Talk:Slaughterhouse-Five

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

	Literature Portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Novels, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to narrative novels, novellas, novelettes and short stories on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit one of the articles mentioned below, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and contribute to the general Project discussion to talk over new ideas and suggestions.
Start	This article has been rated as Start-Class.
High	This article has been rated as High-importance on the importance scale.
Assessment comments This article has been rated for quality and/or importance but has no comments yet. If appropriate, please review the article and then leave comments here to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article and what work it will need.

	Philosophy Portal This article is within the scope of the WikiProject Philosophy, which collaborates on articles related to philosophy. To participate, you can edit this article or visit the project page for more details.
Start	This article has been rated as Start-Class on the quality scale.
???	This article has not yet received an importance rating on the importance scale.
Additional information: Related task forces (major fields): Philosophical literature

Contents 1 On the question of the book's title 2 Time Travel vs PTSD 3 Separate section for historical basis of the book? 4 Merge 5 Not "roughly the same" but "roughly twice". 6 "So it goes." 7 Another literary technique? 8 Redundant Categories 9 Not widely known at the time 10 17 May 2006 additions 11 Poo-tee-weet? 12 Illium 13 themes 14 Alien appearance 15 Babylon 5 reference 16 Time Magazine Reference 17 Story undone from Reference section 18 Re: Explanation of "The Children's Crusade" 19 Quotes section necessary? 20 WikiProject class rating 21 The narrator of the novel is not Vonnegut 22 Removed text 23 Trivial Allusions in other works 24 Miscellaneous misplaced comments 25 Ronald Reagan Reference

[edit] On the question of the book's title

Does this book have two titles... "Slaughterhouse Five" and "The Children's Crusade" or is it two different books? I'm extremely confused and I'm running out of time before school starts! PLEASE HELP! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.14.60.251 (talk • contribs) 07:01, 17 August 2004 (UTC).

I'm not sure, but there's a copy on Amazon called Slaughterhouse Five or the Children's Crusade. -Seth Mahoney 07:25, Aug 17, 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, as I recall, it's all just part of the same long title. Everyking 10:15, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I believe it's actually the sub-title of the book, although it doesn't appear anywhere on the cover of the widely published paperback version. Also, it's mentioned early in the book, in the section that's more from Vonnegut's POV, as far as I recall. aubrey 02:28, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your help!!!

Thanks for your help!!! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.14.60.251 (talk • contribs) 21:08, 17 August 2004 (UTC).

The entire title is

Slaughterhouse-Five or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance With Death by Kurt Vonnegut, a fourth-generation German-American now living in easy circumstances on Cape Cod (and smoking too much), who, as an American infantry scout hors de combat, as a prisoner of war, witnessed the fire-bombing of Dresden, Germany, "The Florence of the Elbe," a long time ago, and survived to tell the tale. This is a novel somewhat in the telegraphic schizophrenic manner of tales of the planet Tralfamadore, where the flying saucers come from. Peace.

In case you were wondering. Caesar 03:25, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

That's not the title, that's merely what's on the title page. The real title ends before the words "by Kurt Vonnegut." Victorianist 16:10, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Time Travel vs PTSD

My opinion is that Vonnegut is using the idea of time travel as a means of expressing the mental break down of Pilgrim, caused by the tremendous stress of war and in particular the devastation of the Dresden fire bombing.

Although this is questioned by the idea that Pilgrim predicts his own death we actually don't know that is true at all. When Vonnegut writes about Pilgrim's "current" situation, that is the war, he uses different language than when he writes about the "time travel" situations. The language used during the war is sarcastic and dismissive, highlighting the brutal pointlessness of war, while the time travel language is calm and almost poetic, serving to delineate what is PTSD induced fantasy and what is reality.

In addition, nothing bad ever happens to Pilgrim during his time-travel. Even his capture by the aliens proves to Pilgrim that he is indeed special (an idea used through the time-travel sequences) and not just some poor grunt. His time in the zoo, although a little humiliating is evened out by his beautiful porn-star mate, and his own death seems to bring him some kind of happiness or relief, a zen like acceptance of the eventually. In a loose fashion his time travel events coincide with the events of his current situation, only, once again, placing him in a much better situation, emotionally and physically, and he always seems to slip in time when things are at their most horrific worst.

