Billy’s Tralfamadorians

Slaughterhouse Five is becoming impossible to interpret. As I read on I find more styles, references, and hidden morals. I find myself wanting to comment on every single phrase in the book. There are however some parts that are more important than others. For example in Diego Rodriguez’s post, he wrote of how the Tralfamadorians had basically the same ideologies to the author, the book, and the characters. I couldn’t agree more. As we read on, Tralfamadorian concepts keep popping up. Diego used the example of how both the Tralfamadorian’s books and Slaughterhouse five appeared to be in the same form. They are described as pictures. I agree with the explanation the aliens give, you could only perceive it when “you saw the big picture”. This metaphor could be extended even further because these moments aren’t static they are always happening. A good representation might be the moving paintings in bestseller, Harry Potter. In the book, “magic” paintings are like living characters and are always “alive”. This might be an even better metaphor, for in the book moments are described as happening constantly.

Diego continues on and relates the “So it goes” with the concept of destiny, explained at the end of Chapter 5. As Diego, I also related them as when I read the concept. The book with the catchy phrase of “so it goes” accepts death as an unstoppable force. Both the writing and the Tralfamadorians have this ideology. Billy believes in this too, in his speech in Chapter 6 he says, “If you protest, if you think death is a terrible thing, then you have not understood one word I’ve said.” Once again, a reflection of the alien ideologies in the overall book and characters.

I agree with Diego’s conclusion, the Tralfamadorians are an invention of Billy’s. The author of the blog post traces it back to Kilgore Trout’s books. Billy reads these books in the veteran’s mental hospital. They seam as Billy’s last resort hold on to something, to avoid going mad. I heavily relate this to the movie Memento directed by Christopher Nolan. In the movie, Leonard Shelby, the main character, has a problem with his memory; he can’t remember anything new since the accident. Spoiler Alert, at the end we learn that he created a goal to base his life around. Find the murderer of his wife. We learn that he has already found him yet continues the search. As Billy, he sub concisely knows he invented it so that they would have something to hold on to. Yet in his concise personality they believe it by heart. The Tralfamadorians are a way for Vonnegut to explain his ideals.

"Farewell, hello, farewell, hello.”

The way Kurt Vonnegut writes a book with hundreds of interpretations is mind blowing. The ongoing questioning of his existence in the book is exhilarating. He has a way of integrating the complex plot with the ongoing mystery of his existence. The merging between them is just genius. In chapter four he states how he is a fellow soldier of Billy’s. Is he just a character, or is he a narrator too? As I read on, I find certain key words that take me one step closer to solving the mystery, “Billy Pilgrim says he went to Dresden, Germany…” This aphorism is written at the beginning of Chapter 6, making emphasis on it. Now the narrator clearly has become an existing character, whereas in the beginning he clearly was omniscient. This new perspective is as if Billy had told the narrator his story, and the narrator had made it into a book, Slaughterhouse Five. However the author can be narrator, character, and Billy Pilgrim could be his shadow. What I mean is, Vonnegut might have invented Billy to give his story room to grow. They were both born in the same year 1922, and both where soldiers who were present in the bombing of Dresden. He could have easily turned his own life into the life of a crazy war veteran optometrist.

The prevailing theme throughout this chapter was death just around the corner. This novel has the ongoing theme of death, with the constant so it goes and the title itself. This was different. The theme in the chapter was that, death was nearly here. The book explains how Billy has a tape in safe deposit box that says, “I Billy Pilgrim, the tape begins, will die, have died, and always will die on February thirteenth, 1976”. After this, he explains in a speech he is giving in Chicago on that day of his death, how he will only die for a moment in time but yet will continue to live in other points in time. “Now he closes his speech as he closes every speech-with these words: Farewell, hello, farewell, hello.” The way death is described in this book by the Tralfamadorians reminds me of the movie Source Code featuring Jake Gyllenhaal. His character must go back in time to stop a bomb from going off on a train. To go back in time he must in person a victim in the train wreck, by using a device that can recreate dead people’s memories. He has a limited amount of time until the train blows up again. He constantly relieves the last moments of that person’s life, as Billy, he dies repeatedly.

