genuine in sentiment and original in expression
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I wasn't sure what to expect before I started this novel, and one always has to be wary of the description "Cult Classic". However, as one of a generation of writers who experienced the Second World War as young servicemen, Vonnegut certainly puts a unique stamp on his account of his experiences.
It's tempting to describe the format of the book and some of the contents, however I fear that this will reduce the impact of the book for any potential reader. Bearing this in mind, the book will appeal to those who enjoy the beat writers of the late 1940's and 1950's, it will appeal to those who are prepared to tolerate a fragmented, sometimes confusing structure, however probably won't appeal to those who prefer straightforward plot and storytelling.
Slaughterhouse 5 is of course deep down ultimately an anti-war novel, as many of those written about the war by war-veterans often are, and as such it always risked spiralling into Blowin'-inna-Wind cliche. Vonnegut avoids this, in providing a distant perspective, devoid of the collective experience and emotion of humanity. He confuses the gravity and awfulness of horrors in the war with the familiarity of mundane day-to-day details, by documenting all in a cool birds-eye matter-of-factness, splicing the two together to highlight how cheap life had become during the war.
This is an excellent book, fresh in perspective and genuine in sentiment. My one criticism was that however original in expression and genuine in sentiment, the sentiment (make peace, not war) is certainly not a new one. However it still gets 5 stars and a recommendation, especially if you're into beat writers.
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Billy Pilgrim shows us the way in this grrrrrrreat book!
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Read this decades ago when Vonnegut was THE thing. SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE was our talisman in school, right along with CATCHER IN THE RYE and about ten other books. We loved this guy for his absurdist comedy and knowing look at the human condition. Occasionally Vonnegut's works will be so "real" that you think he's just giving you a take on a slice of life, but with S5, time becomes a major player in this tale of angst, social malfunction, and Tralfamadorians. The only book I liked better was BREAKFAST FOR CHAMPIONS and the great quirky novel KATZENJAMMER by McCrae which flew off the shelves in America when it first came out. S5 is Black comedy at its finest. Can't go wrong with this one.
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So it Goes.
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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.
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I could not stand it
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I'm sorry to enter so rudely into this phalanx of 5 star reviewers. I picked up this book with great expectations as I saw the photo of this nice guy on the back of the true first Delacorte edition of 1969. But, sad to say, I had to put it down after a while as boredom literally overwhelmed me.
I understand that everyone who has experienced the bombing of Dresden has a right to find methods to overcome it and if it's writing why not write about, just as it comes to the mind. And it seems to me that this book was written just like this.
I could not make any emotional connection to this Billy Elliot type of Billy Pilgrin, and all seems so detached and hopeless, ... and so it goes.
Most of the phrases are state descriptions, a writing style that cannot catch me. Subject verb. Subject verb. Subject verb. And so it goes. Examples of Scinece Fiction writers of the same terribly boring writing style include Edgar Pangborn and Philip Jose Farmer.
Also, this book is full of accusations of this "bad world". Is this making this world better? Also, Vonnegut wants us to know which his favorite books are. Is this interesting to me?
In a good novel, every phrase makes sense and has its place and there would be missing something when it's not there. In Slaughterhouse Five, you could add or remove whole paragraphs and it would be the same still.
Everything is so noncommittal, incoherent, inanimate.
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Not what it seems
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This is an abridged version with notes- don't buy it unless a) short on time b) buying for your children c) are a schoolteacher.
Personnally annoyed as it doesn't mention it anywhere so I had to buy a new copy elsewhere.
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