So, given these ideas I have to conclude that this is not a science fiction novel, but rather a bleak examination of man's inability to cope with the forces of the world at large, over which he has little control. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.92.29.132 (talk • contribs) 23:57, 27 November 2004 (UTC).

I have to agree with this analysis. The argument is made that "PTSD can't explain all that is happening to Billy Pilgrim, because it doesn't explain how he is seeing forward into the future." However, we do not have any confirmation at all that the events Billy thinks he is experiencing in the future are actually going to happen; one might as well say that a psychotic's delusions that he is Alexander the Great are confirmed by the fact that, if asked who he is, he will say "Alexander the Great." It's all coming through the same filter. The article should not necessarily state that it is all delusion, but it should not state (as it currently does) that Billy's "knowledge" of the future all but disproves the possibility of delusion. -- Antaeus Feldspar 04:11, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Is he going to the future or is he not? it is a story and I am satisfied with that explanation, as to the current state of the entry? what about the criticism of christianity? of jesus? Vonnegut has talked about this and he has said, in irony, that he made 5 dollars off of everyone who died in Dresden, there should be a link to the Dresden firestorm. He has talked about who Billy Pilgrim, the flamingo is, he said it was a guy who he saw in the war who died in Dresden, not himself. There should be links to the interviews where he says these things. Dwarf Kirlston March 1 2005 21:14 Time Zone-Brasilia

Here is the issue with the above argument as I see it. The use of 'prettier language' doesn't not justify the conclusion that the narrator is no longer omniscient. Vonnegut is writing in 3rd person. To say that half of what is written is a delusion of the character, somehow deluding the omniscient narrator, too me, is highly suspect. When it's sole basis is, the language is prettier, and nothing bad happens. (Which I also argue. Lots of people close to him still die.) There is also the question unanswered of, where is he when he is traveling in time, or deluding himself. Where is his real location? You seem to be reporting, that his true place in time is Dresden. This means that he doesn't have kids, a wife, isn't an optometrist. Just as in movies, such as amilie, a director will use different lighting schemes to que different settings, Vonnegut uses a slight variation of prose style to que the time travel scenes. This in no way indicates that those scenes weren't real.

The problem with this discussion (as indicated by its title) is that it supposes that time travel and PTSD are mutually exclusive. Whether it is 'real' or not is entirely academic. It is the net effect, showing the state of a mind fractured by war, that is important. Other than in the first chapter, we do not know when 'now' is - which is rather the point (see also last week's Doonesbury sequence). Icundell 00:43, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

If he does, in fact, suffer from delusions is he nessesarily seeing the future? Isn't it possible that developed these delusions about when he started going public with his stories (which happened shortly after he was in the plane crash and his wife died, which could drive someone slightly insane). The story might be simply be a telling of the delusions as of the time he is getting into the argument with his daughter about his going public about Tralfamador. The only real future point past that is when he supposidly dies, which is incredebly like a science fiction story (which could have easily have seeped into his head from reading all those Kilgore Trout novels). I'm just saying that the delusions didn't nessesarily begin in WWII. --Mattrichers 02:18, July 23, 2005 (UTC)

Is it possible that somehow his perception of time got screwed up (and he became "unstuck") as a result of something the Tramalfadorians did? (Perhaps the mere explanation of the way time really works was enough?) The Porn Starlet (her name escapes me) wasn't unstuck, but maybe they never explain it to her- or if they did, maybe she wasn't bright enough to catch on, or something. 209.174.135.66 23:35, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Separate section for historical basis of the book?

The second most controversial aspect of this article (after 'Is he really unstuck in time or are his perceptions skewed by trauma?') is apparently what historical basis the book has. The most recent editing phrases it as a "claim" that Vonnegut was a personal witness to the bombing of Dresden (which was already mentioned, in the very first paragraph, except without the modifier that Vonnegut "claims" it), as well as other claims about the extent of destruction at Dresden.

I'm beginning to think it might be best to make this its own separate section that can be fine-tuned without disrupting the rest of the article. I believe we can achieve the Wikipedian ideal of describing POVs, and the reasons people have to believe those POVs, without endorsement. -- Antaeus Feldspar 20:29, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Merge

This discussion merged from Talk:Billy Pilgrim, since the Merge tag in Billy Pilgrim indicates the discussion of that proposal should occur here.