The importance of title is shown at last. In the previous chapters, we were told why the book was titled Slaughterhouse Five, yet the actual moment hadn’t occurred. The title resembles what stood as shelter for the American soldiers in Dresden. How the old pig corals saved the one hundred soldier’s lives. Vonnegut plays with the structure of his book in a humorous way with bombing of Dresden. Back in the camp, one of the Englishmen tells his fellow Americans’ how, “You needn’t worry about bombs, by the way. Dresden is an open city.” Dresden was actually bombed and it is ironic. Nevertheless it appears this Englishman’s words, aren’t true, they were added by Vonnegut for humor, he indicates so by overdoing the irony in the story.

As we are approaching the end of the book, I am thrilled to learn the ending of this incredible novel.

Another Piece to the Puzzle

Mind blowing doesn’t even begin to describe the second part of chapter five. This part of the book was very dense. There were so many ideals and references you could write a whole book on them. And we finally have the answer to the ongoing question, is Billy a representation of Kurt Vonnegut?

Throughout the book there have been many hints towards the relation between the protagonist, the narrator, and the author. There were some points in which I thought they were all the same person, the protagonist being a representation of the author, and the narrator being the author. We finally our have our answer, the author is a character in the book that knows Billy. “That was I. That was me. That was the author of this book.” The narrator is this character in the story; this explains the intense second and third person perspective. Yet I am eager to learn how he learned so much of Billy’s life.

There is one very important part of Billy’s life told in this section, his marriage to Valencia Merble. Their honeymoon is described in heavy detail. These details are very important and yet often overlooked. For the first time we are given the specifics of Billy’s bathroom routine and his sex life. In the chapter, each time he relieves himself, there is an important event or a change of mood. For example when he goes to the bathroom in the camp, he find the author as “…he had excreted everything but his brains.” After this event there is a sudden change of mood, “He went through the door, and found himself honeymooning again”. This chapter indicates a change in mood in the novel. Suddenly Billy is happy, he is now having intercourse with his wife and Montana Wildhack. The highlights of the mood done by particular events remind me of Scorsese’s Shutter Island. In the movie, Leonardo DiCaprio plays Teddy Daniels, a deranged police detective. The movie has a few very strong and important scenes. In all of them the audience is lead to another understanding of the movie. There is also always, a key factor in them, fire. The presence of the classic element highlights the different scenes. This highlighting of the scene makes the audience understand the value of the section, in perspective to the whole plot. This strategy employed by Vonnegut and Scorsese is what makes them so important in their fields. By having hidden highlights, the audience understands their complicated story.

Finally, it is important to highlight the criticism done by the author to the Catholic Church and the American people. Although Vonnegut states them as others work, he does include them in his book. This sampling, to me is a very cowardly form of criticism from the author. The first critic is done by summarizing The Gospel from Outer Space, by Kilgore Trout, in which Trout uses the premise of an alien visiting our planet and studying the Catholic Church. The second is monogram from Howard W. Campbell Jr., in which he takes the American people as generalization of humans, and continues on to critiques us. These forms of critique are very protective and cowardly. I was a disappointed Vonnegut, he has such a big potential and then goes on to write this? What happened?

As I read on, I hope to find other amazing styles and ideals from Kurt Vonnegut; because we can safely assume that he is, indeed, a literary genius. 

Hidden Morals

As I continue to read, Billy Pilgrim’s life becomes more and more complicated. We learn other of his traumatic life stories and start to understand his madness. This passage was by far the most simple and original part of this novel yet. We follow Billy in his trip around the universe with the Tralfamadorians. As his trip goes on, we learn more about his experiences at war. The war stories then relate to the other part of the chapter, where Billy is in a veteran’s mental hospital. Will we ever come to understand Billy Pilgrim?

What I most liked about this section was the reference to book titles. “The book was Maniacs in the Fourth Dimension, by Kilgore Trout. It was about people whose mental diseases couldn’t be treated because of the causes of the diseases were all in the fourth dimension…” This brief referencing occurs about 4 times. The book titles all explain the current plot. It’s impressive that as it turns out, all these titles exist and used to be best sellers. The book titles all embroil the characters feelings, they explain to the reader the reasoning the characters have. The clarifying of different character’s reasoning is also a very important factor in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight. In the movie, the classic comic book villain The Joker terrorizes Gotham City. It isn’t until the middle of the movie, that the audience understands why he is destroying the city. The Joker tells Batman he isn’t looking for money; he is just trying to prove a point. “I'll show you. When the chips are down, these... these civilized people, they'll eat each other. See, I'm not a monster. I'm just ahead of the curve.” The “hidden” explanations in book and films like these are great, they teach us the complicated morals behind a story. In Slaughter House Five, in the quote I mentioned, the author is clarifying that there is no cure for mental diseases. On the other hand in Batman, The Joker is trying to prove that deep down, everyone is as crazy as he is.

