Vonnegut starts off by writing a novel about his experiences with the war and the bombing of Dresden. After he completed the novel about war‚ he then starts writing a novel about Billy Pilgrim. Billy was born and raised in Ilium‚ New York. He becomes an optometrist and gets drafted. After the war‚ he enrolls in optometry school again and gets engaged to Valencia during his senior year. Billy experiences a mild nervous collapse and gets admitted to a veteran’s hospital near Lake Placid. He gets discharged
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a section gutted for urban renewal. The destruction he sees outside the car reminds him of the scene after the firebombing of Dresden. He drives a Cadillac with John Birch Society bumper stickers. His son‚ Robert‚ is a Green Beret in Vietnam. His daughter‚ Barbara‚ is about to get married. He is quite wealthy. At the Lions Club meeting‚ a marine major speaks about bombing in North Vietnam. Billy has no opinion on this subject. He has a plaque on his office wall that helps guide him through such listlessness
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We need more narrators. For example‚ he doesn’t know anything about the bombing in Dresden. That’s why the letters are important to understand the whole story. * While the book takes place largely in the present‚ there are also “flash backs” to WWII‚ in Dresden‚ Germany. In 1945‚ the American air force bombed and annihilated the entire town. Thomas Schell and the grandmother both experienced the U.S. attacks on Dresden. While both lost the entirety of their families‚ these two characters offer
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It was published in 1969‚ and is based on his experiences as a prisoner of war in Dresden (“Slaughterhouse-Five” 258). It also talks about the Dresden firebombing‚ which killed about 25‚000 people (Authors and Artists for Young Adults 202)‚ but was commonly published to exaggerate to “...135‚000 German civilians killed in the Allied firebombing of Dresden” (“Slaughterhouse-Five” 265). The story is about a man named Billy Pilgrim‚ who is “unstuck in time” (“Slaughterhouse-Five”
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Vonnegut doesn’t only repeat words‚ scenes‚ images but he also repeats stories such as the assassination of Billy Pilgrim by a gunman hired by Paul Lazzaro or the execution of Earl Derby for taking a teapot from the ruins of Dresden after the bombing. He mentions them repeatedly throughout the narrative until they become leitmotivs‚ recurring phrases- like the expression “So it goes”: I‚ Billy Pilgrim‚ will die‚ have died‚ and always will die on February thirteenth‚ 1976. (141) Addressing the
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Death is apart of life‚ it happens to everything and everyone. In the book Slaughterhouse-Five‚ the main character‚ Billy experiences WWII as a prisoner of war. He experiences all the different horrors of war that include the bombing of Dresden and the death of thousands of people. Throughout the book‚ Billy travels in time to different parts of his life‚ including his birth and death. Death is something that happens to everything that lives. Death happens everywhere. Every living thing dies in
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arrives at the hospital and dies from carbon monoxide poisoning. Vonnegut uses these examples of situational irony in order to make the reader laugh at such tragedies when really there is nothing to laugh at. After the Dresden fire-bombing Edgar Derby is tried and executed in Dresden‚ which was firebombed and 135‚000 innocent people died in one night‚ for attempting to steal a teapot. All of these situational ironies and all deaths are narrated by a simple phrase‚ “So it goes”. This simple phrase pushes
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Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) causes a painful recollection of a past harrowing event that haunts victims for the rest of their lives and often causes extreme anxiety‚ depression‚ and in some cases‚ drug abuse and suicide. The suicide rates have increased effectually among soldiers‚ with about twenty-eight veterans killing themselves each day (Rosenshield). Many veterans are diagnosed with PTSD‚ and are forced to live with it for the rest of their lives. It is hard to understand the shift
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a talk that might create the savage indignation. In the novel "Slaughterhouse Five" Vonnegut has shown many themes and metaphorical issues of the time‚ this includes his participation in WW2 and his capture and imprisonment in the German city of Dresden. Also Vonnegut explores the deep psychological repercussions of "Billy Pilgrim" the average American and how being in the war and the experiences he encounters changes his life forever in the real world. (148). James Lundquist connects that hopelessness
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References: Center of Military History. (1992). A Brief History of the U.S. Army. Retrieved from http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA-C-WWII/index.html Schultz‚ K. M. (2012). HIST2‚ Volume 2 (2nd Ed.). Boston‚ MA: Wadsworth‚ Cengage Learning. The WWII Dresden Holocaust – A Single Column of Flame. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://rense.com/general19/flame.htm Weider History Group. (2006). Retrieved from http://www.historynet.com/world-war-ii-the-liberation-of-paris.htm United States History. (2012). Italian
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