This article Billy Pilgrim should be merged and made into a redirect of Slaughterhouse-Five. There's nothing in this article that expands upon the content of the latter, and there never will be, unless Vonnegut writes a new book with Billy in it. Let's discuss for about a week and then I'll do the merge and make this a redirect. Tempshill 18:35, 16 September 2005 (UTC) Annotated w/ strike thru & (new) bolded material, reflecting merge of talk pages' history and content. --Jerzy•t 06:46, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

• _ _ Inasmuch as the Merge tag points to this page, and this discussion has been at Talk:Billy Pilgrim for it 9-day preceding history, it should be obvious there has been no proper opportunity for discussion until now.

_ _ IMO, this merge proposal is far from a slam dunk, and i'd like to see more specific discussion for and against specific divisions. My initial reaction was "of course two articles are needed, bcz Billy is just an incidental character." Now, that's not literally true: the whole novel is from his point of view; nevertheless, what led me to think of it that way is that for me Billy is just the magician's bright lighting that keeps the audience from seeing where the elephant went. To me, the novel is about war, and Dresden, and being a survivor, and i supposed about the inevitability of there being "innocent bystanders" (a careless term for the irrelevantly involved). Billy keeps the reader's attention while the reader is being primed for Vonnegut's presentation of Dresden in a specific context that has little or nothing to do with Billy's nature or development.

_ _ I'm not sure it's important whether an article merge is done in 2005, bcz the real reasons for two articles (or one) may not be clear until we have an article dealing much more substantially with the intent of the novel. The existing section on "time travel" seems almost oblivious to the fact that KV writes SF (and and the article uses that term for something fairly far removed from the usual SF conventions on the subject). Any such section would be much more pertinent to Billy Pilgrim than to the novel as a whole.

--Jerzy•t 06:46, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

This discussion seems to have dropped so I will remove the merge tag. Banana04131 01:05, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Not "roughly the same" but "roughly twice".

From the book: Hopefully all of you die.

"...Dresden, where 135,000 people died as the result of an air attack with conventional weapons."

Later,

"The atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima killed 71,379 people."

So, I have changed the line from "roughly the same" to "roughly twice". —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.126.174.180 (talk • contribs) 01:26, 24 November 2005 (UTC).

• Hey, I'm still pretty new at this (wiki editing), but when I saw this bit in the article I assumed the claim was considered pretty legitimate, but that did not seem to hold with the information contained in the Dresden bombing article itself. It seems like, if the other article is right, it would be more logical to amend the claims phrasing here to something like "claims, now considered dubious" or something along the lines of "for debate over these claims, please see the Dresden bombing article." I'm going to start by putting this up here, but if no one sees it and responds, I'll go ahead and try to make a change like that in the article. Siwangmu 19:54, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, the figure of 135,000 people was the one used by Nazi propaganda. Recent estimates have all been in the range of 25,000-35,000, even the earlier, now not so reputable estimates were in the 25,000~60,000 casualties range.

[edit] "So it goes."

This article states: "Vonnegut used the 'So it goes' chorus as a transitional phrase to another subject, as a reminder, and as comic relief."

I just re-read the novel, and I don't think that's quite right. His use of "So it goes" is more specific: He uses it precisely when he mentions death ("Search Inside" on Amazon.com to see this).

This ties in with a statement on page 27:

"When a Tralfamadorian sees a corpse, all he thinks is that the dead person is in a bad condition in that particular moment, but that same person is just fine in plenty of other moments. Now, when I myself hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is 'So it goes.'"

Perhaps the article should be changed to reflect this.

64.81.242.40 01:09, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree; I don't feel "So it goes" is comic relief at all... I feel that when Vonnegut says "So it goes", he means something like "Such is life"... and is referring to existential ideals

DRE 18:42, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

That there is a literal explanation does not, in any way, alter its metaphorical and symbolic use. Its power comes from its repetition and use-in-context. That it is 'inspired' (so to speak) by Tralfamdorian tradition is neither here nor there. Icundell 19:23, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

