Slaughterhouse-Five

Slaughterhouse-Five while dabbling in speculative fiction is highly philosophical and enlightening. Written by Kurt Vonnegut the novel in a humorous, lighthearted and still haunting way speaks of anti-war. The surprising thing I had found was Vonnegut did not scream the evils of way, or protest the gruesome and terrible parts of war, but more called to the readers attention the mild stumbles of war.

Billy Pilgrim is unstuck in time--travelling forward and backward in time sparatically. Through this, and through discovering or becoming acquainted with an alien race that sees all time as one instance he finds that no one really dies. That there are only dead in one period or time but are not in many others. Through this the author shows how fleeting and pointless war is . . .

He as well touches much on humanity--what is the worst and best of humanity and what it is that brings that out in a person. I found it interesting that through the book Billy Pilgrim seems mildly unaffected by the death around him and the suffering from those he meets. But it is when, (after the bombing of Dresden--which is the surrounding theme about the book) he is chastised by German civilians who notice the horse that he and his buddies are using to pull their wagon is badly injured that Billy breaks down.

War brings about needless suffering . . .

There are many great insights in this book and is definitely worth the read. It shows the beauty of life or of a persons life throughout their existence. The simplicity of living and evils or war. Vonnegut shows amazing wisdom in one of his finest books.

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