An Existence based on Forma (harmless untruths) “No wonder kids grow up crazy. A cat’s Cradle is nothing but a band of X’s between someone’s hands and little kid’s look and look at all those X’s… No damn cat and no damn cradle,” Vonnegut writes is his appropriately titled book Cat’s Cradle. A cat’s cradle is a string trick we all grew up learning and seeing, and it is just as Vonnegut described, nothing. Everyday we experience things like a cat’s cradle; we experience insignificant objects, feelings, or idols that we base our life on. We base and change our lives off of things with no real significance. Kurt Vonnegut’s novels Cat’s Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five demonstrate the ineptness of the human race to base our life and happiness off of intricate and interwoven lies, or off of a single point of view. Kurt Vonnegut was born in the United States, Indianapolis, however he was sent to Europe to fight in the “Battle of the Bulge” in December 1944, as a battalion scout. He was taken prisoner and transported to Dresden, Germany; here he was held in an abandoned meat locker below a slaughterhouse. Vonnegut saw humankind at its worst during his involvement in World War II; he witnessed a true massacre within the air raids, total annihilation, of Dresden. What does Vonnegut have to say about a Massacre? “And what do birds say? All there is to say about a massacre, things like ‘Poo-too-weet?’” Vonnegut noticed humans fighting over things with no importance: lies, half-lies, and altered perceptions, articles that only gained importance because people made them worth fighting and killing for. Cat’s Cradle was written in 1963. This novel is the story of how and why the world ends. The story ironically has the creator of the atomic b... ... middle of paper ... ...ice going God!” “Nobody but you could have done it, God. I certainly couldn’t have!” “I feel very unimportant compared to you, God!” “The only way I can feel the least bit important is to think of all the mud that didn’t get to sit up and look around” “Thank you God!” (Cat’s Cradle 196) Works Cited Bloom, Harold, comp. Kurt Vonnegut. Philadelphia, Pa.: Chelsea House, 2000. 89-128. Hile, Kevin, and Diane Telger, eds. Novels for Students. Vol. 3. Detroit, MI: Gale, 1998. 264-271. Lundquist, James. Kurt Vonnegut. New York, New York: Ungar, 1977. 75. Vik, Marek. "The Themes of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five." Geocities. 11 Mar. 2002. 12 Mar. 2007 . Vonnegut, Kurt. Cat's Cradle. New York, New York: Dell Publishing, 1957. Vonegut, Kurt.. Slaughterhouse-Five. New York, New York: Dell Publishing, 1966.
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Show MoreKurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-five (1969) has been acclaimed by scholars for decades specifically for Vonnegut’s iconic, albeit unusual use of voice, cohesion, and rhythm. In Slaughterhouse-five Vonnegut uses a very unique voice that has come to define most of Vonnegut’s work, specifically his use of dark humor, meta-fiction, informality, disassociation; and the famous line, “So it goes” that appears 106 times in the novel. Vonnegut’s cohesion, or more accurately lack thereof, is unique to Slaughterhouse-five as the story is told in a nonlinear order that uses various flashbacks, time travel, and “sticking” in and out of time and space to tell the tale of the main character
"In Slaughterhouse Five, -- Or the Children's Crusade, Vonnegut delivers a complete treatise on the World War II bombing of Dresden. The main character, Billy Pilgrim, is a very young infantry scout* who is captured in the Battle of the Bulge and quartered in a Dresden slaughterhouse where he and other prisoners are employed in the production of a vitamin supplement for pregnant women. During the February 13, 1945, firebombing by Allied aircraft, the prisoners take shelter in an underground meat locker. When they emerge, the city has been levelled and they are forced to dig corpses out of the rubble. The story of Billy Pilgrim is the story of Kurt Vonnegut who was captured and survived the firestorm in which 135,000 German civilians perished, more than the number of deaths in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. Robert Scholes sums up the theme of Slaughterhouse Five in the New York Times Book Review, writing: 'Be kind. Don't hurt. Death is coming for all of us anyway, and it is better to be Lot's wife looking back through salty eyes than the Deity that destroyed those cities of the plain in order to save them.' The reviewer concludes that 'Slaughterhouse Five is an extraordinary success. It is a book we need to read, and to reread.' "The popularity of Slaughterhouse Five is due, in part, to its timeliness; it deals with many issues that were vital to the late sixties: war, ecology, overpopulation, and consumerism. Klinkowitz, writing in Literary Subversions.New American Fiction and the Practice of Criticism, sees larger reasons for the book's success: 'Kurt Vonnegut's fiction of the 1960s is the popular artifact which may be the fairest example of American cultural change. . . . Shunned as distastefully low-brow . . . and insufficiently commercial to suit the exploitative tastes of high-power publishers, Vonnegut's fiction limped along for years on the genuinely democratic basis of family magazine and pulp paperback circulation. Then in the late 1960s, as the culture as a whole exploded, Vonnegut was able to write and publish a novel, Slaughterhouse Five, which so perfectly caught America's transformative mood that its story and structure became best-selling metaphors for the new age. '"Writing in Critique, Wayne D. McGinnis comments that in Slaughterhouse Five, Vonnegut 'avoids framing his story in linear narration, choosing a circular structure.
Like a dream filled with complex characters and situations which one is compelled to discuss and analyze the next day, Vonnegut uses dark humor to penetrate his reader's world. The Cornell medical student whom the narrator, Jonah, first interviews by mail turns out to be a midget. The brilliant nuclear physicist, the father of the atom bomb, is infantile. Writers and college professors are essential to human existence, and Boko-maru is a form of love that can happen anytime, anywhere, and with anyone.
Vees-Gulani, Suzanne. “Diagnosing Billy Pilgrim: A Psychiatric Approach to Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five.” Critique 44.2 (2003): 175-84. Print.