My concern here is not with any "metaphorical" or "symbolic" use, but rather with the accuracy of the sentence I quoted. I agree, its power comes in part through its repetion and in-context use. What I take issue with is the statement that "So it goes" is used "as a transitional phrase to another subject." If this were so, we would find instances were "So it goes" occurs as a transition between subjects, even when a death has not been mentioned. Correct me if I'm wrong, but my recollection (from re-reading the novel over the last two days) is that every time death is mentioned, "So it goes" follows, and every time "So it goes" occurs in the text, it follows a mention of death -- there is a one-to-one correspondence. It may sometimes happen that Vonnegut mentions a death before transitioning to another subject. In such cases "So it goes" will indeed occur in a transition. But that is missing the point. By the way, the mention of "So it goes" in the final part of the Plot section (whoever wrote that "got it") seems out of place. It should be moved to the "Literary techniques" section. DRE 22:28, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Ah, right - I see what you are getting at now. I think you are right about the bit in the plot section needing moving. We need to find a way to get across that, although 'so it goes' is invariably used in the context of death, it is also a crucial rhythmic device used to (satirically, imo) undermine sentimentality, generally to bleakly comic effect (and how else could you react to someone being shot for stealing a teapot?) - and it was use repeatedly as a brusque way of changing the subject. I suspect that's what the wording you have prolems with was trying to get at. Icundell 01:01, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to raise the WP:OR flag...The problem with this whole discussion is that anybody reading the novel for themselves and then putting in whatever literary critique, context, etc. that they think is valid is, by definition, original research. Is there some literary scholar that you can find that asserts these things in a journal of literary critique? What does Howard Bloom have to say about it? Plot summaries of books are one thing, one can write a plot summary and not get into OR, that's just reporting the facts, the book itself is your source material, but any thing resembling an interpretration or critique needs to come from someone other then we the wikipedia editors. --Easter Monkey 02:14, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Good point. It might be best to remove this part entirely. And, if Vonnegut did indeed pioneer the use of choruses as claimed, I'd like to see a reference. If we do want to keep the "So it goes" material in some form, we can start with this citation: "Vonnegut compensates for his extremely fragmented structures through repetition. ... Several of his books contain recurrent catch-phrases. The refrain of 'So it goes' follows every death (human, animal or otherwise) in Slaughterhouse-Five." - Sim, Stuart. The Routledge Companion to Postmodernism. London: Routledge, 2003. p. 379. DRE 05:15, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Another reference: "The cyclical nature is inextricably bound up with the large themes of Slaughterhouse-Five, time, death, and renewal. ... time means change and is, obviously, equivalent to death ... The Tralfamadorian answer to the problem is hinted at from the very first page. After telling of the German taxicap driver, Gerhard Mueller, whose mother 'was incinerated in the Dresden fire-storm,' Vonnegut begins what will be a persistent refrain throughout the novel, the phrase 'so it goes.' The reader does not know until the second chapter, however, that this is what the Tralfamadorians, those mythical creatures who live on a distant planet in Billy Pilgrim's mind, say about dead people. The philosophy of Tralfamadore on time and death, as Billy explains it, is an escape from the concept of linear time, just as their novels are an escape from linear narration ... The Tralfamadorians, then, avoid the 'duty-dance with death' by ignoring death as a finality. Their little formula 'so it goes,' said ritualistically throughout the novel whenever any death, no matter how trivial, is mentioned, is from the human point of view, the height of fatalism. The most important function of 'so it goes,' however, is its imparting a cyclical quality to the novel, both in form and content. Paradoxically, the expression of fatalism serves as a source of renewal, a situation typical of Vonnegut's works, for it enables the novel to go on despite -- even because of -- the proliferation of deaths. ... The phrase 'so it goes' is a sign of the human will to survive, and it recurs throught the novel as an important aid to going on." - McGinnis, Wayne D. "The Arbitrary Cycle of Slaughterhouse-Five: A Relation of Form to Theme." Critique 17.1 (1975): 58-59. Of course, somebody would need to condense these ideas into a few concise statements for the article. DRE 05:49, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

And it sounds like you are just the guy to do it...just teasing. Anyway, looks like we're on the right track. --Easter Monkey 06:32, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

If I'm not mistaken, "So it goes" is something common to many of the author's works. Perhaps that should not be discussed in this article then but rather on the article on Vonnegut himself...

[edit] Another literary technique?

"Another literary technique used by Vonnegut is the metafiction device. The first chapter of the book is not about Billy Pilgrim, but a preface about how Vonnegut came to write Slaughterhouse-Five." I think it might be just a preface... 86.143.211.173 23:23, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

It's definitely a technique - later in the novel, Vonnegut appears again as a minor character:

"An American near Bily wailed that he had excreted everything but his brains. Moments later he said, "There they go, there they go." He meant his brains. That was I. That was me. That was the author of this book."

Dcteach 18:20, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

He did the same thing in Jailbird.

