Analisi di "Slaughterhouse-Five": temi, stile e struttura del romanzo

"Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance With Death" is a novel by US writer Kurt Vonnegut, which was released in 1969.

Stile e struttura del libro

The book is not a traditional novel: from a stylistic point of view, it presents itself as a traumatic succession of events, or flashbacks that reconstruct history in a chronological manner: it is as if the author had a set of jigsaw pieces the reader has to put them back together.
The book deals with the massacre in Dresden to which the author witnessed, where 1,300 people died. The fundamental theme is a condemnation and absolute aberration of all forms of violence and war, the author uses a canonical, joking and goliardic style.

Memorie e alter ego

The memories of war and massacre are difficult to deal with for the author, who has removed almost everything. For this, in the novel is Billy Pilgrim, the alter ego of the author giving voice to Kurt's memories.
Billy is abducted by extra-terrestrials and acquires the ability to travel over time and revive all the moments of his life. Through this expediency, the author can narrate the facts with some detachment.

"So goes life." This is the phrase that the writer often uses at the end of every illustration of any atrocity or disgrace described in the pages of this book. This phrase represents an acceptance of the atrocities that unfortunately are present in the history and in the life of every man, but they also hide a note of sarcasm, because, as the misfortunes can happen, very often the same men are to procure them to themselves, for futile or even nil reasons.