Slaughterhouse Five, written by Kurt Vonnegut is an anti war novel told by the narrator who is a minor character in the story. Slaughterhouse-Five is the story of Billy Pilgrim, a man who has come "unstuck in time. "The bombing of Dresden is what destroyed Billy. Dresden’s destruction shows the destruction of people who fought in the war: the all the people who died. Some people, like the main character, Billy Pilgrim, are not able to function normally like before because of what they saw, because of their experience. Throughout the book, Billy starts hallucinating about his experiences with the Tralfamadorians: he wants to escape the world which was destroyed by war, a war that he does not and cannot understand. Vonnegut uses the technique of repetition.. The main repetition is “so it goes” which is told after anything related to death, he also uses other repetitions throughout the book. The major theme of the story is the Destructiveness of War. Vonnegut uses repetition to reinforce the theme of the story.
Kurt Vonnegut’s anti-war science fiction novel entitled, Slaughter House Five otherwise known as “The Children’s Crusade” or “A Duty Dance with Death,” is a classic example of Vonnegut’s eccentric and moving writing capabilities.Originally published in 1969, Slaughterhouse-Five pays tribute to Vonnegut’s experiences in World War Two, as an advanced scout in the 106th infantry division, a prisoner of war and witness to the firebombing of Dresden on February 13th, 1945 in which 135,000 people were killed, making it the greatest man-caused massacre of all times.This novel illustrates the cruelties and violence of war along with the potential for compassion in human nature and all that it encompasses.
Slaughterhouse Five is not a book that should be glanced over and discarded away like a dirty rag. Slaughterhouse Five is a book that should be carefully analyzed and be seen as an inspiration to further improve the well-being of mankind. Vonnegut makes it clear that an easy way to improve mankind is to see war not as a place where legends are born, but rather, an event to be avoided. Intelligent readers and critics alike should recognize Vonnegut’s work and see to it that they make an effort to understand the complexities behind the human condition that lead us to war.
Throughout his career, Kurt Vonnegut has used writing as a tool to convey penetrating messages and ominous warnings about our society. He skillfully combines vivid imagery with a distinctly satirical and anecdotal style to explore complex issues such as religion and war. Two of his most well known, and most gripping, novels that embody this subtle talent are Cat's Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five. Both books represent Vonnegut’s genius for manipulating fiction to reveal glaring, disturbing and occasionally redemptive truths about human nature. On the surface, Cat’s Cradle and Slaughterhouse-Five are dramatically different novels, each with its own characters, symbols, and plot. However, a close examination reveals that both contain common themes and ideas. Examining and comparing the two novels and their presentation of different themes provides a unique insight into both the novels and the author – allowing the reader to gain a fuller understanding of Vonnegut’s true meaning.
A society is a group or community of people that are associated together because of cultural, patriotic, political, scientific, and other purposes that they share. People in these societies share common beliefs such as religion, free will, death, and the concept of time and produce and write products that are associated with these subjects. There are those, however, that have the ability to step back and question their existence and absurdity. Kurt Vonnegut’s novel, “Slaughterhouse Five”, is one of those works that challenges the thinking of society at large and introduces new revolutionary ideas to concepts such as time and question its definition. Through the use of death, satire, and time travel in his social commentary. Vonnegut created one of the most ground breaking novels ever that has challenged the thinking of society to cause change.
Kurt Vonnegut was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on November 11, 1922. After attending Cornell University from 1941-43 Vonnegut served in World War II and was captured during the Battle of the Bulge. As a prisoner of war, he survived the fire bombing of Dresden by Allied forces on 13 February, 1945 in an underground meat-storage cellar. When he emerged the next morning, Vonnegut was put to work pulling corpses from the ruins of the desolated city once known as "the Venice of the North." In one night the horrific fire-bombing of Dresden killed more people than the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined, more than 135,000 in all. Vonnegut's first-hand experiences of this, one of the darkest episodes in human history, would later provide the basis for his most influential work, Slaughterhouse Five (1969), though it would take him more than twenty years to come to terms with his wartime experiences and complete the novel.
This essay explores and analyses how Kurt Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse 5" is an anti-war novel. There are various instances throughout the novel which demonstrate that the author was trying to condemn the notion of war. Vonnegut was inspired via his experiences during the war, the protagonist of the novel, Billy Pilgrim, expresses Vonnegut's perspective regarding the horrors of war. The main indications in the novel which denoted anti-war were Vonnegut's unique literature techniques, humanism and author positioning. Throughout this essay, I will examine how Vonnegut effectively deploys his techniques in the novel and convinces readers.
Kurt Vonnegut is a well known American author. Most of his pieces of writing were written in the 1950s, 1960s and in the early 1970s. Vonnegut writes a lot from personal experiences and in most of his books he references his experiences. He is well known for, but not limited to, his famous novels. He also has a handful of well known short stories. One of his biggest, most famous books that he wrote is titled Slaughterhouse Five. Kurt Vonnegut’s style uses many techniques to develop the concept of theme in his novels. He does a great job of helping his readers understand and feel the mood of his stories while they are reading his pieces of writing.
War has been a relevant theme in literature and culture throughout history, slowly desensitizing the mass to the gruesome and painful outcomes of war itself. Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five is an anti-war novel with influences from the author’s life experiences.
"Slaughterhouse-Five Book Notes Summary by Kurt Vonnegut: Major Characters Book Notes Summary." BookRags.com: Book Summaries, Study Guides. Bookrags Inc., 2000. Web. 06 Jan. 2010. .
Lundquist, James. “Facing the Cruelties of Civilization and Its Wars.” Social Issues in Literature: Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, edited by Claudia Durst Johnson, Gale Cengage Learning, 2011, pp.42-50.