Nklatt (talk) 20:57, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Redundant Categories

_ _ "Redundant" here describes putting an article in Cat that is a parent of a Cat it that the article already belongs to. Category:Kurt Vonnegut novels already belongs to Category:American novels. (Sorry for my smart-ass way of describing that situation.)
_ _ The higher in the hierarchy a cat is, the more articles fit its description; we're close to 1M articles, and some Cats like Category:People would have tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of articles in them (and be unusable) except that we move the articles away from the root of the Cat tree into a sub-Cat (eventually into multiple sub-Cats of the same parent) whenever one becomes available. I didn't explicitly describe the redundancy, but Category:American novels is redundant as a Cat for SH5 bcz SH5 is properly in Category:Kurt Vonnegut novels and Category:American novels has Category:Kurt Vonnegut novels as a cat. James II is a Stuart King bcz his father Charles II (hmm, or was it Charles I?) was; it's like our not drawing an extra line back to his grandfather James I bcz we can always trace one generation at a time whenever there is a multi-generational relationship of descent. This process is most of what Cat sorting and stub-sorting are all about.
--Jerzy•t 09:37 &09:41, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Not widely known at the time

The article claims that both the bombing of Dresden and Nazi persecution of gays were not widely known in 1969. Maybe that's correct in some places, but certainly not in general terms. After all, the article says that there was a bestseller about the bombing at the time. Maybe some qualification is needed? Zocky | picture popups 07:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 17 May 2006 additions

Is it just me or does it look like someone just dumped a bad book report into the middle of this article? NickVeys 04:27, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

More like a school assignment. Hope the teacher didn't mark it too high. Icundell 09:19, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Book report = school assignment. If you look through the history, the user who posted it clearly was figuring out how to wikify his or her school paper. --Easter Monkey 10:20, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

aha. That'll be one of those trans-Atlantic terminology things we run into every now and then :) Icundell 00:34, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

I hope that "... from a third perspective, that of the author" is part of that bad school report and will be removed soon. Generally this article is horrible. I know I shouldn't complain but rather make it better, but I'd probably have to start from scratch, and I really don't know when I'll have the time for that. (Bringa, and too lazy to login)

[edit] Poo-tee-weet?

In reference to "Poo-tee-weet?" the article says, "This can only be best guessed as 'why this way?'" It's been a very long time since I read this book, but am I correct in assuming that this interpretation is from the author of the article, not the author of the book? If so, it seems more than a little pretentious to me -- not only does the article presume to impose an interpretation, it characterizes that interpretation as the "only" one and the "best" one. (I don't think that the further characterization of the interpretation as "guess" ameliorates the situation, nor do I see why anyone's guesses belong in an encyclopedia.) Having said all that: If this interpretation originates with someone other than the author of the article, a citation would be helpful. Just my two cents. HMishkoff 22:57, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree, and I removed it. --Guinnog 13:34, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Illium

The explanation of Illium, New York under the characters section should at least accompany the first explanation of Illium rather than the second, although it doesn't really fit in either place, and I don't know where to put it. --Amanaplanacanalpanama 03:20, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] themes

The statement, "Their [the aliens] hapless destruction of the universe suggests that Vonnegut does not sympathize with their philosophy." may be correct, but I don't think it is sufficiently certain to include it in the article as it is. --Amanaplanacanalpanama 03:29, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Alien appearance

Sorry for posting again. Does Vonnegut himself say that the space aliens look like plungers? --Amanaplanacanalpanama 03:31, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, he does. -- Derek Ross | Talk 22:23, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Babylon 5 reference

I'm restoring this passage. I'd be glad to discuss it if it's considered inappropriate, but I think it's quite appropriate.Claudia 18:58, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Time Magazine Reference

Someone should state that the book was #18 in the top 100 by the Modern American Library for 20th Century Fiction (Random House).

