Kurt Vonnegut Vs. Billy Pilgrim

Does Billy Pilgrim represent someone else?

While reading a post from Perfection is a Matter of Perception, by Ana Maria Villaveces I realized we both had similar thoughts. There are many things in the book that make us connect Kurt Vonnegut and Billy Pilgrim. Sometimes I think if they are the same person and Vonnegut incorporated his own person inside Billy Pilgrim, adding in its way different details, emanating from his imagination. 

I have to disagree with Ana Maria when she says that the most probable situation is that Billy is a different person from Vonnegut. She has to look outside the context, search for any sort of connection between them, which actually are many. Both, Billy Pilgrim and Kurt Vonnegut enlisted in the US Army. Both witnessed the Dresden bombing, and both where locked inside a slaughterhouse, incidentally number 5.Therefore, I strongly believe that they are both the same person, and that Vonnegut is just narrating to us his story. I think that the person from chapter 1, is Kurt Vonnegut himself narrating how he wants to write a story about the Dresden massacre, and actually starts writing it in chapter two. Basically the first chapter of the novel, is sort of a preface, introducing to us the actual story. 

"I, Billy Pilgrim, will die, have died and will always die on February thirteenth, 1976"

Have you ever thought of knowing the future? Would you choose to see your future, and even know the date of your own death? Wouldn't you be curious if you had the opportunity of knowing? I would be, and Billy Pilgrim has been given this opportunity by the Trafalmadorians. Many people would think, how lucky he is to know the future, but actually is it really that "cool"? Knowing something and not being able to stop it is terrible, being able to count the days you have left with your loved ones, becoming eager as the date approaches. I believe it’s a terrible thing, interesting in some ways, but knowing your fate is not part of our lives. We become who we want to become, but what if you become who you are destined to become. What if the future you have the chance to watch is you dying from the death penalty? Knowing that eventually you’ll do something you have no control over, just to do as destiny says.

I think of the kind of situation, in which you know the outcomes and you know what is going to eventually happen, but find yourself without a voice; Unable to speak up and change things. Such as a criminal, a victim and a silent bystander, something very common in life. The poor bystander has no control of what is happening, because if he dares to come closer he might end up dead next to the first victim, or they’re silenced by a threat.

"Don't worry. It will never be bombed."

Dresden, through World War II, was an undefended city, free of threats of being attacked; it had never had suffered any mayor damage, until February 13 1945, when it was throughly bombed by the allies. The bombing lasted around two days and Dresden was destroyed almost to ashes. Thousands of people died, innocent people who didn't deserve to die. People who where on their way home to meet their family after work, just to enjoy a happy dinner, while praying to their God they had survived this awful time of war. Only to be stoped dead by a never-ending rain of missiles. 

"You don't need to worry about bombs, by the way. Dresden is an open city. It is undefended, and contains no war industries or troop concentrations of any importance." - Chapter 6, page 146

This quote reflects the irony and black humor in "Slaughterhouse-five". What a perfect target for the allies than to bomb an undefended, open city? If the main objective of theirs is to exhibit power, why not do so by killing thousand of lives in a place that is easy to attack? It's a flawless strategy, however an inhuman one. I have always thought of war as an event filled with cruelness, evil and desire for power. It is something that will never be justified, I mean, how can someone justify the death of thousands of people just for the greater good, or just to prove a point. Do we humans always have to seek violence as our main alternative? Is it in our nature? is it an instinct?  I do not know the answer but something has to be the reason. Nonetheless, the ones who declare war are not actually the ones fighting it; I imagine how small, irregular, and short wars would be if the leaders themselves fought them. It would be unwise, but more human. 

"Ignore the awful times and concentrate on the good ones"

"Life is full of beauty. Notice it. Notice the bumble bee, the small child, and the smiling faces. Smell the rain, and feel the wind. Live your life to the fullest potential, and fight for your dreams."- Ashley smith

Since I was a toddler, I've always enjoyed reading, however, I wasn't the type of child who read every book I could reach. I wasn't like Matilda from Roald Dahl's book, yet, last year I realized I really liked non-fiction books, especially those who talk about the future, such as utopian and dystopian novels. Through his life, Billy Pilgrim has encountered a rather interesting source of life, the so-called Trafalmadorians, who inhabit the Trafalmadore planet. As every different civilization they differ from us in various ways, such as their perspectives on life’s aspects and their anatomy.

Life is Life. It can be lived in many different ways, in different manners, but it will always be life. You can enjoy its every aspect and receive nourishment from the first day of life, or throw it aside and let life die. I believe, we humans choose our destiny, our choices makes us who we are. Haven’t you ever wondered what would have happened if you hadn’t done something when you were smaller, or what if you had done this other thing? We all reach a destiny, however, we all take different paths to reach it. The Trafalmadorians think that we have a destiny with a predestined route we cannot vary, we have our choices already make and the only thing left for us to do, is to enjoy life. “On other days we have wars as horrible as any you’ve ever seen or heard about. 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 the pleasant moments” 

War means death, and if there is war there is death.

“So Billy uncorked it with his thumbs. It didn't make a pop. The champagne was dead. So it goes”- Chapter four, pg. 73 

So it goes. What do you think when you hear this sentence? It may mean many things, it could fit in different situations, it could relate to various topics. It just states that things go on, time passes and things change, that's life; but, what does it mean when Vonnegut uses it? I’ve come to realize that after a death occurs in the book, so it goes. Vonnegut uses it after the decease of someone. An utterly common event in war.  This is one of the few things that cannot be avoidable in war, it is something we have no control of. War means death, and if there is war there is death. 

This book is dedicated to war, to the Dresden bombing in World War II. I believe Vonnegut is trying to convey the message that in war there is always going to be the loss of life, that it something ordinary but, grotesque. That as there are so many losses there is really no time to stop and think about it, just time to run and protect yourself, its the place to be selfish and only think about me, myself and I. It makes me think of the holocaust, of how hundreds of jews died everyday but no one really cared, they were treated as something not worth living. Those hundreds of people who supported Hitler what were their reasons to follow him? To clean the world? To clean the world from what? Everyone is different and just because of their believes they are not less worth than others, not even by their skin color they should be classified as not pure, there is nothing like that. Everyone should be equal. Still, Vonnegut seems to have compassion to all of these deaths, as he writes about the Trafalmadorians and their thoughts about life and death. Which are about how when someone dies they are not truly dead, the just seem to be so. They may be dead in the future and present but, they're always in memories that come from the past, they continue to live in other places and times.