How bad is it

[Nico]

Who agrees that Slaughter house 5 is horrible?

[Wreade1872]

Do you mean disturbing or badly written? I think its a pretty good book i gave it 4/5. Every war story could do with more aliens and time-travel :) .

[Topher]

No one.

[Monty J]

Nico wrote: "Who agrees that Slaughter house 5 is horrible?"


Probably any Texas oil baron Republican who owns stock in Halliburton and Lockheed or some other part of the Oil/Military-Industrial Complex would hate it.

People who profit from war might be sickened by a book that shows the gory truth or satirizes war. They probably hate M*A*S*H as well. And All Quiet on the Western Front.

[Gordon]

I was underwhelmed by it. I am no war monger, I just think this is one of those books that everyone praises because everyone else does. If you just picked it up cold, and didn't know anything about it--or that you were *supposed* to like it, I daresay most people would be unimpressed.
It's a great example of a Kardashian of books--everyone talks about it and it is famous for being famous, even though it didn't really do anything.

[Monty J]

Gordon wrote: "...everyone talks about it and it is famous for being famous, even though it didn't really do anything. "

The book has some subtleties. I had to read it 3 times before I began to really understand it. I think it would be especially appealing to someone who had combat experience or PTSD, or both.

Over a decade prior to reading it, I had also seen the movie (with Michael Sachs, Valerie Perrin--and Lee Marvin in a cameo role as a German officer). The movie went right over my head, as I suspect it did a lot of people.

The book's historical significance has to be considered. It is the only account of what is arguably the Allies' greatest WWII atrocity--the bombing of Dresden--by an American who lived through it. Because there were no military targets and the city harbored 600,000 refugees it was technically a war crime, for which we were never held accountable.

The story made me think deeply about war. I hadn't realized that the bombing of Dresden exceeded the death and destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. For propaganda reasons, the official count was classified for decades. Some estimate the deaths to have been in excess of 500,000.* But how much proof is left, 50 years after the crime? (Billy Pilgrim conveys a more conservative death count.)

Vonnegut deftly wove the Allied propagandizing into the plot in the hospital room scenes without preaching or judging. "It is exactly the way it had to be," he effectively says.

By interweaving different aspects of Billy Pilgim's life, the author powerfully replicates how it's like to have post-combat PTSD. It is done in non-linear fashion, the way flashbacks about trauma occur in real life. This also is accomplished without spelling it out for people and that vagueness can be disorienting, plot-wise. It was for me, initially.

The hallucinations about Tralfamadore and time travel seem to represent how a war veteran can cope with trauma by escaping with drugs.

Vonnegut's rendition of time travel and fantasy seem to make the point that as we move along in life, every moment of our history is mentally available to us, sometimes invasively so, and worrying about the future is fruitless. This philosophical posture emphasizes the primacy of the present moment. Focus on now and the past fades and the future becomes merely the sum of an uncountable series of nows. Therefore, make the nows count.

All this, the author accomplishes without preaching or spelling it out. It's a metaphorical message the reader assimilates over the course of the book. Or not.


*[Wikipedia] "During the final months of World War II, Dresden harbored some 600,000 refugees, with a total population of 1.2 million. Dresden was attacked seven times between 1944 and 1945, and was occupied by the Red Army after German capitulation.[citation needed]

The bombing of Dresden by the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) between 13 and 15 February 1945 remains controversial.[citation needed] The inner city of Dresden was largely destroyed[16] by 722 RAF and 527 USAAF bombers that dropped 2431 tons of high explosive bombs, and 1475.9 tons of incendiaries.[17] The high explosive bombs damaged buildings and exposed their wooden structures, while the incendiaries ignited them, denying their use by retreating German troops and refugees.[citation needed] Widely quoted Nazi propaganda reports claimed 200,000 deaths however the German Dresden Historians' Commission made up of 13 prominent German historians, in an official 2010 report published after five years of research concluded that casualties numbered between 18,000 and a maximum of 25,000, while right-wing groups continue to claim that up to 500,000 people died."

http://www.spiegel.de/international/g...

http://www.rense.com/general85/ddes.htm

[SheRa]

Perfectly stated, Monty J. Thanks for explaining so succinctly the feelings I have about this book, but never could articulate. Reading your answer brings back all the heart-aching, chest-paralyzing agony and empathy I felt for Pilgrim. Thank you.