While I think that the article should reflect the changing critical fortunes of the novel, I don't think that the article should register the constantly adjusting numerical placement of the novel in lists. Victorianist (talk) 20:36, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Story undone from Reference section

That was an interesting story, but it's not appropriate for the References section. Maybe it could go into the Pop Culture section, provided it was properly and adequately referenced. ----- 23:42, August 29, 2007 (UTC) Gouveia2 15:43, 30 August 2007 (UTC)(talk • contribs)

[edit] Re: Explanation of "The Children's Crusade"

IMHO the analogy is that the children of the historic crusade were not knowing what the purpose of their crusade was. They realised it later on when they were going to die. V. was supposed to write a book with no John Wayne type character in it because most of the soldiers sent to war were young, poor and unexperienced boys. That is exactly the point Ms. O'Hare is making and V. promises her to call the book "The Children's Crusade". Appologies for any language flaws as I'm native German.

tmegow —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.6.8.123 (talk) 11:25, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree; but that section shouldn't be there anyway. The majority of this article needs a cleanup -- almost none of it is sourced, and it sounds like somebody's high school essay, and full of speculation and uncited assertions. Deshi no Shi 15:20, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Quotes section necessary?

I'm tempted to remove the whole thing. Could go on forever, and that's what the book's for. At most, I would include repeated phrases (like "So it goes," "Poo-tee-weet?" and "And so on", but most of those are already represented elsewhere. Dcteach 18:27, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the quotations section should be removed. If we are going to follow the template for Novels WikiProject, we can't have a quotations section. The place to put quotations would only be in the == Allusions in other works == subsection. And that's only if another work has actually quoted this work. There should probably be a minimum threshold of importance for including a citation or allusion. Victorianist 16:23, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

The following section of quotatoins was removed because it does not align with the Novels WikiProject:

~ "And I say to Sam now: 'Sam-here's the book.' It's so short and jumbled and jangled, Sam, because there is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre. Everybody is supposed to be dead, to never say anything or want anything ever again. Everything is supposed to be very quiet after a massacre, and it always is, except for the birds. And what do the birds say? All there is to say about a massacre, things like 'Poo-tee-weet?" (19) ~ "Billy is spastic in time, has no control over where he is going next, and the trips aren't necessarily fun. He is in a constant state of stage fright, he says, because he never knows what part of his life he is going to have to act in next." (23) ~ "When a Tralfamadorian sees a corpse, all he thinks is that the dead person is in a bad condition in that particular moment, but that the same person is just fine in plenty of other moments. Now, when I myself hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is 'So it goes'." (27) ~ "Even though Billy's train wasn't moving, its boxcars were kept locked tight. Nobody was to get off until the final destination. To the guards who walked up and down outside, each car became a single organism which ate and drank and excreted through its ventilators. It talked or sometimes yelled through its ventilators, too. In went water and loaves of black-bread and sausage and cheese, and out came shit and piss and language." (70) ~ "Rosewater said an interesting thing to Billy one time about a book that wasn't science fiction. He said that everything there was to know about life was in The Brothers Karamazov, by Fedor Dostoevsky. 'But that isn't enough any more,' said Rosewater." "Another time Billy heard Rosewater say to a psychiatrist, 'I think you guys are going to have to come up with a lot of wonderful new lies, or people just aren't going to want to go on living'." (101) ~ "How nice - to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive" (105) ~ "The Tralfamadorians tried to give Billy clues that would help him imagine sex in the invisible dimension. They told him that there could be no Earthling babies without male homosexuals. There could be babies without female homosexuals. There couldn't be babies without women over sixty-five years old. There could be babies without men over sixty-five. There couldn't be babies without other babies who had lived an hour or less after birth. And so on. It was gibberish to Billy." (114) ~ "Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt." (122) ~ "There those girls were with all their private parts bare, for anybody to see. And there in the doorway were Gluck and Derby and Pilgrim-the childish soldier and the poor old high school teacher and the clown in his toga and silver shoes-staring. The girls screamed. They covered themselves with their hands and turned their backs and so on, and made themselves utterly beautiful." (159) ~ "Echolalia is a mental disease which makes people immediately repeat things that well people around them say. But Billy didn't really have it. Rumfoord simply insisted, for his own comfort, that Billy had it. Rumsfoord was thinking in a military manner: that an inconvenient person, on whose death he wished for very much, for practical reasons, was suffering from a repulsive disease." (192) ~ "Billy and the rest wandered out onto the shady street. The trees were leafing out. There was nothing going on out there, no traffic of any kind. There was only one vehicle, an abandoned wagon drawn by two horses. The wagon was green and coffin shaped. Birds were talking. One bird said to Billy Pilgrim. 'Poo-tee-weet'?" (215) ~ "Billy had a framed prayer on his office wall which expressed his method for keeping going, even though he was unenthusiastic about living. A lot of patients who saw 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." (60) ~ "She was a dull person, but a sensational invitation to make babies. Men looked at her and wanted to fill her up with babies right away. She hadn't had even one baby yet. She used birth control." (171)

