Why did Kurt Vonnegut choose to structure this text the way he did? What effect did he want this novel to have on its readers?
(If you have comments or observations that do not align precisely with those questions, that's okay. These are just suggested jumping-off points.)
Respond by 11:59 p.m. on Thursday, Dec. 18 for full credit.
5 comments:
I thought the immortality Kurt Vonnegut portrayed with in Billy showed the view point of how the tralfamadorians taught Billy to see life through the view point of no one every truly dies everyone still is living within moments that people remember. if it is possible I think Kurt is actually writing in a 4D to demonstrate to the people how know he sees life because the way he jumps to here and there in life and technically he is already dead so in a weird way we are seeing proof how the way tralfamadorians see life is true how even when one is dead, one is not truly dead. I think in my opinion the book that Billy reads by trout impacts him and also can go back to a big theme of this PTSD, because it was weird how when Billy is explaining the story line of the book he describe the aliens that kind of look like tralfamadorians and do sort of the same things the tralfamadorians do. I think in the book Kurt uses trout as another way to express himself I feel like he wrote a character of himself where he writes a book of aliens and how this author is typically known for weird writings and how most people wouldn’t be interested in his book and I feel that is how Kurt sees himself. I do agree with others when they say Billy is a scape goat to Kurt, because I feel even if he is writing through Billy Kurt can’t help himself but began to start talking in first person about himself whenever Billy starts talking about a certain subject Kurt can relate to. whenever Billy says "so it goes" it’s not him being unemotional he is actually an optimistic person thing in 4D, because he knows there’s no point in feeling sad because he is bound to see them again when he time travels so truly no one really ever really dies. When he says so it goes I feel it means he is brushing it off saying he acknowledges there died but he is not going to mourn to the reader. I think Kurt adds Montana for Billy, because he wants to represent a little of his happy family life he actually has of himself and Montana does bring him that joy he never felt with Valencia because there is a point in the book were she is like lately I felt you weren’t here where did you go this time and he would lay with her and explain to her the past were he jumped to and in a way she is normal about it which makes him feel normal like crazy like others do which could connect to why Kurt the way he presented himself in the beginning says he doesn't like talking about Vietnam and slaughter house because even through reading this book we think he is crazy so imagine how he would feel when he tells people his story.
(Ms. Rayburn, this is your favorite student Eriq Rojas. I am using Lauren's account in order to publish this post because I never made a google account in order to post earlier in the year. I hope this is not inconvenient.)
Kurt Vonnegut structured the text this way in order express his crazy thoughts and feelings of war in a cool, creative way. Vonnegut uses Billy as a cover up in order to express the questionable and ludicrous thoughts that veterans (and possibly him) may have after their service in the war. Billy's constant time travelling left him in an inescapable daze, never knowing where he would end up next. Similar to the old show Quantum Leap, Sam could never find his way home again just like after a veteran returns he can never come back the same. After war, soldiers are forever altered and can never become the same person in society that they were beforehand. I think Vonnegut wanted this to become known. Billy was always moving from year to year and could not pinpoint where his life actually existed which may be how veterans feel once returned. Kurt Vonnegut wrote Slaughterhouse Five in order to show the irreversible effects and inevitable thoughts war can cause a person. Kurt Vonnegut is Billy Pilgrim. Vonnegut used Billy in order to display his emotions towards war so that society would not look down upon him. This book, actually, was the perfect way to show that war does make you go ludicrous without causing other to think you are ludicrous yourself.
I personally believe Slaughterhouse- Five was written to depict the loss of innocence among those who physically experience war. Kurt Vonnegut dedicates this novel to two people, one being Mary O'Hare, the wife of Vonnegut's close friend. Mary tells Vonnegut in the first chapter, that her husband and him "were just babies in the war" (18). They were literally not babies learning how to walk and speak for the first time, but they were not mature to experience the trauma of sudden and common death among others, but then again who is ? Throughout generations serving in the war is seemed as a glorious sacrifice. Again, according to Mary, war is counterfeit illustration, and after reading Slaughterhouse- Five, this is evident. Kurt Vonnegut and Bernard O'Hare had been "foolish virgins" in the war (18). After being greatly impacted by the succession of events, both were not able to be the same person as they were before.
I thought it was creative for Vonnegut to utilize the tralfamadorians and time traveling to describe Billy Pilgrims war experience. Especially because I saw a correlation between the childhood mentioned in chapter one (Mary O'Hare and Kurt Vonnegut discussing how they were just babies when they went to war), the three illustrations and the time traveling that occurs throughout the novel. As a child, there is a fantasy for becoming a doctor, an astronaut, time traveling and much more. I believe the novel portrays how dysfunctional Vonnegut became because of the war. Vonnegut portrays himself in his novel through Billy Pilgrim. Obviously Vonnegut did not travel in time or was keep in a cell in a Tralfamodorian zoo, but both him and Billy experienced traumatic event caused by the deaths of their peers and near by attacks. I believe the tralfamadorians were essential characters and were utilize to emphasize the time between significant events. For Billy, he revisited tragic moments such as the day of the accident in which his father in law died and Billy was one of two survivors. This is realistic consider that memory wise, as humans we tend to hold on to disastrous and content moments the most. Tralfamadorians helped Billy determine that time was like the illustration of a stretch of the Rocky Mountains . "All time is all time. It does not change", says a tralfamadorian to Billy as he is strapped aboard the flying saucer. Similarly, I believe time has helped Vonnegut lessen his trauma with war. Vonnegut constantly repeats the phrase, "so it goes" to imply that there is so much more behind a story. When someone on the novel dies, "so it goes" follows the short description of their death, but in reality there is so much more than that short explanation. Both Vonnegut and Billy, soldiers of war, experience post traumatic stress disorder. I include Vonnegut in this because he wrote a book describing the atrocities that occurred in his life (regarding war) all by using another character by the named of Billy Pilgrim.
I really liked the book although some parts were confusing to me. I really liked the Kurt Vonnegut uses Billy to time travel to different parts of the war. Time traveling is something that no one can ever do. There have been different things that have been said about it. Billy time travels back to the horrible parts of his life. I'm guessing that these specific parts that he time traveled to made him become someone who was changed by many people. The people he meets all treat Billy as someone who does not know about anything. When he time travels he meets Weary who guides him through the war by calling him names even though Billy knew that he was going to survive the war. Another person that he meets was a guy from the hospital. The man has his wife sitting next to him while he talks about Billy's problem. The man views Billy as someone who has lost himself. These people I feel made Billy feel weak in a way that made them seem more normal than he ever was. When will Billy ever return to earth? Will he ever be able to experience the future other than seeing his own life. How is Billy able to time travel back in time and the woman he is staying with cannot. The use of time travel in Kurt Vonnegut's book seems to me that he wanted to compare time traveling to war in that we believe others for what they have seem because it is a different experience. Kurt Vonnegut used Billy Pilgrim to show the truth about what he saw when he was in the war. Not everyone comes back the same. Living in war and living a normal life away from war is really different and we should acknowledge that the people who come back from the war are traumatized. We can not believe people who write about war but have never experienced it. Only those who have fought through it can only tell the true meaning of war.
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