[E.D.]

Next May 13, 2015...I'm going to unplug Nico's computer. Or not.

Depends on how it goes. :}

[mkfs]

I doubt it's war-mongering that makes people hate this book.

The non-linear narrative is more to blame. This is a book many people read in high school before they have encountered much complex writing and before they have acquired much in the way of real life experiences.

The World War II/Dresden narrative is very powerful. The escapist bits (captured by aliens, living with a Hollywood starlet) provide perspective, but can seem quite silly to the impatient reader.

Of course, according to a study by Microsoft, humans now have a shorter attention span than a goldfish, so perhaps the capacity to appreciate a novel like Slaughterhouse has evolved out of us.

[Benja]

Love it.

[A.]

I came upon a copy of Slaughterhouse 5 among a college classmate's collection. The subtitle piqued my interest. A few pages in and I was totally lost and confused. I knew nothing of Dresden. All I knew about WWII were the piles and piles of emaciated corpses that showed up every Sunday on Walter Cronkite's Twentieth Century and how we had spectacularly ended the war with atom bombs. I have always been one who refused to be bested by anything, however, so I had no choice but to continue. As I did, by bits and pieces the purpose of the narrative began to reveal itself. I remembered a friend of my father's who had survived one of the North Korean onslaughts, who was always talking about picking up the pieces of his buddies and putting them in bags. He also spoke of aliens and trips to foreign planets. When he got drunk, he mostly cried. I think if he had been literate enough to write, he would have come up with something akin to Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five.
I read the book accidentally. It's affect on me was anything but accidental.

[[deleted user]]

I especially liked the non-linear narrative. Nothing is fixed, the protagonist is essentially nomadic with very little control. I read this quite some time ago now, but it certainly left some impression. I mean I have very little interest in war, but those passages in Dresden came across as fairly realised. A very tumultuous and human book.

[Jade]

Mkfs wrote: "I doubt it's war-mongering that makes people hate this book.

The non-linear narrative is more to blame. This is a book many people read in high school before they have encountered much complex wri..."

I agree with this. I think I would have liked it had I read it in high school, but I would have missed the nuances that make it as loved as it is. I've had way too many nuanced conversations about the novel to think that it's just a "one of those books that everyone praises because everyone else does".

[Sarah]

I really enjoyed this and only read it because of The Universe Versus Alex Woods one of the main characters was a massive fan of Kurt Vonnegut. So as one does I checked out Mr Vonnegut and got a couple of his books to read. Loved them. I don't recall, anyone from my life advising his books to be a must read. I was brought to tears in this book which for me if words can do that or make me laugh then you are onto a winner for me.

[Monty J]

Sarah wrote: "...I was brought to tears in this book "

People capable of empathy are more likely to react in this way to books like SH5, Catch 22 and The Catcher in the Rye.

Some people are psychologically shielded. They would go mad if they opened themselves up to such deep feelings. Early in WWII, many German soldiers did, which is why the gas chambers were created.

The scale of empathy can be stated this way: Empaths--->Liberals---->Conservatives--->Fascists.

Some people will never "get it" because they cannot face the discomfort that accompanies an empathetic view. It's not so much a matter of conscious choice as it is psychological makeup. Where a Buddhist may have a hard time squashing a bug, Japanese soldiers bayonetted babies during the Baatan March.

Kurt Vonnegut wrote a book that brings people face-to-face with the inhumanity and bureaucratic inertia that not only allowed the Nazi murdering to go unchecked, but also led to the bombing of Dresden and Nagasaki, both of which in retrospect seem highly questionable.

The message of SH5 is: there will always be people whose psychological makeup and political sensibilities prevent them from facing the repugnant realities of war.

And "so it goes." (Didn't Walter Cronkite say that at the close of his evening news programs?)

[E.D.]

"That's the way it is."

