So It Goes
Leslie Phillips


     At  first  glance  Slaughterhouse-Five  appears  to  be
a simplistic  story.  It  is  a  short  account  of  a man’s
experiences in World  War II and the effects  the war had on
his   life.    But   by   taking   a    deeper   look   into
Slaughterhouse-Five   we  see   intricately  woven   themes,
contrasts,  and  morals.  Vonnegut  has  disguised  a  great
lecture against  war and an acceptance  of death through the
idiocy and simplicity of Billy Pilgrim.
     Vonnegut  begins the  novel with  a warning.  His first
chapter  subtly warns  us that  Slaughterhouse-Five has been
difficult for  him to produce.  "This one is  a failure," he
writes, "since it was written by  a pillar of salt" (22; ch.
1). The irony  of this statement is that  by looking back in
time Vonnegut accuses himself of idiocy, like Billy Pilgrim.
Yet one of  the main themes of the entire  work is the "bugs
in amber" or the existence  of the past, present, and future
all at once. In the opening chapter he also humbles his work
by  telling  us  how  it  begins  and  ends,  stressing  the
succeeding theme.
     Billy  Pilgrim is  a master  of disguise.  He serves as
a superb mask that Vonnegut hides behind in order to get his
messages  across without  scaring readers  away with  boring
lectures. Vonnegut wants  us to accept life as  it is and to
understand that  death is inevitable  and something we  must
not  fear.   He  indirectly  lets  us   know  that  this  is
a realization  that he  has come  to in  his own  life, most
likely through the war experience,  and invites us to follow
in his footsteps. Through  his humor and lightheartedness he
does not  force these ideas on  us but helps us  to open our
minds to  new ways of perceiving  our lives. As the  king of
repetition,  one  of  Vonnegut's  various  echoes throughout
Slaughterhouse-Five is the prayer "God grant me the serenity
to accept  the things I  cannot change..." (60;  ch. 3, 209;
ch. 9). Religious themes are  woven in here as an invitation
to  face and  reconcile ourselves  with death.  He offers us
religion,  science, fantasy,  and human  experience as doors
for us  to open. It also  opens our minds to  another theme:
the concept of time.
     We are  immediately told that  Billy Pilgrim "has  come
unstuck in time" (23; ch.  2). He moves backward and forward
through  time throughout  the novel  as if  time itself were
some  sort  of  photo  album.   He  goes  from  the  war  to
Tralfamadore and  back again to  his childhood. We  begin to
wonder  if Pilgrim  is sane  or if  his experiences could be
reality. Are we really "bugs  in amber"? Billy's time lapses
also   present    us   with   the    cyclical   feeling   of
Slaughterhouse-Five.  There is  a continuing  cycle of death
and renewal  throughout Billy's story.  “So it goes”,  found
over  one  hundred  times,  plays  an  important role in the
continuation of the  novel. Each time a death  occurs "so it
goes" helps us to accept the death, that there is nothing we
can do about it, and move  onto renewal and reentry into the
living.  This  expression  ties  many  aspects  of the story
together, helping the entire work to keep dying and renewing
itself again.  Billy learned this  from the Tralfamadorians.
They saw the world as a portrait, laid out and finished with
all experiences present  at once. "All time is  all time. It
does not change," they tell him (211; ch. 10). They believed
that death is predestined and  cannot be avoided. Billy also
learned  this acceptance  from the  Tralfamadorians. Just as
Vonnegut has  come to see death  in a new light,  we too are
witnesses to Billy's changing  perception of life. "I, Billy
Pilgrim,...will  die,  have  died,  and  always  will die on
February  thirteenth, 1976"  (141;  ch.  6). Billy  dies and
renews his life repeatedly, enforcing the cyclical nature of
the book.
