Slaughterhouse 5, published in 1969, was the novel that propelled author Kurt Vonnegut into the minds of the masses. Written during the...

Slaughterhouse 5, published in 1969, was the novel that propelled author Kurt Vonnegut into the minds of the masses. Written during the Vietnam war era, it focused on the ugliness of war, time travel, fate, free will and death (a lot of topics for 177 pages). Through Billy Pilgrim, Vonnegut channelled his own experiences of World War 2 and specifically being a POW in Dresden when the bombs fell. What he created was a novel rich with black humour, sentimentality and irony, that withstood time and became a staple of American Science Fiction.  

What I loved:
The freedom and confidence to write honestly stands out. The book is centred around World War 2 and Vonnegut's own experiences but he expressed his ideas freely. He writes how he wants to write, which is easier said than done. He isn't tied down by the dark subject matter but isn't obscene or tasteless toward events. Great death happened, lives ended but Vonnegut is able to show the human side of war, the unseen elements that history books brush over. It's this freedom to tell war from his perspective that holds the most memorable moments throughout. 

The choppiness of the narration is similar to Japanese pulp literature. One minute the story is in Dresden, the next it's in a hospital bed twenty years later, before quickly heading back to Dresden. Sometimes the travelling from different parts of Pilgrim's life happen three or four times on a page. It sounds odd and a recipe for disaster, but it's a testament to Vonnegut's skill that readers never feel lost.  

Billy Pilgrim, the protagonist, is pretty empty, he watches and doesn't take part, almost like a kid in a Maths class far too difficult for him, but he won't put his hand up and say he's struggling. On initial glances Pilgrim appears to be a literary device, used by Vonnegut to tell his story, but as you dive into the story Pilgrim becomes an embodiment of the Tralfamadorians (aliens who destroy the universe, eventually, but not in this story - sounds wacky but it's not, at least not too much.) philosophy. It is a philosophy that questions fate and free will, think the oracle from The Matrix mixed with the apathy of Dr. Manhattan.  

What I didn't love:
It's only 177 pages - when the only negative is it's too sure, you know you've done well.   

Summary: 
Slaughterhouse 5 is a fun read, showcasing the talents of an author who writes with confidence (TEACH ME!). It says a lot without saying a lot. As a victim of war, writing on war, Vonnegut could have fallen into the Robert Heinlein trap of devoting chapters and chapters of telling the reading why war is wrong, e.g Starship Troopers. Where Vonnegut succeeds is never forgetting that he is telling a story about Billy Pilgrim. He never loses sight of this, and it helps avoid preachiness and random episodes that webbed Heinlein's war based work.    

This is a great read if you like humour, succinct writing and a story packed with reflections on society. I mentioned previously about the aliens and time travel, if that sort of thing isn't your cup of tea, I'd still give this book a go. Vonnegut uses these elements to create questions not commonly posed in alien/time travel work.   

There it was. After a year of wandering, A year of following unfinished maps and the whims of blind mystics, we’d reached it - The Movin...

There it was. After a year of wandering, A year of following unfinished maps and the whims of blind mystics, we’d reached it - The Moving Castle of Fendor. It was huge, larger than the drawings and so blue it melted into the sky if you stared at it for too long. All we needed to do was climb the mountain range it rested upon, scale the walls it used for its foundations, fight off the undead army sworn to defend it, and find the gold locked away somewhere in a chamber called The Pit, which was supposedly guarded by a warlock who controlled matter. Simple. The real problem was the moving castle lived up to its name. The slabs of stone propping it up were its legs. No euphemism. The moment the castle felt it was under threat, it could break free from its rocky confines and move, either to flee or crush its awe struck opponents.

By this point in our journey we were a band of only 10. We started much larger, but danger and death are old lovers and we lost many good men and women. Captain Jekob, the leader of our troop, and the only member who thought vanilla garments looked good, was hell bent on success. Gossip had it, his family were killed by the castle years before and this entire crusade was about revenge, and not the life changing gold that he’d mentioned to rope in some of the best mercenaries in the eastern sector.

Many of us wanted to stop before tackling the castle, take stock of everything, make our final prayers, piss, you know the important stuff, but the captain wanted to push forward. Night was falling and he didn’t want to wake to find the castle gone or on the verge of attacking us. We knew the plan, every crazy element of it was drummed into us over and over, but we were spent. I tried to speak to the captain but he gave me the look, the look that said this wasn’t up for debate. The stare itself wasn’t particularly memorable, he did nothing unique with his eyes or eyebrows, but what he did do was slowly stroke the hilt of his sword. That was all. It rested above his hip and his fingers ran slow circles around it. You see, it’s whispered across the four sectors, that at Jekob’s birth he was born without a tear, or a hair on his head. The only thing he came into the world with was a sword, which he promptly used to cut his umbilical chord. Yes, this sounds ridiculous, but that’s until you see Jekob use a sword. There aren’t enough superlatives. Once he stroked his sword’s hilt your options were limited, continue or leave. So we marched on. 

Before I say anything further, I must explain why no-one left or stopped listening to the captain’s orders. He wouldn’t have used his sword on anyone who wanted to leave, but no-one did because we trusted him, unequivocally. He was the best man any of us had ever known. He had saved everyone of our lives twice over, treated us as humans, as equals, and was a man completely of his word. We would have followed the captain to our deaths and sadly, on that day, all my friends did. 

Artwork by @sparth
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