How Does Vonnegut Use Irony In Slaughter House Five

In order to illustrate the devastating affects of war, Kurt Vonnegut afflicted Billy Pilgrim with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), which caused him to become “unstuck in time” in the novel. Billy Pilgrim illustrates many symptoms of PTSD throughout the story. Vonnegut uses these Slaughterhouse Five negative examples to illustrate the horrible and devastating examples of war. The examples from the book are parallel to real life experiences of war veterans, including Vonnegut’s, and culminate in a very effective anti-war novel.

Billy is displayed as being a weak and unprepared soldier. He is a mockery to everyone around him but still manages to survive WWII. This irony is exemplified through what Billy wears as a prisoner of war. Vonnegut writes, “And then they saw bearded Billy Pilgrim in his blue toga and silver shoes, with his hands in a muff. He looked at least sixty years old,” (Vonnegut 149). By making Billy an antihero, Vonnegut highlights the antiwar sentiment of the entire work. Billy’s weakness shows the flaws in people’s glorified depictions of war and of an American soldier. The traumatized Billy after the war also contrasts a traditional hero and shows another way that war can be destructive. Vonnegut’s development of Billy as an antihero supports the themes of Slaughterhouse

Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Slaughterhouse-Five contains important implications for psychoanalytic criticism. These implications are portrayed in the behavior of Billy Pilgrim, a World War II veteran whose life is full of traumatic experiences. Even a reader not reading this novel through a psychoanalytic lens can conclude that Billy’s life is full of traumatic experiences and being unstuck in time. Through a psychoanalytic lens we can see that Billy is merely trying to save himself from remembering those traumatic experiences through repression, the expunging from consciousness. The psychoanalytic concept of repression is so pervasive in the novel that, through a psychoanalytic lens, it seems to be the only reason for Billy Pilgrim’s continued existence.

The anti-war message is upheld further with the ironies that Vonnegut provides in the book. One example is "when one of the soldiers, a POW, survives the fire-bombing, but dies afterward from the dry heaves because he has to bury dead bodies" (Vit). When Billy and one of his comrades join to other scouts the Vonnegut portrays as well trained, Vonnegut displays irony by killing the skillful scouts and allows the less competent Pilgrim and Roland to survive. Roland does eventually die because he is forced to walk around in wooden clogs that turn his feet to pudding. The greatest example of irony is seen in what Vonnegut claims to be the climax of the story. He explains the situation before the story even begins. He is referring to the:

. . . Like I was losing myself, everything spilling out” (O’Brien 202). Provided with only laconic, expository definitions, an audience cannot truly feel the pains of war. O’Brien utilizes descriptions which evoke all the senses and submerge the audience in the unique and powerful sensations of war. Witnessing war’s pains through the familiar tactile crunch of an ornament or the splash of liquid spilling, the audience can immediately understand the inconceivable pressure placed on the soldier’s injured body. O’Brien continues, “All I could do was scream. . . . I tightened up and squeezed. . . . then I slipped under for a while” (203). His abrupt syntax and terse diction conveys a quickness to these events. Not bothering with extraneous adornment, his raw images transport the audience to the urgency of the moment and the severity of the pain. Now supplied with an eyewitness’s perspective of war’s injuries, the audience can begin to recognize the significance of the suffering. O’Brien tells his audience, “Tinny sounds get heightened and distorted. . . . There was rifle fire somewhere off to my right, and people yelling, except none of it seemed real anymore. I smelled myself dying” (203). In the same frame, O’Brien paints the rumbling chaos of the big war juxtaposed with the slow death of the small individual. His description emphasizes the purposeless discord and confusion of war and seeks to condemn its disorder. He argues that war’s lack of

In Susanne Vees-Gulani’s article, A Psychiatric Approach to Kurt Vonnegut, she writes about the mental state of Kurt Vonnegut through the character of Billy Pilgrim, a war veteran. Gulani diagnoses Billy Pilgrim with PTSD based on the symptoms he displays in the book. Billy’s PTSD is caused by a near death incident or traumatic event. It is also caused by sensory phenomena, such as the Barbershop Quartet. Billy shows symptoms of PTSD though his rejection to communicate with the world.

