Slaughterhouse-Five
and
The Things They Carried
Vonnegut & O’Brien Articles
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Each pair will read the two articles
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Vonnegut: pink
O’Brien: white
Take notes on the important and relevant
information
Share your info w/ your partner
We will discuss the articles as a class
Food for Thought: Quickwrite

Only the dead have seen the end of war.
George Santayana

Does the quote above hold truth? Why or
why not?
Is war necessary? Explain.

Kurt Vonnegut
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
Born November 11,
1922, in Indianapolis,
Indiana
Died April 12, 2007 in
New York, New York
Education

Attended Cornell University; majored in
chemistry and biology

After college, Vonnegut enlisted in the United
States Army, serving in the World War II

Following the war, Vonnegut studied
anthropology at the University of Chicago
World War II
Experiences
as POW in Germany had profound
influence of his writing, including Slaughterhouse
Five.
While
a POW, witnessed firsthand the
firebombing of Dresden, Germany, by Allied forces
in 1945.
Experience
in Dresden = the basis for
Slaughterhouse-Five, which was published in
1969
Vonnegut on what he saw in Dresden

“The firebombing of Dresden,” Vonnegut wrote,
“was a work of art.” It was, he added, “a tower of
smoke and flame to commemorate the rage and
heartbreak of so many who had had their lives
warped or ruined by the indescribable greed and
vanity and cruelty of Germany.”
Critical Reception and Censorship

Slaughterhouse Five, wrote the critic Jerome
Klinkowitz, “so perfectly caught America’s
transformative mood that its story and structure
became best-selling metaphors for the new
age.”

Novel reached No.1 on best-seller lists, making
Vonnegut a cult hero. Some schools and
libraries have banned it because of its sexual
content, rough language and scenes of violence.
Understanding the Confusing Narrative Flow

Slaughterhouse-Five = a nonlinear work;
includes many flash-backs, flash-forwards, and
changes in setting.

At beginning of Chapter Two, non-linear
structure will become clear.

Non-linear structure sometimes described as
holistic rather than mechanistic: conveys
experience as a continuous whole
Understanding the POV



Central character (Billy Pilgrim) knows every
event which has ever happened or will happen
to him
Each scene in Billy Pilgrim's life = a moment
with an impact on the totality of his existence
The worldview of the Tralfamadorians, the aliens
who kidnap Billy during the course of the book,
seems to express how Vonnegut would like the
reader to experience the novel.
Limits to the Structure

Example of a clear transition between scenes in
his life : "And then Billy was a middle-aged
optometrist again...(Vonnegut, 85)", or "And Billy
took a very short trip through time...”

Vonnegut always alerts the reader to the shift in
time and space, as though the flow of the novel
were a tow rope which pulls the reader safely
through a series of scenes.
Diagram for Structure

The structure of Slaughterhouse-Five looks
like this:
Each bullet represents a scene; numbers
represent physical chronology; and the line
represents narrative flow
Motifs: Definition
Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or
literary devices that can help to develop and inform
the text’s major themes.
Look
slide.
for and trace the motifs listed on the next
Motifs in Slaughterhouse Five
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“So it goes”
“If the accident will”
“an old fart with his memories and Pall Malls”
“My name is Jon Jonson”
“And so on”
the smell of mustard gas and roses
The Children's Crusade
a dance with death
“So it goes.”

“Robert Kennedy, whose summer home is eight
miles from the home I live in all year round,”
Vonnegut wrote at the end of Slaughterhouse
Five, “was shot two nights ago. He died last
night. So it goes.”

“Martin Luther King was shot a month ago. He
died, too. So it goes. And every day my
Government gives me a count of corpses
created by military science in Vietnam. So it
goes.”
“So it goes.”

One of many repeated, mantra-like words and
phrases that run through Vonnegut’s books, “so
it goes” became a catchphrase for opponents of
the Vietnam war.

Why might this phrase resonate with an anti-war
audience?
CHAPTER ONE

Key to the novel is the opening section in
which, apparently, the author speaks in his
own voice about a visit he made to talk with
an old war buddy, Barnard V. O'Hare, as he
was completing the manuscript for the novel.

It explains how the novel came to be outfitted
with its subtitle ("Or The Children's Crusade |
A Duty-Dance with Death") and how it came
to be dedicated to O'Hare's wife.
CHAPTER ONE

Chapter One makes explicit the author's
purpose in writing the novel, as well as his
skepticism about whether there is any hope it
might contribute to its intended effect.
The Things They Carried
An introduction to Tim O’Brien and his
fictional account of the Vietnam War
What Do You Need to Know About
the Book Before Reading It?


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It is ALL fiction
Facts are not important
The emotional effect of incidents is what is
important.
Tim O’Brien (author) vs. “Tim
O’Brien” (character, narrator)

Protagonist and narrator is “Tim O’Brien”.
This “Tim O’Brien” in the book is NOT REAL.

Even when “Tim O’Brien” talks directly to the
reader, it is the fictional “Tim”.
Tim O’Brien

The author Tim did actually
go to Vietnam and really
was in the Alpha Company,
but is writing a fictional
account.
Abbreviations found in The Things They
Carried
Abbreviation
Part of
speech
Definition
SOP
N
Standard Operating Procedure
CO
N
Commanding Officer
PFC
N
Private First Class (rank)
RTO
N
Radio Transmissions Officer
LP
N
Language/Listening Patrol
CS
N
Tear gas
MRE
N
Meal ready to eat
VC
N
Viet Cong