Slaughterhouse 5

It took Vonnegut more than 20 years to put his Dresden experiences into words. He explained, "there is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre. Everybody is supposed to be dead, to never say anything or want anything ever again." Slaughterhouse Five is a powerful novel incorporating a number of genres. Only those who have fought in wars can say whether it represents the experience well. However, what the novel does do is invite the reader to look at the absurdity of war. Human versus human, hedonist politicians pressing buttons and ordering millions to their deaths all for ideologies many cannot even comprehend. Flicking between the US, 1940's Germany and Tralfamadore, Vonnegut's semi- autobiographical protagonist Billy Pilgrim finds himself very lost. One minute he is being viewed as a specimen in a Tralfamadorian Zoo, the next he is wandering a post-apocalyptic city looking for corpses. Slaughterhouse Five-Or The Children's Crusade A Duty-Dance with Death is a remarkable blend of black humour, irony, the truth and the absurd. The author regards his work a "failure", millions of readers do not. Released the same time bombs were falling on South East Asia, this title caused controversy and awakening. Essential reading for all. So it goes. --Jon Smith

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Realities of War - Rated
Catch 22 exposes the ruthless realities of war and subsequently the harsh realities of life, as the novel depicts war as a microcosm of life itself. By doing this Heller are showing to the reader that war is just as inevitable as life itself and that life is sometimes as harsh and unyielding as war.

Didn't Live up to Expectation - Rated
It bored me half to death. Slow moving, uninteresting, frustrating and somewhat confusing. Would have been better if the writer had stuck to one plot. Only worth reading to say you've read it.

Curious, philosophical, wide reaching great book - Rated
The first chapter in this book is in the first person which gives context to the rest of the book. I always forget how rare, but enjoyable, it is to read first person until you come across it, generally in autobiographies. This gave a fascinating start which engaged my curiosity from the beginning.
I loved the swapping backwards and forwards in time. It was initially unsettling but once I accepted that was normal then it was a very relaxing technique. The use of the fourth dimension led to a interesting conclusion that when a body dies it doesn't matter as there are still times when it was alive and they can be revisited at any time.
Billy has memories from the future which is a great concept and I loved his complete acceptance of what will be happening at some time and also accepting his inability to change it.
I'm not quite sure how the author managed to acheive it, but the suspense was retained all through the novel even though, through Billy, the reader has already seen the end of the story.
There is a thin line between the philosophical genius of Billy and his lunatic tendancies which increase as the time progressed towards his death.
This is the first Kurt Vonnegut book I have read and I will read more.

Read it, pass it on to your sons and their sons - Rated
Not much more can be said about this book beyond what the previous reviewers have already said. Unlike a lot of highly recommended reading it is however a great and despite its subject, enjoyable read. The enjoyment may however be intruded upon by some sober reflection on the part of the reader. The mental picture of Billy Pilgrim's entry into Dresden is a wonderful metaphor for the absurdity of war as is the moral outrage of the Dresdener who berates him for his appearance a superb portrayal of the differences which arise from nothing more than perspective.
Buy it.

So it Goes. - Rated
Kurt Vonnegut was a genius. If you were a publisher reading the synopsis (if he ever did such a thing!) on Slaughterhouse 5 you would probably need to have a lie down for a while, whilst you wondered if you ever dared print such a thing. But back in 1969 it was, and drew interest at a time of ant-war protests in the US.

Vonnegut follows Billy Pilgrim as he stumbles towards the curtain of the Allied bombing of Dresden at the end of World War 2.

In-between Billy slips in and out of time travel and is kidnapped by an alien race called the Tralfamadorians who put him in a zoo. The aliens perceive all points in time at once:

"When a Tralfamodorian sees a corpse, all he thinks is that dead person is in a bad condition in that particular moment, but that person is just fine in plenty of other moments."

Billy also meets his favourite author Kilgore Trout.

"Are - you Kilgore Trout?"
"Yes." Trout supposed that Billy had some complaint about the way his newspapers were being delivered. He did not think of himself as a writer for the simple reason that the world had never allowed him to think of himself in this way.
"The - the writer?" said Billy.
"The what?"

Slaughterhouse works on a number of levels. (Let me be clear, the book should not work, the fact that it does is a testament to Vonnegut.) It is funny, moving and informative. It brings into perspective the level of suffering in a city which Vonnegut describes as having no military significance (it was untouched until the bombing at the end of the war). Vonnegut himself survived the bombing as a prisoner of war in Dresden.

1945
Air attack on Tokyo by American bombers kills 83,793 people.
Atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima kills 71,370 people.
Conventional bombs dropped by the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Force on Dresden, kills 135,000 people.

What I like about the book is the way you are drawn into the thought gymnastics that go on in Vonnegut's mind. He is clever, witty and provides a view on life that is refreshing and allows you to look at the human condition from a perspective outside the normal polite form of thought demonstrated by the mass of media that surrounds us.

It's like discovering a donut sprinkled in brightly covered hundreds and thousands in a packet of cornflakes. Totally unexpected and a real treat at the wrong time of day. Disjointed from the normal patterns.

In the book The Tralfamadorians teach Billy that a person only appears to die. He is still very much alive in the past.
Tralfamadorians say about dead people, "So it goes."
Vonnegut died this April aged 84.

So it goes.