Christian Bladon
Mariana Lazarova
Physics: Life in the Universe, PC 120
“So it goes”
With this simple phrase, Kurt Vonnegut lays down the entire philosophical ideology of a far greater, far more advanced form of life. With these three words the protagonist of Slaughterhouse 5 drifts through his life, living off the almost apathetic saying of an alien race. However, this novel’s main character, a man named Billy Pilgrim, is not a typical person. Self-proclaimed as being, “unstuck in time,” Billy jumps around moments of his life, never quite knowing where or when in his life he will be whenever he opens his eyes. This means that any moment that Billy has lived or will live, he may find himself there at any time. Whether this moment is his birth, life as a war prisoner in World War II, presence at the infamous bombing of Dresden or his abduction by the fourth dimensional Tralfamadorians, he flits about time while only semiconscious of it all. Unfortunately, as wonderful a plot driver as Billy’s experiences with time and extraterrestrials may be, the absurdity of these ideas pull the narrative away from semi-plausible science fiction. Although the presentation of such elements may push this book into the genre, the way in which time is presented from Billy’s perspective, as well as the highly unlikely portrayal of extraterrestrial life, make this narrative closer to pure fiction than anything scientific.
Looked at linearly, the life of Billy Pilgrim is related in fragments from his childhood, life as a chaplain’s assistant in World War II, and eventual old age in Illium, New York. From the bombing of Dresden, a massacre greater than even Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to being held captive on the planet Tralfamadore with the adult film actress Montana Wildhack, Billy floats by with an acceptance of misfortune that borders on indifference. The passive look at tragic events comes from Billy’s encounter with the fourth dimensional Tralfamadorians, who view all of time simultaneously and simply prefer to detach themselves from the unfortunate, while giving more attention to the good moments. Billy’s ready acceptance of death is derived from this, and he derides the typical view of time in his statement, “It is just an illusion we have on Earth that one moment follows another one, like beads on a string, and that once a moment is gone it is gone forever”(25). With his particular situation involving time travel, Billy detaches himself from the horrors of his life, while living through them at the same time, knowing he will jump out of the moment soon enough.
Although the idea of time presented from the view of the fourth dimensional Tralfamadorians may be to some degree understandable, the way in which Billy Pilgrim skips about the chapters of his life is singularly a narrative element, and in no way based upon reality. The prospect of becoming unstuck in time, jumping around the events of one’s life is impossible any other way than remembering. With how time is understood, moving one’s conscious perspective back and forth through their timeline would only be possible in a person’s imagination, where they can create different memories or scenarios at their pleasure. By transferring his conscious mind across time, Billy Pilgrim is changing the configuration of the particles in his brain during all given moments of his life into that of a disembodied sentience for a few moments, only to switch back shortly after. In the novel, Billy Pilgrim initially experiences his jumps in time during a march through the frozen forests of Germany, mid World War II. As a coping mechanism for the intense stress and depression that he felt at that time, it is likely that he instead began hallucinating or dreaming while awake during his ordeal. To detach himself from the horrors of living through the now infamous bombing of Dresden, Billy Pilgrim creates this idea of shifting consciousness. Combined with the eventual appearance of the Tralfamadorians, the ever-present philosophical phrase, “So it goes,” is created. Even the narrator, told from the perspective of Kurt Vonnegut himself, is skeptical of Billy Pilgrim’s unnatural ability, beginning the novel with, “He has seen his birth and death many times, he says, and pays random visits to all events in between. He says.” Through the duration of the novel, Vonnegut acknowledges himself as the narrator twice, taking on the role of a member of Billy Pilgrim’s platoon, who then writes the narrative as an outsider looking in. However, with the repetition of the last line in this quotation, Vonnegut conveys a sense of doubt to the reader that confirms the fictitiousness of it all.
Despite their use as an interesting plot device to move the narrative along, the portrayal of Tralfamadorians as vaguely plunger shaped creatures is utterly unrealistic. Described as being, “two feet high, and green and shaped like plumber’s friends… [and] at the top of each shaft was a little hand with a green eye in its palm(25)”. Evolutionarily, this shape and size is completely impractical, with there being no apparent advantages to this body type. Besides this, and with the intelligence that these creatures have, it seems unlikely that a body as such would be able to support a complex neural system, or organs in general. However, they are also described as being fourth dimensional beings, which could play some part in how they evolved. Still, with how life and evolution appear to work, it seems unlikely that they would be the only creatures living in the fourth dimension, and so would still need to better themselves through adaptation. The Tralfamadorians do contribute a major idea to the story of Billy Pilgrim, due to their nature as being able to see all of time. While talking about horrible events in life, they say, “There isn’t anything we can do about them, so we simply don’t look at them. We ignore them. We spend eternity looking at pleasant moments (112)”. The Tralfamadorians can see all moments, good and bad; yet choose to dwell on the better ones for happiness sake. Billy Pilgrim adopts this philosophy of enjoying the pleasant moments, and glazes by the bad ones with the alien expression, “so it goes”. Although these extraterrestrials are completely founded in fiction, they add a necessary element of absurdness and philosophy to Vonnegut’s novel, and how he conveys its message.
Despite these glaring contradictions to common sense and knowledge of how time and evolution work, Vonnegut’s tale portrays an interesting view upon time, and how tragic events should be viewed. By using broken narrative of non-linear storytelling, the saga of Billy Pilgrim and all his fortune and suffering are told in a way that never seems to get too tragic or too joyous. In a novel that is at its core about war and certain atrocities that humankind has committed, Vonnegut never preaches his message. By using the science-fiction elements of time travel and extraterrestrial life throughout, the absurdity and satire mix to soften the point, but still convey a message. Aside from the fantastic elements, Slaughterhouse 5 tells an amazing tale of one man’s life in an extremely original and inventive way.
Vonnegut, Kurt. Slaughterhouse-five, Or, the Children’s Crusade: A Duty-dance with Death. New York, NY: Dell, 1991. Print.