I infer that in the first chapter, we follow the Vonnegut trying to start the writing of this book. He discussed with a friend’s wife, that he would call his book “The Children’s Crusade”. Then at the end of today’s reading, a mysterious coronel that is part of the “medical team” in the prisoner camp says, “My God, my God-’ I said to myself, ‘It’s the Children’s Crusade”. This makes it seams as if Billy is a representation of the author, consequently, the title of the book. Therefore, I am very excited to learn the existence of the Kurt Vonnegut, in his novel.

Our Written Fate

Chapter four is a very important part of the book. In this section, Billy meets with the Tralfamadorians for the first time. We already knew this would happen because of the puzzle structure. Although, this is the first time it occurs in present like time. Vonnegut uses the stereotypical movie plot of an alien abduction, which is a disappointing based on the creativity of his other chapters. Once in the ship, the aliens explain to Billy their power of traveling in the time continuum. Billy asks the alien some questions of why he was taken. He says, why me? The Tralfamadorians continue to explain, humans always ask delusional questions about destiny. According to them we, are the only civilizations they’ve visited, that believes in free will instead. “If I hadn’t spent so much time studying Earthlings… I wouldn’t have any idea what was meant by ‘free will.’…Only on earth is there any talk of free will.” It is as if the Tralfamadorians are saying we are delusional, by thinking we have control over our fate. I relate this to the movie “The Adjustment Bureau” starring MattDamon. Damon’s character, David Norris discovers the awful truth; people’s destinies are controlled by God or as referred to in the movie “The Chairman”. God’s angels are represented as a government like agency, The Adjustment Bureau, where “The Chairman” is the director. These angels must coordinate our actions so everything goes according to plan. David Norris in search for the love of his life must outrun his destiny to be with her. The movie does have a cheesy plot, yet it still left me wondering, does our world run on destiny?

As I read on I was struck with the over use of “so it goes”. In this short chapter it’s used over 8 times. This might indicate the loss of importance of the signature phrase. He even uses it non-death situation, “It didn’t make a pop. The champagne was dead. So it goes.” The decay of the importance of the phrase indicates Billy’s acceptance of death. He has either finally accepted the death of people or just suppressed it. The blocking of death memories might be the case. My point is proven when he watches a movie of the war, backwards. “It was a movie about the American Bombers in the second world war and the gallant men who flew them. Seen backwards by Billy…” The description is of how all the ruins and dead soldiers come back to life. This might hint that Billy is suppressing his horrible memories and living on.

This book seams to get better and better as I read. I am curious, how Billy will survive being a prisoner at war. It’s exhilarating. I am also eager to find who and what type of narrator is the book in.

Life as a Puzzle

As I continue to read into chapter 3, I am still very impressed and captivated by Kurt Vonnegut’s great use of structure. Throughout the chapter he changes from different experiences in Billy’s life in such a passive style that as a reader you are shocked with the seamless transition you took from an impacting war story to the dull life of an old optometrist. The way he makes the reader understand his complex plot is genius. This complicated structure reminds me of director Quentin Tarantino’s masterpiece Pulp Fiction. Both the book and the movie use the inconsecutive plot structure. In Pulp Fiction the story is told from different characters prospective in different time frames, which makes it confusing. Tarantino and Vonnegut take advantage of this and create breath-taking puzzles. By using the irregular plot they tell a story that although the audience knows the ending to, it’s still intriguing. The obvious example being how we know the general story of Billy yet still want to find his path through the war.

The complicated puzzle structure used by the author leaves a huge amount of possible endings. The short references he does to articles and historical events leave a lot of space for interpreting. The reference that most caught my attention was that of the bombing of Dresden on page 59 “It looked like Dresden after it was fire bombed like the surface of the moon”. It seams as if Vonnegut is telling us that Billy is actually himself represented as a character in his story. The reference is only a sentence long but does leave you wondering whether the author is actually Billy. I am very curious, I hope that along the way we will be able to identify if the author is really taking a third person perspective on his life. This book’s complexity makes me eager to read, it leaves me questioning more than one aspect of the story, which makes it a great novel. Asides from the existence of the author in the book, I want to finds out what will happen to Billy as a war prisoner to the Germans.

