Slaughterhouse-Five | Slaughterhouse-Five

At a glance:

Author: Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
First Published: 1969
Type of Work: Novel
Type of Plot: Science fiction—cautionary
Time of Work: 1922-1976
Setting: Ilium, New York; Dresden, Germany; and the planet Tralfamadore
Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Science fiction
Subjects: 1950’s, 1960’s, 1970’s, New York, North America or North Americans, Northeast, U.S., United States or Americans, Twentieth century, Other worlds, 1940’s, World War II, 1920’s, 1930’s, Time travel, Bombs, Prophecy or prophets, Germany or German people, Time, Aliens, space
Locales: Ilium, NY, Cape Cod, MA, Dresden, Germany

The Plot

Slaughterhouse-Five: Or, The Children’s Crusade, A Duty-Dance with Death is a framed narrative in which Kurt Vonnegut himself appears in the first and last chapters, explaining how and why he wrote the novel. He also pops up occasionally in the action itself, because he was—like his protagonist Billy Pilgrim, as he tells readers in the frame chapters—a prisoner of war in Dresden, Germany, when Allied bombers incinerated the city on February 13, 1945.

The novel proper opens in 1944, when Billy, a chaplain’s assistant and inept foot soldier, is...

Slaughterhouse-Five | Slaughterhouse-Five

At a glance:

The Plot

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