To which I would respond...., "Indeed. Is it?" :}

[Monty J]

E.D. wrote: ""That's the way it is."

To which I would respond...., "Indeed. Is it?" :}"

Yes, that was it. He could deliver it in different tones, evoking humor, sadness or cynicism depending on the day's news content.

[A.]

E.D. wrote: ""That's the way it is."

To which I would respond...., "Indeed. Is it?" :}"

"And that's the way it is...."

[A.]

Monty J wrote: "E.D. wrote: ""That's the way it is."

To which I would respond...., "Indeed. Is it?" :}"

Yes, that was it. He could deliver it in different tones, evoking humor, sadness or cynicism depending on t..."

Actually he intended to end each broadcast with an ironic story -sad, humorous, cynical... - followed by: "And that's the way it is...." Unfortunately, from the very first broadcast they always ran out of time before getting to the closer (they only had 22 minutes actual broadcast time). As the story goes, on the first broadcast Cronkite prepared for the closer, but looked at the clock and saw that he only had a couple of seconds remaining, so the only thing he had time to say was the closer's final remark, which went on to become his signature sign-off.

[mkfs]

Monty J wrote: "People capable of empathy are more likely to react in this way to books like SH5, Catch 22 and The Catcher in the Rye. "

Three books which are notorious for readers being unable to empathize with the main character(s).

It is the author's job to make the reader empathize with the main character. If the reader is an "empath", then they'll empathize with characters no matter what the author does, so it makes no difference what (or whose) they read. Let 'em read Das Kapital! For "non-empath" readers, the author has his work cut out making them care.

Vonnegut turns off many readers with Pilgrim's meandering narrative and passivity. Salinger turns readers off with Caufield's swearing or immaturity (really, a teenager is only interesting to other teenagers -- a better comparison to Slaughterhouse Five is Salinger's "For Esmé—with Love and Squalor", and it holds up quite well). Heller turns readers off with Yossarian's non-sequiturs.

Now, it can of course be argued that none of these authors tried, or should have tried, to make the general reader care about their main characters. But to claim that a reader is less human, or more republican, or in some way diminished because they cannot empathize with the characters of any of these books, is downright silly.

[Monty J]

Mkfs wrote: "t to claim that a reader is less human, or more republican, or in some way diminished because they cannot empathize with the characters of any of these books, is downright silly."

You've a right to your opinion.

I stand by my comments. People have different tastes and capacities. An author's job is whatever the author defines it to be. Readers are on their own to comprehend or not and interpret as they will.

An author who tries to get readers to sympathize with his main character, and many do, is a sellout. And so we have genre literature. It has its place. But it's not for me.

"in some way diminished because they cannot empathize"

I didn't say they were diminished. That's your judgement, not mine.

People simply are who they are and no two have the same capacities. Judging is in the eye of the beholder, and no two beholders are the same. Judgement is subjective.

People's characteristics define them. The most realistic characters are multidimensional. The wrinkles are not ironed out to make a reader sympathetic, although some readers may prefer them that way.

[Israel]

You're the only one. This book is a classic.

[E.D.]

A. wrote: "E.D. wrote: ""That's the way it is."

To which I would respond...., "Indeed. Is it?" :}"

"And that's the way it is....""

Indeed. Must not forget "and". Not Uncle Walter without. :}

[Sarah]

Monty J wrote: "People capable of empathy are more likely to react in this way to books like SH5, Catch 22 and The Catcher in the Rye. "


Catcher in the Rye wasn't a book I enjoyed, so much so It was relegated to the "Started but will never finish" shelf. Catch 22 is on my to-read pile.

[E.D.]

Empathy does not require agreement. Or a "bleeding heart". A sense of fair-play is not a weakness to be avoided.

And even though we might try to understand why..., sometimes a prick is just a prick.

[A.]

I will write a good review to let a writer know I have been in someway touched by his/her words.

I will never write a bad review. If I do not appreciate an author's work, far be it for me to dampen his/her candle for others. The fault is as likely mine as the author's.

