planet can live in peace! As you know, I am from a planet that has been engaged in senseless slaughter since the beginning of time. I myself have seen the bodies of schoolgirls who were boiled alive in a water tower by my own countrymen, who were proud of fighting pure evil at the time." p. 148 (Billy talking to the Tralfamadorians about his visions of Dresden) Tone There are several options, as far as tone is concerned. In a way, Vonnegut constructs a novel displaying a mocking tale of how absurd everything is. Although war is never a joking matter in a modern-day conversation, he manages to take an awful situation, and emphasizes it with black humor. "The naked Americans took their places under many shower heads along a white-tiled wall. There were no faucets they could control. They could only wait for whatever was coming. Their penises were shriveled and their balls were retracted. Reproduction was not the main business of the evening." (p. 107) "So-- I suppose that the idea of preventing war on Earth is stupid, too." (p. 149) After the Americans enter a prison camp and are taken to the showers, Vonnegut uses a rather inappropriate topic to lighten the mood a little. Taking an event where an outcome is uncertain, he transforms it into a situation where the reader can almost forget that something bad is happening. He also comes to the conclusion, after viewing the Tralfamadorian's habitat, that he can't stop the Earth from acting the way it does. Mood The mood of Slaughterhouse-Five is rather cynical. Looking back at how badly things were handled during World War 2 and the bombing of Dresden, Billy Pilgrim can't help but think about how ridiculous everyone is. "One of the candles and the soap were of German origin. They had a ghostly, opalescent similarity. The British had no way of knowing it, but the candles and the soap were made from the fat of rendered Jews and Gypsies and fairies and communists, and other enemies of the State. So it goes." (p. 122) |
Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut Literacy Devices Simile As I've come to find through these website analyses, similes seem to be the main source of comparison through novels. In Slaughterhouse-Five, where so much flashback and time-travel is occurring, the reader really needs to be informed of Billy Pilgrim's surrounding changes. With every break in the page (which is often), Vonnegut provides similes to describe Pilgrim's new atmosphere. Metaphor Though metaphors were not used as heavily as smilies (hey, that was a simile!), they were still used, but for a different purpose. With similes, Vonnegut was able to distinguish every change in time Billy dealt with. Metaphors were used as support in describing Billy's thought process. Because Slaughterhouse-Five is written in third person, the usage of metaphors allows the reader to get a better feel for what Billy's motivation and thoughts are. Alliteration I think alliteration is used frequently because it is a form of repetition. I think it is Vonnegut's way of re-emphasizing emotion through different means. Repetition is a way to convey a message without bluntly stating it. Repetition, Used 102 times throughout the novel, 'so it goes' is the real message, I feel, that Vonnegut is trying to convey. Slaughterhouse- Five is known as "one of the world's greatest anti-war books" and this quote, alone, illustrates it as such. To oppose the war would be to go against anything it stands for and any repercussions that people must face because of it. 'So it goes' is said every time someone is mentioned to die in the book. This being said, 102 people died in this 275 page book. When I hear the expression, I imagine someone blowing off whatever is going on. It symbolizes that the escalating deaths within the war really mean nothing to anyone. 'So it goes,' life goes on. Flashback Without flashback, this novel wouldn't exist. The plot progression relies strictly on Billy Pilgrim's traveling of his past. The book is a never-ending series of flashbacks. From the examples above, it should be clear how often Billy Pilgrim goes through time change. First on page 112, again on 113, and yet again on 114! The only way Billy's story can be told is through flashbacks. Protagonist Deconstruction The protagonist in Slaughterhouse-Five is Billy Pilgrim, a man who is constantly reminded of the days of World War 2, mainly the bombing of Dresden. Every situation he lives through in present day reminds him of situations and people of the past. Things are recurring and he is living his past through his current mindset, so to speak. "A lot of patients who say the prayer on Billy's wall told him that it helped them to keep going, too. It went like this: 'God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom always to tell the difference.' Among the things Billy Pilgrim could not change were the past, the present, and the future." (p. 77) |
|
 |
||