     Another  aspect  of  this  cycle  is  Vonnegut's use of
repetition.  "So it  goes" is  the most  used phrase  in the
book. Pilgrim is often saying "um" while Vonnegut's personal
narration repeats  phrases such as  "mustard gas and  roses"
and  "listen". Ideas  are also  repeated in  order to stress
morals  and messages  that the  author wants  to convey. The
"pillar  of  salt"  emphasizes  and  mirrors  Vonnegut's own
recollection  of the  war as  well as  his reflection on the
stages  he  went  through  in  order  to achieve his current
perceptions that "all time  is all time." The "poo-tee-weet"
of  the birds  found in  the beginning  and end  of the book
reflects Vonnegut's own "so it goes." He tells us that after
massacres  there  are  only  the  sound  of  birds. There is
nothing  to say  about the   death, only  the birds  can say
"poo-tee-weet" (19;  ch. 1). Later  in the novel  Pilgrim is
accused of  having echolaia, a  "mental disease which  makes
people  immediately repeat  things that  well people  around
them say" (192;  ch. 9). The audience could  also accuse the
author of the same disease  in a metaphorical sense. This is
just one of the incidents  connecting the two narrations and
perspectives in the novel: Vonnegut’s and Pilgrim's.
     As Vonnegut tells us  in his introductory chapter: "All
this  happened, more  or less.  The war  parts, anyway,  are
pretty  much  true"  (1;  ch.  1).  Vonnegut  uses  Billy as
a spokesman  for  his  experience  and  often Billy reflects
Vonnegut's  progression  through  time  and understanding of
self. Both continually  reinvents themselves through writing
Slaughterhouse-Five.  Each  are  able  to  manipulate  their
realities  in  order  to  grow  and  to  cope with the past,
present,  and future.  Vonnegut connects  himself to Pilgrim
through  the presence  of Kilgore  Trout, a  science-fiction
writer. Trout writes about  similar experiences that Pilgrim
has  had, such  as his  visit to  Tralfamadore. Vonnegut  is
doing the same thing. Kilgore questions Billy's time travels
just  as Vonnegut  questions the  very theories  of time and
death that he presents to his own audience (174; ch. 8). "Am
I as  irrational as  Billy?" he  asks us.  Billy thinks  the
world  of   Trout  though  many   others  do  not.   Trout's
unpopularity parallels  Vonnegut's humble perception  of his
own abilities.  He continues to write  despite the fact that
he  doesn't  think  highly  of  his  works.  Just  as in the
introduction,  he  tells  us  that  this  book is a failure.
Vonnegut's humbleness  implies another underriding  theme of
religion and humanity.
     Vonnegut  is inspired  by the  Biblical story  of Lot's
wife looking  back at the  cities of Sodom  and Gomorrah. He
loves "her for  that, because it was so  human" (22; ch. 1).
He begins to teach us a  moral lesson of war: it's wrong and
stupid  but we  must accept  it in  order to  go on with our
lives.  Just  looking  at  the  subtitle  of  the book, "The
Children's Crusade:  A Duty-Dance with  Death" we peer  into
Vonnegut's personal  view of life, death,  and war. Soldiers
are not  soldiers but children  that have an  obligation, or
"duty",  to  go  to  war,  the  "dance  of  death." "We were
baby-faced, and as a prisoner of  war I don't think I had to
shave very  often," Vonnegut tells us.  God and Jesus Christ
are mentioned  from time to time  throughout the novel. They
help us to justify and  understand the awful situations that
we  put   ourselves  into.  The   Tralfamadorians  serve  as
a surrogate God, teaching Billy and  the reader that war and
death are meant to be. God does not leave us but has planned
these things in order for us to learn. We are also taught by
the Tralfamadorians  not to be proud,  a sin associated with
Christian belief. They tell Billy that earth is just a small
bit  of  the  universe  and  we  shouldn't take ourselves so
seriously  (116-7;  ch.  5).  Applying  this  to the reader,
Vonnegut  reminds us  not to  think too  highly of ourselves
either, just as he continually humbles himself and his work.
     Tied in  with Vonnegut's religious  themes is the  time
structure of  the entire book.  He questions us,  as well as
himself. What really  does life look like from  a bird's eye
view? Are we and the events  that occur in our lives already
planned  out? Are  we part   of that  big portrait  that the
Tralfmadorians  believe in?  The entire  text is  scattered,
shifting  from  one  place  and  time  to another, giving us
a feel of this new "bugs  in amber" concept. We have trouble
discerning just  what is happening in  the story. Vonnegut's
subtlety  shows us  glimpses of  the randomness  of our  own
lives. We have no control over our past, present, and future
and at times  do things we feel we  are drawn towards. Billy
samples his own predestination through his unwanted marriage
to  Valencia.  He  didn't  want  to  marry  her  but he felt
compelled  to do  so. "Everything  is supposed  to be  quiet
after  a  massacre,"  is  another  example of predestination
concepts  throughout the  work. Vonnegut  often used phrases
such  as "supposed  to be"  and "had  to be"  to back up his
concept. The  author himself tells  us he had  to write this
book. His  subtitle "A Duty-Dance with  Death" also takes on
a personal  aspect. Vonnegut  had to  reconcile himself with
the  war, the  death, and  its impact  on him.  What exactly
propelled  him  to  do  so,   is  a  question  that  remains
unanswered.