Victorianist 17:28, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

It turns out there is a quotations section as per the Novels WikiProject template, but before we restore this section to its proper place, I want to have a discussion over there about whether or not novel pages should have quotation sections. It seems like unnecessary clutter, in addition to inviting copyright violation (if we exceed fair use quotation limit). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Victorianist (talk • contribs) 20:07, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 04:27, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The narrator of the novel is not Vonnegut

I think we should avoid referring to this narrator as Vonnegut, even in the first chapter. It is a convention of academic discussions of novels that we avoid asserting a simple 1:1 correspondence between the narrator and the author. I think we could discuss this potentially interesting problem of the apparent correspondence between author and narrator in the "Literary significance and reception section." Certainly, some of the criticism asserts that the narrator and Vonnegut are the same person, and I think we can usefully address the confusion here. I really think that the tone of this article should be scholarly and neutral. We all have a deep love of Vonnegut, so let's keep the tone of the article as encyclopedic as possible. Victorianist 17:13, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Removed text

I removed the following piece of text because it is extravagant in its claims. Vonnegut did not pioneer the use of choruses (refrains as I have modified the term in the main article). I am not sure of the legitimacy of the term "plant-connect," but since I've never heard of it, I don't think it's real. In any case, a better term for what the author of the passage has described is "metaphor" or even "analogy." But we should be clear that Vonnegut's novel is not pioneering for its use of figurative language, which may be described as impoverished. The point of the narrative style of the novel is to be clear so that it appears that what is being described is fact, when it is not fact.

Two techniques Vonnegut pioneered were the use of choruses and the "plant-connect" analogies. The "plant-connect" analogies are probably best explained with an example. Vonnegut uses the phrase "radium dial" to describe both a Russian's face in the prisoners' camp, and Billy Pilgrim's father's watch in the utter darkness of the Carlsbad Caverns. This emphasizes a connection between the two. The Russian's face reminded him that the other people in the camp were human, and that moment of recognition is thus filled with hope for him. So it was with Billy's father's watch, a bastion of security and familiarity in an unfamiliar place.

Victorianist (talk) 18:55, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I removed this block because this article should be about Slaughterhouse-Five and not Kurt Vonnegut.

Vonnegut uses metafiction to an even greater degree in his more recent novel Timequake. In it, Vonnegut discusses an old version of the book and how improvements were made on the original.

Victorianist (talk) 19:00, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Trivial Allusions in other works

The following material has been removed from the main article because the references are too trivial. If we are going to note allusions in other works to S5, we should be prepared to justify the allusion. Wikipedia is not a storehouse of pop-culture references, but an encyclopedia. I think a good guideline for an allusion is whether or not it requires critical commentary. The mere presence or mention of this book in a film or song probably does not require critical commentary and thus probably does not pass the smell test.

• The character of Clayton reads and briefly discusses the book in the film The Recruit. Other references to Kurt Vonnegut's work in this movie include the presence of a computer virus named ICE-9 (from Cat's Cradle), and Clayton referring to his father's eggs as the "Breakfast of Champions", which might be understood as a reference to the Kurt Vonnegut novel of the same name.
• The book is mentioned in the 1984 film Footloose and the subsequent musical of the same name.
• James Van Der Beek is seen reading the book in the 1999 film Varsity Blues.
• The book is mentioned in the song "Shut Up & Make Out" by The Hazzards.
• American rock group Nine Inch Nails uses a passage from Slaughterhouse-Five in the Year Zero album's coinciding Alternate Reality Game.
• American rock band Kifkiñata wrote a song entitled "The Ballad of Billy Pilgrim" about the main character.
• The character of John Crichton makes reference to Slaughterhouse-Five in the science fiction series Farscape] at the beginning of the fourth season which dealt with "Unrealised Realities".
• The Sloppy Meateaters' song "So It Goes" refers to the novel. Also, the pyschedelic punk rock group Nebula (band) has a song of the same name that is a reference to Kurt Vonnegut.
• The janitor in Disturbing Behavior has a copy of the novel in his back pocket, the novel is mentioned in brief dialogue.
• In Frasier season 8, episode 7 (The New Friend), Niles Crane gives his father Martin Crane a gift box of five types of meats, called The Slaughterhouse Five. The corresponding act's heading is With apologies to Mr. Vonnegut.
• Montana Wildhack and Kilgore Trout are mentioned in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier.

