Jerome Klinkowitz

Describes the background of Slaughterhouse-Five, discusses its themes, and looks at its critical reception

Reforming the Novel and the World

Slaughterhouse-five

Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death

Kurt Vonnegut

Billy Pilgrim returns home from the Second World War only to be kidnapped by aliens from the planet Tralfamadore, who teach him that time is an eternal present

Or, The Children's Crusade, a Duty-dance with Death

Slaughterhouse-Five

Iris van der zanden

She upset Billy simply by being his mother. She made him feel embarrased and ungrateful and weak because she had gone to so much trouble to give him life, and to keep that life going, and Billy didn't really like life at all.

Macy HB

It was very exciting for her, taking his dignity away in the name of love. 

It is just an illusion we have here on Earth that one moment follows another, like beads on a string, and that once a moment is gone it is gone forever. 

Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made sense from things she found in gift shops. 

Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt.

Avery

There in the hospital, Billy was having an adventure very common among people without power in time of war: he wahe was trying to prove to a willfully deaf and blind enemy that he was interested to hear and see.

Before you kill somebody, make absolutely sure he isn't well connected.

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.

He said that Americans had no choice but to keep fighting in Vietnam until they achieved victory or until the Communists realized that they could not force their way of life on weak countries.

It was his addled understanding of the rules of warfare that the marksman should be given a second chance.

'The great, urgent, passionate American writer of our century, who offers us a model of the kind of compassionate thinking that might yet save us from ourselves.' George Saunders Prisoner of war, optometrist, time-traveller - these are the life roles of Billy Pilgrim, hero of this miraculously moving, bitter and funny story of innocence faced with apocalypse. Slaughterhouse Five is one of the world's great anti-war books. Centring on the infamous fire-bombing of Dresden in the Second World War, Billy Pilgrim's odyssey through time reflects the journey of our own fractured lives as we search for meaning in what we are afraid to know. 'An extraordinary success. A book to read and reread. He is a true artist' New York Times Book Review

The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death

emmy 

** spoiler alert **
           What I really loved about the book is how it explores the absurdity and futility of war, while also delving into deeper themes like free will, destiny, and the human condition. 
Vonnegut's writing style is straightforward yet deeply thought-provoking, and his non-linear narrative, bouncing back and forth through time and space, adds a layer of complexity that I found captivating. 
One of the most memorable parts of the book for me is the refrain of "so it goes" whenever death is mentioned. It's a simple phrase, but it's so powerful in its acceptance of the inevitability of death and the randomness of life.

It was overall a good book. I really liked the plot and the adventures of Billy Pilgrim. I loved the way the author made such a tragic event seem so normal. So it goes.

Ryan North

The first-ever graphic novel adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world’s great anti-war books. An American classic and one of the world’s seminal antiwar books, Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five is faithfully presented in graphic novel form for the first time from Eisner Award-winning writer Ryan North (How to Invent Everything: A Survival Guide for the Stranded Time Traveler) and Eisner Award-nominated artist Albert Monteys (Universe!). Listen: Billy Pilgrim has... ...read Kilgore Trout ...opened a successful optometry business ...built a loving family ...witnessed the firebombing of Dresden ...traveled to the planet Tralfamadore ...met Kurt Vonnegut ...come unstuck in time. Billy Pilgrim’s journey is at once a farcical look at the horror and tragedy of war where children are placed on the frontlines and die (so it goes), and a moving examination of what it means to be fallibly human.

Patrick Book

This isn’t my favourite Vonnegut, but this might be the best version of this story. Gorgeously rendered and elegant in every way.

It's good. But it's too bleak. Vonnegut's best works have a strong undercurrent of humanity, no matter how dark or impossible the scenarios. This lacks that to a degree that makes it more depressing than anything...which, I suppose, a novel centred around the worst attack in the history of war probably should be.

Andrew Reeves

Figured it was time to go back and give it another read for the first time in 18 years or so. Holds up.

Evan

My first Vonnegut and it was pretty disappointing. It won't be my last, but I honestly hope it's no where but up from here.
To be honest, I don't really know what Kurt hoped I, as a reader, would take away from this book. Based on what he said in the beginning, before he wrote about Billy Pilgrim and instead spoke about how hard it was to even write about Dresden, I had expected it to reach places he was vastly uncomfortable to talk about. Perhaps that's why he wrote the story of Dresden structured around Billy Pilgrim's ridiculous and silly "space-time adventure" where the firebombing of Dresden is barely even discussed. I thought the most entertaining thing about the book was probably a short-lived character in the beginning. Obviously "death" is the ever-present concept, here, always punctuated with the quickly-dull "So it goes" after every single one.
This book felt like, in part, a coping mechanism to me. The entire thing written by Kurt for Kurt and not really for anyone else. Death is going no where so you should just get comfortable with it. Things go how they go and, whether it happened in the past or will happen in the future, you cannot change them. This laissez-faire, borderline-defeatist mindset only gets questioned once in the story and is immediately shot down. I wish it had been poked at a bit more.
There're some laughs to be had, but they're too infrequent for me to call this "dark comedy" or a good one, anyways. It felt more absurdist and wandering, Vonnegut's visit and reflection of Dresden probably deserved more than what it got, here. Mostly, I was pretty bored, though I saw what I believed to be blips of 'why' Vonnegut got the praise he did. Again, I hope his other works are better examples of this talent.