I write to satisfy myself. I have an urge to organize and analyze my own experiences and opinions about the life I am living, and the world in which I am living. If I am the only one enlightened or entertained by it - so be it! (In the Hebrew - Amen!)

[Monty J]

A. wrote: "I write to satisfy myself. I have an urge to organize and analyze my own experiences and opinions about the life I am living, and the world in which I am living. If I am the only one enlightened or entertained by it - so be it!"

Nicely put.

[A.]

I think one point that is missed in discussing Slaughterhouse Five is the time period in which it was published. In 1969 the nation was divided - those who had experienced WWII, either first hand or through someone they knew, and who felt that America had saved the world and could do no wrong; and those who believed the war in Vietnam was an act of aggression and an atrocity committed by the United States to protect certain economic interest, and not to "stop communism." It would have been nearly impossible for Vonnegut topublish a realistic account of what happened at Dresden and other German cities at the close of the war during this period. I think Vonnegut took the only real course available to him to tell his story- fictionalize and satirize.

I remember reading Ralph Franklin Keeling's Gruesome Harvest after accidently finding it stashed away in the stacks of a university library. Keeling had been a reporter on the continent at the end of the war and during the initial occupation of Germany. The story he told was not marketable in 1947. Today I doubt there are many that even know this book exists. In fact, Mr. Keeling has been all but erased from the record. I believe this would have been Vonnegut's fate as well if he had tried to tell his story any other way.

[Monty J]

A. wrote: "...those who believed the war in Vietnam was an act of aggression and an atrocity committed by the United States to protect certain economic interest, and not to "stop communism."

How many wars must be fought over oil before we recognize petroleum as the national security risk it is and get serious about energy alternatives?

The Domino Theory was disproven and the Vietnam War is now widely considered just "a mistake." The slimy truth is the Vietnam War was fought over oil, just as Iraq and Afghanistan are about oil. The Faulklands War. 911 was about oil. Al Qaeda exists because of the military bases we built "on sacred soil" in Saudi Arabia to protect our regional oil interests.

I know about Vietnam's connection with oil because the company I worked for (subsequently bought by Halliburton) was then the largest seismic data collector/marketer on the planet.

Studies by our marine seismic crews promised oil deposits in the waters off Vietnam larger than Saudi Arabia. This is not public information, nor will it ever be unless Halliburton releases it, but I was present in board meetings during the Vietnam war where these findings were discussed. The phrase "oil is synonymous with national security," was the reply to my expressed concerns about the Vietnam "conflict."

Vietnam subsequently became one of the top 50 oil exporters in the world. Last I checked, the oil derricks offshore Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon, were Russian.

Today, Vietnam is #29 worldwide in proven oil reserves: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_...

Given China's recent activities in the South China Sea, it is clear China is now wise to the secret and will continue pressing unprecedented territorial claims there.

Conceivably, we could go to war again over that same oil. Here's the latest example of China's territorial ambitions:http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Securi...


And here's a chilling prophetic quote from a 1975 film, Three Days of the Condor, that puts where we are today in perspective: "Today it's oil, right? In ten or fifteen years, food, plutonium. ...Ask them when they're running out. Ask them when there's no heat and they're cold. Ask them when their engines stop. Ask them when people who've never known hunger start going hungry. You want to know something? They won't want us to ask them. They'll just want us to get it for them."

Here's the Youtube clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9w3E3...

[mkfs]

A. wrote: "I think one point that is missed in discussing Slaughterhouse Five is the time period in which it was published. In 1969 the nation was divided ..."

A good point. That certainly sets the tone for the book. There's an almost presumed unimportance or incompetence of earhtly authority figures, and the Tralfamadorians have a bit of an 'age of Aquarius' feel.

It would have been nearly impossible for Vonnegut topublish a realistic account of what happened at Dresden and other German cities at the close of the war during this period. I think Vonnegut took the only real course available to him to tell his story- fictionalize and satirize.

I've heard that view expressed before in relation to other books (a claim that Catcher In The Rye was a World War II allegory might have been one of them), and I don't buy it.