Revised Ethia Anthem

In here, where peace ...A
is like the air, …B
things are at ease. ...A

Like we all care ...B
for everyone else. ...C
Everything’s fair. ...B

Nothing is false, ...C
No-one’s at war. ...D
They drink their own mulse ...C

We all adore. ...D
Music’s our soul, ...E
It is like the core ...D

We all have a role. ...E
Everyone knows ...F
We live as a whole. ...E

Here the wind blows ...F
From east to west, ...G
Where the past froze. ...F

And we are all blessed...G
Like Heaven and Earth. ...H
We’re never that stressed ...G

Like this since our birth. ...H
Perfection is here. ...I
Ethia is worth. ...H

We all endear ...I
The future that comes. ...J
It’s all now so clear ...I

Ethia Anthem

In here where peace ...A
is like the air ...B
things are at ease ...A

Like we all care ...B
for everyone else ...C
Everything’s fair ...B

Nothing is false ...C
No-one’s at war ...D
They drink their own mulse ...C

We all adore ...D
Music’s our soul ...E
It is like the core ...D

We all have a role ...E
Everyone knows...F
We live as a whole ...E

Here the wind blows ...F
From east to west...G
Where the past froze ...F

And we are all blessed...G
Like Heaven and Earth ...H
We’re never that stressed ...G

Like this since our birth...H
Perfection is here ...I
Ethia is worth...H

We all endear ...I
The future that comes ...J
It’s all now so clear ...I

Slaughter house five (20-40) Kurt Vonnegut

The Second chapter is the start of the story. The book takes us through our main character Billy Pilgrim’s life. The narrator takes us through our protagonist’s depressing life. After the War he became rich, married, and had two children. Until this point his life seams quite happy. Then in 1968 on a flight to Montreal, his plane crashed, everyone died except him. In the crash he had some head bruising which made him go mad. After this he starts saying his made contact with aliens and how they teach him to time travel. His daughter now married has to take care o him because of the obsession his take on the alien civilization of Trafalmordians. Billy has consumed his life in search of writing a letter for the News Leader, the local paper. The News Leader published the first letter he wrote on the Trafalmordians. The book continues on to describing the odd soldier that Billy was, he was in an idiot. It seams Billy has created the illusion of the aliens in his mind to shelter from his real life.

This shelter he created relates to the film directed by Martins Scorsese called Shutter Island starring Leonardo DiCaprio. DiCaprio’s character, Teddy Daniels behaves similarly to Billy. Teddy Daniels goes mad when his wife drowns their children. He creates the idea that he is investigating the disappearance of a patient in a asylum. Initially Detective Daniels was investigating the asylum known as Shutter Island when he snapped. His mind then created the illusion that he was still investigating the asylum when he had actually become a patient. Both Daniels and Billy created an illusion to their conscious mind that they had a mission. Yet both of them knew deep down that they were insane.

Slaughter House Five (Pg. 1-22) By Kurt Vonnegut

The book is written in first person perspective through the eyes of Kurt Vonnegut a Second World War veteran. The author seeks to write a book on the bombing of the little town of Dresden. It takes place after the war, with the main Vonnegut seeking information for his unwritten book. He is now a married man with two daughters and calls himself an “old fart”. He is now addicted on doing late calls to operators to find pieces of his memory. To research on his book he finds a old friend from war, Bernard V. O’Hare. With his daughters he goes to visit in Pennsylvania. They have a good chat about war when Vonnegut comes to realize he has no good memory of war. Then he has a good chat his friend wife, Marry O’Hare, which he dedicates his book to. In his chat he comes up with a title and a purpose for his book:  “The Children’s Crusade”.

 The style Vonnegut uses is quite realistic and appealing. You can feel what the character has been through in the words. War has come to define the writing. Although I haven’t been at war I can definitely relate. Our author has, as many characters in both movies and history been impacted greatly by his experiences at war. We can take for example Saving Private Ryan. Matt Damon’s character relives his experiences in WW2. The director (Spielberg) shows us the importance of brotherhood and the brutality in war. Matt Damon’s character is in the movie an old man remembering the other soldiers that gave their lives for his rescue. As Vonnegut, director Steven Spielberg portrays the effects of such small yet impacting experiences. Although both Kurt Vonnegut and Private Ryan (Damon’s character) have tried to live on, they can’t. The memories of war don’t let them, they are indeed changed men.