Billy Pilgrim survives capture by the Gemans in World War II, the Dresden bombings, and the struggle for financial success only to be kidnapped in a flying saucer and taken to the planet Tralfamadore.

A Duty Dance With Death

Slaughterhouse Five Or the Children's Crusade

Clair High

loved the sci fi elements combined with the repeated phrases that made the whole book feel so cohesive

amelo

Lovro Oreskovic

Sarah Sammis

There are many classics and well known books that I haven't read. I'm trying to make amends with that. I can now cross Slaughterhouse Five off my list.

Slaughterhouse Five is two stories in one. There is Vonnegut trying to explain his desire to write the great Dresden bombing book and then there is the story of Billy Pilgrim who is "unstuck" in time and keeps finding himself back in WWII (among other times and places).

Unlike the men in The Time Traveler's Wife and The Man Who Folded Himself, Billy has no control over when he jumps or where he'll end up. Billy doesn't seem to care either that he jumps through time living his life (and death) at random. Billy's philosophy on the absurdity of life (and his life in particular) is summed up repeatedly through the book: and so it goes.

I'm not sure how I feel about Slaughterhouse-Five, having now finished it. I can understand why it's a novel with literary merit but at the same time, it didn't capture my imagination the way The Man Who Folded Himself did.

Vicky  Nuñez 

Rating: 4.5

I wish there were more books like this one.

Chaitanya Baranwal

"If I am going to spend eternity visiting this moment and that, I'm grateful that so many of those moments are nice."

A unique mixture of time travel and déjà vus, slaughterhouse-five wasn't the book I expected it to be. Sure, it talks about the horrors of war, about the effects it can have on people, but it does so in such a peculiar manner that sometimes, I found it hard to accept that this was an "anti-war" novel. Kurt Vonnegut's writing style is quite unique too, and frankly, if you're looking for a book which will make you go "whoa" at times, I don't think this book is the one. That being said, the entire time travel made me so engrossed in the moment that I genuinely forgot which period Billy was actually living in, and I think that's kind of the point (that time is not linear).

Without mentioning gruesome details with intense visual imagery, without intricately detailing the various deaths that are mentioned throughout the novel or the horrific bombing of Dresden, this book gets across its point that war is dreadful. That is what makes it an anti-war novel, and this I something I consider quite an achievement. A combination of equal parts tragedy and equal parts humor, this is the kind of book which makes a unique impression on the reader's mind.

jack

there’s so much to love about this book!!!!! so much so that i can’t express it all (the two things i want to say most is how much i love his overuse of motifs and the way he can write beauty with a sort of dumb simplicity. raw as fuck)!!!! this is the quickest i’ve breezed through a book in quite a while!
 but i do have one problem, and it may come from my own misunderstanding. i really don’t like how his anti-war message seems to gloss over and humanize nazis! yes war is an atrocity and should be condemned, but doing so in a way that vastly overlooks the crimes committed by one party feels a little uncomfortable to me

edit: additionally, this book lowkey propagates a lot of falsehoods about the bombing of dresden that vilifies the allies a lot more than they deserve (for this one particular instance). while i’m all for vilifying war hungry assholes, this unfortunately is often used by the modern far right to paint a narrative in which the nazis weren’t all that bad. while i’m not going to blame vonnegut for this, it does make me a little uncomfortable while reading. for more info, check this out https://youtu.be/kS2_YFbzAVs

The story of Billy Pilgrim, who was a soldier in Dresden when it was fire bombed, a survivor of an airplane crash, a dentist, and a time traveler.

“(…) if I am going to spend eternity visiting this moment and that, I’n grateful that so many of those moments are nice”.

benja

unlike anything I’ve read before.

“(…) if I am going to spend eternity visiting this moment and that, I’n grateful that so many of those moments are nice”.

Jackie Lu

“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”. Need to read it again someday without the high school external essay pressure-mindset looming over me. I enjoy the concepts and ideas but I’m too impatient to stop and understand the true depth of the story, reading about the main ideas and quote explanations on SparkNotes at 2am in the morning did make me quite emotional when I was studying for it once tho. This is definitely a book that needs to be read twice. Didn’t even know it was Gray’s favourite book until later, but I can see why- even if I don’t interpret it as deeply as Gray or true connoisseurs of this novel do.