Moreover, Vonnegut explains how war experiences create a variation in perspective among civilians and veterans. Early in the novel, he writes, "Sooner or later I go to bed and my wife asks me what time it is. She always has to know the time” (Vonnegut 6). In this excerpt, Vonnegut means that billy has no interest within the time the manner his wife does. Also, this illustrates how warfare can distort human notion and result in significant variations among human beings.

Kurt Vonnegut, an American author, explores the traumas and glamorization of war through his anti-war book: Slaughterhouse 5. In this book, the main character, Billy Pilgrim, tells about his time in Dresden serving in the army and the people he met while fighting for America. During the war in Dresden, Pilgrim experiences traumatic events that cause him to return home with PTSD. The PTSD eventually takes control of Pilgrim’s life and relationships. Pilgrim realizes this and understands that he should have never joined the army.

Kurt Vonnegut reflects his life during World War II as a German prisoner through his character Billy Pilgrim in the novel Slaughterhouse-Five. While enlisted in the US Army, Vonnegut had life threatening experiences that were inspiration for his writing. Vonnegut was a young boy during the Great Depression and was raised through the hardships of the time. As a child, Vonnegut’s father worked as an architect, but during the Great Depression, the building industry was brought to a halt and Vonnegut’s father was out of a job. He was out of work for ten years, yet Vonnegut says they had never gone hungry or felt unsafe. Once things started to get worse, Vonnegut’s mother began writing to provide for their family (“Kurt”). Soon Vonnegut enlisted in the US Army, and just one year after that, his mother killed herself. While in Germany, Vonnegut was taken prisoner and put in several prison camps. Since Vonnegut was held prisoner, he experienced the bombing of Dresden firsthand (“Slaughterhouse-Five”). Vonnegut repeatedly reveals that he encountered trouble writing this book because he must explain the tragic things that he experienced (Freese). Vonnegut wrote this story to show how terrible war is in his eyes and he gives his opinion of stopping war through his characters and events that made it interesting to readers (O’Sullivan).

Through carefully thought out techniques in Slaughterhouse Five, Kurt Vonnegut utilizes strong symbolism, character growth, and in depth setting analysis to show the reader the immense effect war has on people. Vonnegut argues that war has a lasting effect that makes individuals feel disconnected and alienated from the rest of society both psychologically and physically. Vennegut uses powerful symbolism to illustrate the profound psychological isolation experienced by Billy Pilgrim. This shows the broader disconnection felt by those touched by war in Slaughterhouse Five and in the real world. Vonnegut writes that, “Billy traveled in time to the zoo on Tralfamadore.

In Kurt Vonnegut’s novel, Slaughterhouse-Five uncovers the underlying conflict within the simple story of Billy Pilgrim who adopts the philosophy of predetermined life. The conflict between Billy’s actions and the narrator’s personal ideas portrays the struggle of believing war is inevitable and the unacceptance of war. Vonnegut displays this conflict through Billy’s passive behavior, as well as presenting his own ideas about war as a narrator into the story. The Tralfamadorian’s philosophy of fate as well as Billy’s passive behavior after his abduction correlates to the inevitability of war.

Where innumerous catastrophic events are simultaneously occurring and altering the mental capability of its viewers eternally, war is senseless killing. The participants of war that are ‘fortunate’ enough to survive become emotionally distraught civilians. Regardless of the age of the people entering war, unless one obtains the mental capacity to witness numerous deaths and stay unaffected, he or she is not equipped to enter war. Kurt Vonnegut portrays the horrors of war in Slaughterhouse Five, through the utilization of satire, symbolism, and imagery.

In this novel, Vonnegut employs literary techniques to explore the struggles of veterans post-war through the expression of escapism. Kurt Vonnegut represents the motif of escapism through Billy’s experiences in other realities, the connection to the

In the novel Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, a fictional character named Bill Pilgrim is used to depict the various themes about life and war. Vonnegut went through some harsh times in Dresden, which ultimately led to him writing about the tragedies and emotional effects that come with war. By experiencing the war first handed, Vonnegut is able to make a connection and relate to the traumatic events that the soldiers go through. Through the use of Billy Pilgrim and the other characters, Vonnegut is able show the horrific affects the war can have on these men, not only during the war but after as well. From the very beginning Vonnegut portrays a strong sense of anti-war feelings, which he makes most apparent through Billy Pilgrim.

First, the diction that Vonnegut uses to supports his message of the horrors of war. Many