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Billy Pilgrim returns home from the Second World War only to be kidnapped by aliens from the planet Tralfamadore, who teach him that time is an eternal present.
andomck: Both books, besides having science fiction/magical realism elements, discuss bloody episodes of WWII from the point of view of everyday people.
Usuário anônimo: Elliot Rosewater, the main character of God Bless You, Mr Rosewater, appears in Slaughterhouse-Five. Also, they both feature books from fictional author Kilgore Trout.
I went into this book knowing it was a politically driven story (I mean, hello, the forward tells you as much in the first place) but I found that even with that in mind, the story was still quite enjoyable. (I generally loathe all politically driven conversations; everyone’s too focused on swaying someone to their point of view to actually value another individual’s perspective. …but that’s a whole other can of worms we can leave unopened at this time.) Most of the animal characters were developed off of existing political leaders, two or three people (in one character), or groups of people in the Russian Revolution at that time. I really, really enjoyed the irony of the ending and how perfectly it captured the corruption of socialist ideas in the hands of corrupt leadership. I almost wish I could have been alive to witness the effects of this allegory on the world. But then again, it might have been harder to get my hands on a copy then…
And while I can see the depiction of the Russian Revolution and it’s components within this story, I also think that these characters and scenarios can transcend the intended allegory. Meaning it’s contents can be applied to more than just the Russian Revolution and it’s leaders, but to any nation in which leadership is corrupt and all powerful.
Anyway, Orwell’s writing was good – I would have liked it to be a touch more smooth and easy reading like, and it is a short book but you get a lot of detail and development from the story and it’s characters.
I definitely recommend reading it, if not for the historical nature of it then for the unique portrayal of the ideas held within.
The reviews on the back of my copy say that the book is "very funny ... sad and delightful," and that it is "a funny book at which you are not permitted to laugh, a sad book without tears."
I would agree with both. The book is sad throughout, but in a resigned way; the book is funny throughout, but not in a laughing way, not in a comedy-show way, but in the way one laughs at something they feel only emptiness for.
The story of Billy Pilgrim is misery throughout, and yet I can't help but feel like him that everything about him is alright.
So it goes.
I give this four stars, not because it isn't an excellent novel, but because - despite its quality - I didn't "enjoy" it as much as others in my library. ( )
Had to re-read this classic. The world doesn't seem to be improving on its level of intelligent. Our store of knowledge grows with the exuberance of exponents. Yet our ability to glean from that store is no better than when we sat on the steppes eating raw meat while our toes froze. ( )
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
The cattle are lowing, The Baby awakes. But the little Lord Jesus No crying He makes.
Dedicatória
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
For Mary O'Hare and Gerhard Müller
Primeiras palavras
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
All this happened, more or less.
Citações
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made sense from things she found in gift shops.
There was a a soft drink bottle on the windowsill. Its label boasted that it contained no nourishment whatsoever.
I have told my sons that they are not under any circumstances to take part in massacres, and that the news of massacres of enemies is not to fill them with satisfaction or glee.
You know — we've had to imagine the war here, and we have imagined that it was being fought by aging men like ourselves. We had forgotten that wars were fought by babies. When I saw those freshly shaved faces, it was a shock. "'My God, my God — ' I said to myself, 'It's the Children's Crusade.'"
All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is. Take it moment by moment, and you will find that we are all, as I've said before, bugs in amber.
'We don't ever have to talk about it,' said Billy. 'I just want you to know: I was there.'
How nice--to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive.
The nicest veterans in Schenectady, I thought, the kindest and funniest ones, the ones who hated war the most, were the ones who'd really fought.
Billy covered his head with his blanket again. He always covered his head when his mother came to see him in the mental ward - always got much sicker until she went away. It wasn't that she was ugly, or had bad breath or a bad personality. She was a perfectly nice, standard-issue, brown-haired, white woman with a high-school education. She upset Billy simply by being his mother. She made him feel embarrassed and ungrateful and weak because she had gone to so much trouble to give him life, and to keep that life going, and Billy didn't really like life at all.
There are almost no characters in this story, and almost no dramatic confrontations, because most of the people in it are so sick and so much the listless playthings of enormous forces. One of the main effects of war, after all, is that people are discouraged from being characters.
There isn't any particular relationship between all the messages, except that the author has chosen them carefully, so that, when seen all at once, they produce an image of life that is beautiful and surprising and deep. There is no beginning, no middle, no end, no suspense, no moral, no causes, no effects. What we love in our books are the depths of the many marvelous moments seen all at once time.
The master of ceremonies asked people to say what they thought the function of the novel might be in modern society, and one critic said, "To provide touches of color in rooms with all-white walls." Another one said, "To describe blow-jobs artistically."
Trout, incidentally, had written a book about a money tree. It had twenty-dollar bills for leaves. Its flowers were government bonds. Its fruit was diamonds. It attracted human beings who killed each other around the roots and made very good fertilizer. So it goes.
There was a big number over the door of the building. The number was five. Before the Americans could go inside, their only English-speaking guard told them to memorize their simple address, in case they got lost in the big city. Their address was this: 'Schlachthof-funf'. Schlachthof meant Slaughterhouse. Funf was good old five.
The most important thing i learned on Tralfamadore that when a person dies he [sic] only appears to die. He is still very much alive in the past, so it is very silly of [eople to cry at his funeral.
The gun made a ripping sound like the opening of the zipper on the fly of God Almighty
Últimas palavras
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês.Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
Billy Pilgrim returns home from the Second World War only to be kidnapped by aliens from the planet Tralfamadore, who teach him that time is an eternal present.
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Google Books — Carregando...
1001 Group Read-December, 2012: Slaughterhouse Five
12
And while I can see the depiction of the Russian Revolution and it’s components within this story, I also think that these characters and scenarios can transcend the intended allegory. Meaning it’s contents can be applied to more than just the Russian Revolution and it’s leaders, but to any nation in which leadership is corrupt and all powerful.
Anyway, Orwell’s writing was good – I would have liked it to be a touch more smooth and easy reading like, and it is a short book but you get a lot of detail and development from the story and it’s characters.
I definitely recommend reading it, if not for the historical nature of it then for the unique portrayal of the ideas held within.
Full review: https://wanderinglectiophile.wordpress.com/2018/02/14/mini-reviews-slaughterhous... (