Didn't Vonnegut publish Mother Night before this? Hadn't authors like Céline been publishing anti-war/anti-establishment novels for decades?? Hadn't Mailer already published The Naked and the Dead (and, in terms of novel-as-autobiography, Armies of the Night)? In fact, weren't the Sixties awash in anti-establishment and revisionist novels and film?

Even putting aside such precedent, nothing would have prevented Vonnegut from writing an accurate account of Dresden, and publishing it once it became acceptable. Bulgakov accomplished this, albeit posthumously, with The Master and Margarita -- and he had Stalin to deal with, not LBJ.

No, Slaughterhouse Five is the book Vonnegut wanted to write. Perhaps it was the only way he could make sense of Dresden. I highly doubt there is a reliastic account of Dresden that Vonnegut wanted to publish, but was afraid to.

[A.]

Mkfs wrote: "A. wrote: "I think one point that is missed in discussing Slaughterhouse Five is the time period in which it was published. In 1969 the nation was divided ..."

A good point. That certainly sets t..."

I must grant that Slaughterhouse Five was probably the only way Vonnegut could tell a story about his experience in Dresden. A twenty-three year old boy from Indiana walking amongst all that death and destruction certainly could not have come away without an injured or at least altered psyche.

[Silverpiper]

Nico wrote: "Who agrees that Slaughter house 5 is horrible?"

Why do you think it's horrible. Can you make a good case for it?

[Duane]

Gordon wrote: "It's a great example of a Kardashian of books--everyone talks about it and it is famous for being famous, even though it didn't really do anything. "

no, you're thinking of an "Obama"... A Kardashian at least is famous for a big ass.

(hmmm... waidaminnit...)

[Easytarget]

Nico wrote: "Who agrees that Slaughter house 5 is horrible?"

I'll go so far as to agree you are free to express your opinion. I'd probably if pressed go one step further and suggest this isn't likely the only book you've read that flew over your head that you then hated.

[Duane]

Mkfs wrote: "Vonnegut turns off many readers with Pilgrim's meandering narrative and passivity."

Yeah, that's what he gets for smoking pot.

[E.D.]

Duane wrote: "Mkfs wrote: "Vonnegut turns off many readers with Pilgrim's meandering narrative and passivity."

Yeah, that's what he gets for smoking pot."

Perhaps, the readers turned off should turn-on and get with the program. An open mind is never a terrible thing when wasted. :}

[Duane]

RIIIIiiiiiiiiiight... One can only comprehend a pot-head when it's viewed through a fog of dope!

[mkfs]

If you're high when you study for the test, make sure you're high when you take the test!

[E.D.]

Remember what the Door Mouse said....feed your head.

[A.]

E.D. wrote: Perhaps, the readers turned off should turn-on and get with the program. An open mind is never a terrible thing when wasted."

Neither is preferring a bottle in front of me to a frontal lobotomy, but that's beside the point. I think what many (if not most) people refuse to recognize is that the horrors of war experienced by young men in their late teens and early twenties gives them an outlook on life hard to express. I was a conscientious objector during Vietnam; many of my best friends are veterans of that war. Yet, in many instances I seem to be the only one who understands their predicament. For many of them, failed marriages and abandonment by family have all to often been their lot. One particularly close friend has had little or no contact with his family for 40 years. He is not welcomed at family gatherings. They consider him a "sicko." Yet they proudly stand in defense of sending even more young men to war. Go figure....

[Monty J]

A. wrote: "Neither is preferring a bottle in front of me to a frontal lobotomy, but that's beside the point. I think what many (if not most) people refuse to recognize is that the horrors of war experienced by young men in their late teens and early twenties gives them an outlook on life hard to express."

Thank you for expressing my thoughts. At the VA clinic I see these "walking wounded" frequently. It is sad when families who don't understand them reject them. More understanding is needed.

Rare is the combat veteran who lives to write about it effectively, but when he/she does, the results can be of real importance.

There is a saying: "In the place of a great wound lies the opportunity for great healing" (or words to that effect.)