Ive seen a lot of somewhat bad reviews out here and in real life regarding 

but what amused me the most, and very much impressed me was the way the author via the character of Billy Pilgrim, lets himself unravel not just in time, but within himself as he goes on frightently remembering his past, and the way all of this is spilled onto the pages in the form of a jumbled unravel of words. His use of "So it goes. . ." evoking the presence of death in the next few lines. Or maybe the last few lines. Jumbled, one may suspect of losing the plot, not receiving a plot twist, a spoiler present perhaps, but as you battle on this surface of the moon you realize there is everything and nothing to predict. Quoted by many as an anti-war novel, I believe this to be far more than 'just' that, it outlines the strained presence of war from which we really cannot find a way out no matter how much we try, no matter the time or century we are in.

diya

Ive seen a lot of somewhat bad reviews out here and in real life regarding 

but what amused me the most, and very much impressed me was the way the author via the character of Billy Pilgrim, lets himself unravel not just in time, but within himself as he goes on frightently remembering his past, and the way all of this is spilled onto the pages in the form of a jumbled unravel of words. His use of "So it goes. . ." evoking the presence of death in the next few lines. Or maybe the last few lines. Jumbled, one may suspect of losing the plot, not receiving a plot twist, a spoiler present perhaps, but as you battle on this surface of the moon you realize there is everything and nothing to predict. Quoted by many as an anti-war novel, I believe this to be far more than 'just' that, it outlines the strained presence of war from which we really cannot find a way out no matter how much we try, no matter the time or century we are in.

Benedict Neo

This was my first ever Vonnegut book, which I hear is an amazing author, and this book proved that to me. Since this was one of the greaters anti-war books, I learned a lot about world war 2 in particular, the experiences of POWs, the brutal conditions they were forced to live in, and most importantly about the bombing of Dresden, which I did not know about beforehand. 

The way the protagonist, Billy Pilgrim travels through time uncontrollably was interesting to read and it kept the story exciting and flowing. I also found what the Tralfamadorians said about seeing time in all it's entirety, and not as a thread from one point to another intruiging, and how when a person dies, they're not really dead, but existing in time, realting to the quote “All moments, past, present and future, always have existed, always will exist.” 

I kept thinking about why the protaganist did not do anything to stop his abduction, or the plane crash, but let it happen because the idea was "everything has happened and will happen", and that trying to change your destiny and exercise free will is pointless. This dichotomy of predestination and free made me think about my own life, and whether God has predestined my entire life for me, down to my every action, or there's an infinite amount of possiblities that could spring from my actions, and free will still exist. 

Overall this was a fun read and it helped me from the business of life. The next Vonneget books I wanna read are Cat's Cradle and Breakfast of Champions.

Aamna

Thoroughly enjoyable read, you never know where the story might turn and Vonnegut doesn't shy away from anything; in one scene a man coughs and shits himself, in another a man wakes up in a heated massage bed smelling of mushrooms...

Read the book and see what a wild journey it is.

This book is very good. The non-linear storytelling is fantastically well done. I have seen this described widely as an anti-war book - maybe even THE anti-war book - it even describes itself as such, but I did not find its anti-war rhetoric that strong. To me it is only not a glorification of war, which set against the heroism we are so often exposed to around the subject makes it seem like it is positioned against it. 

I cannot say that I have an in-depth and scholarly understanding of the themes of this book or of exactly what all of the messages and morals of the story are. The book was not explicit, to me at least, on whether Billy Pilgrim really was unstuck in time, or if his Tralfamadorian visions and time travel were his way of dealing with the horrors he saw in his life. 

Billy Pilgrim is meek and miserable, this is the true mastery in this story for me, there could be no better character to experience the horrors of war who could give the reader the opportunity to explore it.

I would recommend that this book be put on everyone's reading list, it is not long and I will read it again sometime to see whether I can take more out of it.

Liam Richardson

This book is very good. The non-linear storytelling is fantastically well done. I have seen this described widely as an anti-war book - maybe even THE anti-war book - it even describes itself as such, but I did not find its anti-war rhetoric that strong. To me it is only not a glorification of war, which set against the heroism we are so often exposed to around the subject makes it seem like it is positioned against it. 

I cannot say that I have an in-depth and scholarly understanding of the themes of this book or of exactly what all of the messages and morals of the story are. The book was not explicit, to me at least, on whether Billy Pilgrim really was unstuck in time, or if his Tralfamadorian visions and time travel were his way of dealing with the horrors he saw in his life. 

Billy Pilgrim is meek and miserable, this is the true mastery in this story for me, there could be no better character to experience the horrors of war who could give the reader the opportunity to explore it.

I would recommend that this book be put on everyone's reading list, it is not long and I will read it again sometime to see whether I can take more out of it.

Aaron J Mitchell

An essential book. Everyone should read it, a hilarious and strangely touching book. It's been described to me as an anti war book and while it certainly paints a bleak picture of war it feels more like a meditation on mortality and the value of life as a whole, and the anti war sentiment is a byproduct of the setting.

Slaughterhouse-five Reforming the Novel and the World

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