Tralfamadore An Escape To Sanity - 1879 Words

Kurt Vonnegut is considered by many to be the greatest American author of the twentieth century. He was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on November 11, 1922 to Kurt Vonnegut, Sr. and Edith Vonnegut. His father was a prominent architect in Indianapolis, and provided well for his three children until the Great Depression hit in 1929. The Depression put Kurt, Sr. out of work, and harmed his spirits in such a way that he essentially gave up on life. His wife, Edith, ultimately resorted to alcoholism and prescription drug abuse as an escape from the troubling times the Depression brought upon the Vonnegut household. These habits eventually resulted in her death in 1944. At age 20, Kurt, Jr. was deployed in Germany to serve during the Second World†¦show more content†¦Time travel is Billy’s way of dealing with the stress brought upon him by his traumatic wartime experience. Billy does not have an adequate amount of time to accept his experience for what is was before he is th rown back into the real world. Billy quickly transitions from wartime life back to working a desk job, having a love life, a family and also learning to interact with people on a personal level. This is psychologically exhausting to Billy, as he has â€Å"never fully left World War II† (Vees-Gulani 177). Vonnegut makes this apparent as he cites Billy as being â€Å"simultaneously on foot in Germany in 1944 and riding his Cadillac in 1967† (Vonnegut 58). Though Billy Pilgrim shows many symptoms of PTSD, his diagnosis probably goes deeper than that. This diagnosis goes not only for Billy but also, in many ways, for Vonnegut himself. Vonnegut created Pilgrim as a fictional representation of himself. Both Pilgrim and Vonnegut were born in 1922, had fathers who hunted, are tall; both were captured in Luxembourg during the Battle of the Bulge, were sent to Dresden, where they stayed in Schlachthoffunf, worked in a plant that manufactured malt-syrup for pregnant women; both s urvived the Dresden holocaust and helped dig up the corpses afterwards; both were discharged in 1945, returned to college, and were married soon afterwards. (Harris NP) While Tralfamadorian time travel isShow MoreRelatedSlaughterhouse Five Comparison1717 Words   |  7 Pagesthe sanity of Billy is questioned by numerous characters, ranging from his family to other military personnel. Another comparison would be the abnormal structure of the story. This serves to reflect the chaos and the preposterousness that war brings to society, which matches the overlapping theme of sources. The recurrence of absurd events and the abnormal structure of the novel demonstrates how war has affected Billy and how it has ultimately lead to his lost hope in humanity and his sanity. Read MoreThe Madness of War1458 Words   |  6 Pagesface of overwhelming and inexplicable cruelty and violence (â€Å"Slaughterhouse-Five† 263). Billys condition and his time travels could be the delusions of an emotionally unstable man, and a symbol of the shock, confusion, dislocation, and desire for escape that result from the horrible experiences of war (Cox 270). The emot ional separation that Billy experiences is a direct result of the awfulness he faces in war. Billy encounters countless atrocities and absurdities in his life and his war experiencesRead MoreSlaughterhouse Five and Hamlet1701 Words   |  7 Pagesother words his insanity, much like Hamlet’s. â€Å"We know how the world ends and it has nothing to do with Earth, except that it gets wiped out too† (01:26:20) this quote explains that he has seen the end of the world and that the aliens from planet Tralfamadore have told him why and how it happens. The bombing of Dresden is a significant event which makes Ibrahim 3 him insane. â€Å"I was there, I was there in Dresden† (7:5:13) this was said in the hospital bed when the crazy man beside