     The Tralfamadorians play a  big role in Billy's thought
development. Not  only do they  teach him the  phrase "so it
goes", but  they also help Billy  to come to grips  with the
war. "When a person dies he only appears to die. He is still
very much alive in the past," they teach him (26; ch. 2).
     Billy   becomes    an   educational   tool    for   the
Tralfamadorians.  By caging  him up  the creatures  begin to
study human behavior. Humans are very animalistic in nature.
This  may  be  another   of  Vonnegut's  subtle  lessons  in
morality. He may be warning us of our self-destructive pride
while  helping us  to  ask  ourselves some  questions. Could
Earthly life simply be an  experiment made by God? Could God
be  putting  us  in  cages  and  observing  us  too? Kilgore
Trout's novel The Gospel from Outer Space tells the story of
an  alien who  visited Earth  and "made  a serious  study of
Christianity, to learn, if he could, why Christians found it
necessary to be cruel" (108; ch. 5). Again we see Vonnegut's
use of  Trout as a  tie-in to his  personal presence in  the
book.  Vonnegut too  is writing  of a  journey to understand
Christianity, to understand life.
     The  caging of  Billy in  outerspace mirrors Vonnegut's
own  caging  as  a  prisoner  of  war.  They  experience the
devastation  of  being  restrained  animals  yet  both  have
invented  a pleasant  reflection on  it: the  Tralfamadorian
cage. As the aliens taught Billy  we can "look at any moment
that   interests  [us]"   so  are   these  former  prisoners
reinventing their pasts (26; ch. 2).
     Throughout   Slaughterhouse-Five  Vonnegut   used  many
symbols to hint  at notions he has on  those ideas he subtly
wants to share with the  reader. Note the character's names.
Billy  Pilgrim is  really a  man on  a journey through time,
a pilgrim.  His  wife  Valencia's  name  comes  from  a  few
sources, all adding to her  character. Valencia is rooted in
the  name   valerian,  a  flower  known   for  its  sedative
properties. Billy often finds her boring and put to sleep by
her. Her name can also be rooted in the word valence, having
to do  with the combining  capability of atoms.  Billy feels
drawn to marry her, though he does not know why. Could it be
her "valency"?  Billy's hometown of  Ilium can be  linked to
the word ileum which labels the lower part of the intestine.
Billy never did have a strong bond with his hometown. It can
also be rooted  in a Latin word having  to do with illusion.
Billy's entire  life is an  illusion. If said  slowly Roland
Weary  can sound  like "roll  on weary".  Roland was  a sad,
pathetic man  who kept plugging away  despite his weariness.
Montana Wildhack adds to  our image of her "mountainousness"
like  the state  of Montana.   Her last  name is  an obvious
compound word  describing her as  a free spirited  person in
search  of work  (i.e. an  actress). Not  only are names but
other images  in the text  are symbolic. The  destruction of
Sodom  and  Gomorrah  can  be  linked  to the destruction of
Dresden. Both  were blown up with  "brimstone and fire" (21;
ch. 1). Vonnegut's repetition of the phrase "mustard gas and
roses"  echoes the  mixture of  the horrors  of war  and the
beauty of humanity, a consistent theme throughout the novel.
Billy's career reflects truths about  his own state of mind.
Ironically  his  optometry  enables  others  to  see when he
can't  see  for  himself.  It  also  parallels  his  need to
"comfort so many people with  the truth about time" (28; ch.
2). Like the catcher in the  rye, Billy wants to save people
by helping them see.
     Vonnegut's true motives for writing Slaughterhouse Five
may  be remain  unanswered. We  could say  he is  being that
catcher in the  rye, trying to save us  from our own limited
thinking  or our  loss of  humanity at  times. Whatever  the
reasons, Vonnegut  has produced a  powerfully neurotic novel
that has proven itself to be both timeless and amusing.

Go back to