Here's a partial list of writers who experienced the fear and uncertainty of war:
J.D. Salinger (The Catcher in the Rye)
Ernest Hemingway (For Whom the Bell Tolls, etc.)
William Golding (Lord of the Flies)
Kurt Vonnegut (Slaughterhouse Five)
John O'Hara (From the Terrace, etc.)
Walter Heller (Catch 22)
Norman Mailer (The Naked and the Dead, etc.)
Erich Maria Remarque (All Quiet on the Western Front)
William Styron (Sophie's Choice)
Herman Wouk (The Winds of War, etc.)
James Jones (The Thin Red Line, etc.)
Tim O'Brien (The Things They Carried)
Tobias Wolff (The Barracks Thief, etc.)
Anne Frank (Diary of a Young Girl)

Of these, Catcher in the Rye stands out. War isn't a central theme, but Salinger's war experience had to have informed the development of Holden Caulflield's compassion and reverence toward innocence. Salinger carried into combat six stories that were later melded into CiTR. Ignoring his war record, Salinger's critics have savaged him for his reclusiveness, his preference for younger women and his deficiencies as a father.

Similar to Salinger, Anne Frank's writing was contemporaneous with the fear and uncertainty of war. If she had lived, she certainly would have suffered mentally as many combat veterans do. Who would have considered her a "sicko?"

Perhaps "Sicko" better describes those who label veterans that way.

[E.D.]

A few months ago, I lost someone I consider an older brother. Agent Orange. His name isn't on the wall..., but should be. Effectively, he was killed in 67. So it goes.

Depleted uranium is primed to take up where defoliants left off in the next 20 or so years. So it continues.

[Monty J]

E.D. wrote: "A few months ago, I lost someone I consider an older brother. Agent Orange. His name isn't on the wall..., but should be. Effectively, he was killed in 67. So it goes.

Depleted uranium is primed t..."

I lost one of my dorm-mates at the orphanage to Agent Orange. So it goes.

I didn't see him after he returned from Vietnam, but our scoutmaster gave me a running report. Said he came back severely wracked up, health-wise and mentally. What good cannon fodder orphans make.

[E.D.]

Our plutocratic imperial republic will always need fresh fodder. It is the nature of our empire. It is how "we do business".

Tame it. Kill it. Serve it.

[Silverpiper]

Monty J wrote: "A. wrote: "Neither is preferring a bottle in front of me to a frontal lobotomy, but that's beside the point. I think what many (if not most) people refuse to recognize is that the horrors of war ex..."

Monty J wrote: "A. wrote: "Neither is preferring a bottle in front of me to a frontal lobotomy, but that's beside the point. I think what many (if not most) people refuse to recognize is that the horrors of war ex..."
Don't forget Jerzy Kosinski (The Painted Bird)

[Monty J]

Silverpiper wrote: "Don't forget Jerzy Kosinski (The Painted Bird)"


Thanks. I'll add that to my list.
:)

[Jonathan]

I'd venture that many readers like this book mainly because it is incredibly original, certainly considering the time it was published and the subject it covers.
Then again, his style is not for everyone. So it goes.

[Slowlygainingknowlege]

I hated this book because of how despairing and nihilistic it was. I read it at a bad time in my life and it made me feel worse. It was the final push that made me believe life was pointless and not worth anything.

[A.]

Slowlygainingknowlege wrote: "I hated this book because of how despairing and nihilistic it was. I read it at a bad time in my life and it made me feel worse. It was the final push that made me believe life was pointless and no..."

Slowlygainingknowlege wrote: "I hated this book because of how despairing and nihilistic it was. I read it at a bad time in my life and it made me feel worse. It was the final push that made me believe life was pointless and no..."

Someone once said something to the effect: Enjoy your old age, it's something many never live to experience.

Keep 'slowly gaining knowledge', it's the best rate at which to learn. I guarantee you will overcome that sense of pointlessness and worthlessness. You're on the right road, it's just a little steep. Vonnegut survived it; his message to us is: you can survive it too!

[Monty J]

Slowlygainingknowlege wrote: "I hated this book because of how despairing and nihilistic it was. I read it at a bad time in my life and it made me feel worse. It was the final push that made me believe life was pointless and no..."

Life is only as meaningless or meaningful as we each individually make it.