Victorianist (talk) 19:45, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Another trivial allusion:

• In Allan Moore's graphic novel, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier, a Tralfamadorian is an ironic exhibit in an interplanetary zoo on Earth. A character is later seen reading a sleaze magazine featuring Montana Wildhack and a story by Kilgore Trout. Victorianist (talk) 16:29, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Yet more trivial allusions:

• In the TV series Lost, the character Daniel Faraday refers to a lab rat's condition as "unsticking in time", and therefore hinting Desmond Hume has become "unstuck in time", in a similar manner as Billy Pilgrim does in the novel.
• On the March 2, 2008 episode of Saturday Night Live, in the sketch "The Dakota Fanning Show", Fanning (played by Amy Poehler) mentions her assumption that the name Hannah Montana is an obvious allusion to Montana Wildhack's character.
• In the film Footloose, the novel is thought to be a terrible, sinful book, most likely due to the title alone. Kevin Bacon's character defends it as a great story. Victorianist (talk) 16:00, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
• Nick Lowe has a song titled "So it goes". --76.83.24.57 (talk) 22:59, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

And more:

The episode The Constant in the television show Lost features a character who becomes similarly "unstuck in time" and revisits moments from his past. Victorianist (talk) 04:04, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

They just keep on coming:

Sherman Alexie's novel, Flight, was published in 2007 and contains an epigraph quote from Slaughterhouse-Five, while also clearly speaking back to Vonnegut's writing style and structure.

In their 2007 album Bone Palace Ballet, the Michigan-based band Chiodos has a song titled "Teeth the Size of Piano Keys". This is a quote made in reference to the appearances of German soldiers as compared to American prisoners.

mewithoutyou, a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based indie rock band, has a song entitled, "everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt," a reference to the "crazy thought" of Billy Pilgrim that could "make a good epigraph" in chapter 5. Victorianist (talk) 16:42, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Is it not relevant to reference the fact that Vonnegut and Joseph Heller were friends, even appearing in a playboy interview together (Copyrighted, hence my not editing the article to include it) here: http://www.vonnegutweb.com/vonnegutia/interviews/int_heller.html

I realize this is more relevant to Vonnegut's page than Slaughterhouse-Five, however, in "Closing Time", the sequel to Catch-22, there's a reference to a character in Dresden who survives the fire bombing, the character's name is "Vonnegut". Reference the wiki for Closing Time: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closing_Time_(novel) (last paragraph).

Just a thought. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.64.206.167 (talk) 11:54, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Miscellaneous misplaced comments

Moving these comments from above to here. Note that none of these comments are by me, Victorianist.

• {{{So what are some of the similarities between Tralfamadore and earth? I have discovered many clues on my own, but feel I am missing a big hidden one. Care to shed light anyone?}}}

• Is there anywhere on this article to add its on the AS level curriculum and is a bitch of a book to analyse?82.39.40.93 23:39, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

• Is it possible that possible that Billy is not traveling in time at all, but is merely seeing life as a moment? He exists, always has existed, and always will exist. There is no chronological order. He views life as the tralfamadorians do. Just a thought —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.17.233.85 (talk • contribs) 22:04, 29 November 2005 (UTC).

Victorianist (talk) 03:05, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ronald Reagan Reference

The article currently says, "Billy's wife Valencia has a bumper sticker on her car stating "Reagan for President!". This refers to Ronald Reagan's unsuccessful 1976 campaign for the Republican Party nomination, not his successful campaign in 1980 for the Presidency." This makes no sense, though. The novel was written in 1969, a full seven years before 1976 - three years before the previous presidential campaign, even. How could it reference a campaign that was years away from beginning? According to the Ronald Reagan Wikipedia article, he also ran unsuccessfully in 1968, so assuredly, that's what the book is referencing. So, I'm changing the sentence in question. Jcb9 (talk) 23:17, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

My teacher tell me the writer express to the absurdity in Slaughterhouse-Five, but I don't know what is the absurdity. Please help! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.28.17.42 (talk) 03:49, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Absurdity

My teacher tell me the writer express to the absurdity in Slaughterhouse-Five, but I don't know what is the absurdity. Please help! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.28.17.42 (talk) 03:51, 29 May 2008 (UTC)