Chapter two of Slaughterhouse-Five offers a variety of stories. It skips and stops along the way, but it covers many different aspects of the novel. No longer a preface, Chapter two is a masterpiece. The narrative style and the originality that this chapter exhibits offers a refreshing change of pace to the traditional “one plot and one climax story.” One would think that given the amount of stories, timeframes, and “so it goes” the narrative would be confusing. Nonetheless, Vonnegut has proven that it is possible to combine different stories on a single thread and combine genres in order to make an interesting storyline. In my reading blog to the “preface” of the book I noticed that time seemed to be circular. I have been proven right, Vonnegut employs a sort of spastic time device where as the reader we identify ourselves with Billy because we have seen his whole life, and we want him to succeed. Character Roland Weary called my attention, he reminded me of the movie The Hurt Locker.
“The rush of battle is often a potent and lethal addiction, for war is a drug.” –Chris Hedges
This quote was used at the beginning of the movie. While reading Chapter 2 I constantly found myself thinking about the meaning of the quote in relation to Slaughterhouse-Five. War and violence has made Weary an aggressive soldier, yet he wishes to be part of The Three Musketeers and he longs to be with the same team until the end of the war. Aside from that, the quote can refer to war and the plot of the book in general. The almost simplistic narrating style is tied in by one phrase: “and so it goes”. It is used as a transition between stories, it adds an ending but leaves the story open for later commenting. I eagerly await chapter 3. What will happen with the German soldiers watching Weary and Pilgrim fight?
Este comentario ha sido eliminado por el autor.
ResponderEliminarGreat blog Mateo, the relation you established with The Hurt Locker was quite interesting. By reading it I also linked the importance of the brotherhood among soldiers in the same movie. The Three Musketeers reminded me of the main characters in the movie that are a three-man Army bomb squad. They remained as a team in war, as the Three Musketeers, they cared and watched out for one another. I had same questioning of the future plot and I am excited for what will happen next.
ResponderEliminarI really like your idea on how Vonnegut changes the way we see time go in other books. And I completely agree, his second chapter doesn’t stay in chronological order telling us moment by moment of Billy’s life, but rather tells us the beginning, middle and end of it; thus proving your statement that we get to know Billy’s whole life. I also really liked your comparison to The Hurt Locker, like Francisco said in his comment; the Three Musketeers do have a resemblance to the main characters in the movie. But there is one thing I don’t completely agree with, your interpretation of the “and so it goes”. Of course, everyone might see it in a different way, but the way I’ve seen that phrase is not exactly to make a transition between stories. If you look at each time he says it, it’s just after he talks about death, every time he talks about someone’s death, and he ends the paragraph or idea with “so it goes”. So to me, it’s more of a way to “get over” that death, as if it was a defense mechanism, to accept the death and move on with life, or in this case the book.
ResponderEliminar