Slaughterhouse Five, pages 71-96

This chapter continues to talk about Billy’s impressions and experiences as an American prisoner of war, as well as his kidnap by the Tralfamadorians. While walking in his house late at night, waiting for the arrival of the Tralfamadorians, the narrator of the book mentions the following quote: “Billy was guided by dread and the lack of dread.” (p.73). This has been one of my favorite quotes thus far, as it makes the public aware of the narrow wall separating success from failure. It is fascinating to know hat those who thrive in life are not specifically the smartest ones or the ablest ones, just those who have the courage and will power to defeat fear and apprehension. This passage reminds me of the poem The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost. This poem basically talks about two roads, representing the different paths in life, and how the traveler took “the one less traveled by”, referring to the decision of taking the path filled with the greatest obstacles and hardships, but that would ultimately guide him to success. Here, Robert Frost was being guided by “lack of dread”, or by the courage to take a risk and attempt to achieve success.

I also noticed the continuous reference to Adam and Eve throughout the novel. For example, on page 75 the omniscient narrator describes how Billy got unstuck in time and watched a documentary backwards, tracing the events in his head back to the beginning of humanity, to Adam and Eve. Why are these two Biblical humans so important? Will they play a mayor role in the novel? Why is Billy Pilgrim so obsessed with them?

Apart from continuously mentioning Adam and Eve, the book also makes constant references to dogs. Billy is always seeing and hearing dogs in almost every setting of the novel: the German establishment where he was taken to as a prisoner, the outside of his home while waiting for the arrival of the Tralfamadorians….. Are these animals supposed to symbolize something in the novel? Why does Billy keep on mentioning them? Why do they keep on appearing everywhere?

The narrator also repeats the phrase "So it goes" every time death is mentioned: "Then Billy got his clothes back, they weren't any cleaner, but all the little animals that had been living in them were dead. So it goes.... A slave laborer from Poland had done the stamping. He was dead now. So it goes...After poor Edgar Derby, the high school teacher, was shot in Dresden later on, a doctor pronounced him dead and snapped his dogtag in two. So it goes..." (pgs. 90, 91, 92). Like Billy Pilgrim, the narrator is totally indifferent to death. This leads me to wonder whether Billy Pilgrim and the narrator are actually the same individual. This hypothesis makes sense with the questions about the character of the narrator I had asked in previous entries, about how the narrator actually knew about everything that had happened to Pilgrim and about the thoughts that had wondered inside his head during the time warps. Are the narrator and Billy Pilgrim the same individual?

Another quote that also caught my attention was the Tralfamadore’s explanation to Billy’s inquiry as to why he had been chosen: “Because the moment simply is… there is no why." (p.77). This excerpt helps to explain the inquiry I had the night before, whether it was free will or destiny what determined our fates. Apparently, the answer is destiny. We as humans, therefore, do not have the capacity to make our own decisions because, like the Tralfamadorian says, we are merely “…bugs trapped in amber.” (p.77). I personally find the inexistence of free will very degrading. We are not even capable of controlling ourselves! This leads me to thinking, what is the purpose of life? What is the point of living if we are not able to make our own decisions based on what we want, but on what we are meant to have? What would have happened, then, if Billy, knowing the time and place of his capture, would have gone somewhere else, trying to evade the moment and trying to bend destiny? Would some sort of a force have obliged him to be at his backyard, at that specific time of the night? What would have happened if Billy Pilgrim had stayed in his bed and not done what fortune had planned?

Later on, I encountered a very similar quote. This time is was said by a German oficial to one of the American prisioners: "'Vy you? Vy anybody?' He said." (p.91). This makes me wonder whether Billy's abduction by the Tralfamadorians was actually an imaginary response to what was happening at war. For one thing, we know Billy is a coward ("His mother touched him, and he wet his pants" (p. 89)). Was Billy pilgrim trying to escape reality and horror? Were his experiences in Tralfamadore a product of his mind?